Hi everyone!! First I’d like to apologize for taking so long to touch base – the last 3 weeks have been hectic, and we’ve finally had a weekend where we could catch our breath a bit. We’ve managed to have a lot of fun amongst the moving, working and furnishing our apartment.
After arriving on a Monday, we began work on Tuesday. Coincidentally, that day was the annual strategy meeting for the coming year. It was a good introduction to some of the differences b/w here and our US practice – mainly this office is much larger (1500 total – with 100+ in our group), and that everyone always wears a suit. It was surreal to march across the street from the office with 1500 people all in dark suits, long lines of us going up the escalators and filing into the ballroom… Anyway, maybe it seemed weirder b/c of our jet-lag…
I think I’ve just adjusted to the time change this week, I still wake up in the middle of the night sometimes. The first 2 weeks were the worst, we couldn’t stay awake past 7pm and we’d wake up at 4am. This wasn’t helped by all the world-cup watching Socceroos fans who would celebrate through the streets of Melbourne after a victory (b/c of the time difference the world-cup games are shown here b/w 1 and 4 am).
We’ve moved in to our apartment, it’s close to the city and there are at least 20 restaurants w/in walking distance. Our building is also adjacent to the Telstra Dome, where they play Aussie Rules Football. We haven’t been to a game yet, but plan to go soon. We currently are w/out furniture – so, we’ve been camping out on the floor (we ordered furniture today - yay).
The social scene here is great, which is good since we didn’t know anyone. Last Friday was the end-of-financial-year dinner for our group at work. They rented out a restaurant and had a sit-down meal. There were also “awards” given for goofy things people had done throughout the year. Afterwards we went to a club. The nightclubs here are strange – the good ones don’t advertise and hide themselves in alley-ways. The place was fun – standard club: dj, bar, giant red velvet sculpture in the middle of the dance floor :)
Last weekend a couple of “the girls” from the office took us along on a trip to Healsville Animal Sanctuary (about an hour outside the city). It was really great to get up close to all the strange critters that live here – we also had the highlight of our trip so far … we got to pet a koala!
Coming up in August is the KPMG Ball, which is apparently a really huge event w/ live entertainment. I have to get a formal dress for it :) Some of the girls in the office have offered to help me shop :) :) Speaking of …
The shopping here is really great, but unfortunately everything is 20 – 30% more than at home. I’ll definitely be visiting the states with an empty suitcase to fill. Also, there is almost no on-line shopping, not IKEA, not Target, no clothes! The one thing I can order-up though is groceries, which is pretty neat – and once we get our fridge we’ll try it out.
So, everything is going well here - we like it a lot, unfortunately it's a bit far from friends and family. We'll definitely be thinking of everyone this Tuesday the 4th (which is not a holiday here). I'd like everyone to have a hot dog and light a sparkler for me! Love and miss - Noel
No comments:
Post a Comment