Returning to the UK is NOT an option, Ok we've still got a house there, but that's it, just a house, not a home....home for me is where i am, where my husband and children are..it's sad that we've left 3 of them behind, but they'd already left home...so technically we didn't leave them anywhere.
So when asked to come up to South Africa....we didn't draw up a pro's and con's list....silly?...no not really as Peter had been asking work for a move abroad for a long time, egged on mainly by me, but what a fantastic opportunity it would be...new language, experiences, cultures, fantastic on the kids CV...but South Africa....OMG...we thought Europe, Denmark even...we never dreamed we would come here, it's not even a place we'd thought of for holidays (been to Tunisia and Egypt)......
So now we're here what are the pro's and con's?
Pro's
Experience, weather, culture, fantastic people, safari's, lions, giraffes, (who stole the elephants?)
Private schools (not at our expense for a change), the house..WOW..it's huge we could never afford this in the UK, a pool, a steam room, seperate living area for the eldest and for visitors (when are you coming over), the food, the supermarkets, the malls, car insurance (it's so much cheaper), the medical facilities (however it would drop into con's if we didn't have med aid, the roads (round here anyway are fantastic)
Con's
We've acclimatised...25c is too cool to go for a swim (mind you pool is bath size so can't swim in it anyway...lol), shops shut early on weekends and no 24hr service, shoot outs in the streets (but we've not been involved and they're areas we wouldn't go to anyway, but its scary as a Brit to hear and read about it) robbery inside the estate (hey our neighbours were robbed prior to us coming out here), trying to get anything done (that's just the way things are here, you have to queue for everything, they even pay people to queue for them here) racism (one bad experience, unfortunatly the bloke was a twat and used me being English as an excuse to be an even bigger twat), pot holes (big buggers, they'd close the roads in the UK for ones that size)
So apart from all that, we can't complain....but we do..the reason we complain is 'we just don't know how to do things'....how do I know what I need to know unless someone tells me, I'm not thick, I've been doing all of this in the UK, yes there has still been problems, but I know what to do there, how the system works, friends, family, colleagues for guidance and support, to moan at, to phone up on my behalf...we struggle here because we do it alone....
