HAPPY NEW YEAR!! I hope you all enjoyed the holiday season whatever you were up to. We had a lovely Christmas. Maya flew over from New Zealand for a week which was great. She particularly wanted to spend some time with her Grandma, the smile on Shirley’s face when she heard Maya’s voice was radiant. Heather and Anthony came over from Melbourne so the Carmody Clan was gathered for feasting and festivities – all great fun. We spent most of the rest of Maya’s stay in between the shopping mall and the beach but she also managed to catch up with some old friends and cousins. We popped her back on a flight to Nelson (via Melbourne and Wellington – ouch) and she made it home in time for New Year’s Eve!
So now we are on the move again. I am starting a new job with Lundin Petroleum in Jakarta on 18th January so once things started moving again after New Year we had our work cut out getting ready to leave. Despite having kept the furnishings in the house to a minimum, we were amazed how much stuff we’d managed to accumulate –verge crawling can be quite lucrative as well as and bits and bobs donated by philanthropic family and friends!! It all needed to be returned to storage in Fremantle so we begged, borrowed and hired a couple of utes. It felt kind of sad emptying the house so soon after moving in!
We decided that we’d only take the bare essentials to Jak. which to us meant kitchen gear, clothes, linen (or Manchester as they bizarrely call it in Australia!) and lots of toys – water skis, surf boards, bikes, golf clubs etc. I guess one man’s necessities are another man’s excessories! Anyway the movers came on 11 January and packed it all up and it’s now sitting in a warehouse somewhere outside Perth, waiting for our visae before it can be put on to a ship from Fremantle.
We arrived in Jak last Tuesday. It’s the rainy season so the weather has been mostly cloudy with mounting cumulus, drizzle and heavy rainstorms. It’s about 32oC but actually the humidity doesn’t feel that bad. We are staying in a hotel at the moment and have spent most of the last few days looking for an apartment. This involves an agent picking us up then sitting in traffic for about an hour to travel 3-4km to a shiny new, sky-scraping apartment block. Once there we view a couple of units and the facilities (pool, fitness centre etc.) then on to the next one. It’s actually quite fun! Our plan is to move into a place for a couple of months while we get to know the city. Because the traffic flow is so bad, choosing the right area with accessibility to the office, shops, golf clubs, the airport or whatever is important to you can make or break your enjoyment of living here. So we want to take our time while we are waiting for our packing to arrive to find the right place. We have found a short lease serviced apartment which we’ll be moving into on Monday.
Unfortunately our days on Distant Drummer are becoming a distant memory (sob sob!). We have decided to keep her berthed in Nelson Marina while we are in Jakarta. This means we have to bite the bullet and import her into New Zealand, ouch $$$. Neil will be going back in a month or so to check her over, take her out for a spin and shake the spiders out of the sails. We’ll get back there when we can for a sail!
So that’s our news. Tata for now!
Suzy and Neil