First entry - Summary

This blog will describe the adventures I'm encountering while I'm going back home (to Germany) after two and a half years in Australia. I still have 25 days until my flight leaves and I'm planing to see everyone I met here to say good-bye. And I also try to organize as much as I can do from here to make the return home as smooth as possible. So it's a challenge to find the perfect balance between organization and leisure time.

This far I have already managed to find out how to get back into my health insurance, which was one of my biggest worries but it turned out that this will be easy as. That was a huge relief. Just imagining I would be in Germany without health cover caused nightmares. The doctors are a little more expensive there than here in Australia but to be fair at least they are good. Some of the docs I met here...well let's just say "I can't believe you're a doctor".

I'm also listed as "job-searching" with the German department of labor but I will need to go there in person once I'm back home even though I won't get any money from them anyway. Good old German bureaucracy, I told them I was in Australia the last 2.5 years and they sent me a form asking if I have worked at least 360 days in Germany during the last 2 years. As a question, fair enough but somehow pointless. Anyway, as I havn't worked for at least 360 days in the last 2 years in Germany, I won't be eligible for "workless money". I might apply for welfare though, not sure yet, wait and see how things develop once I'm home...

The next big worry was my beloved little princess. What to do with my cat? Take her home with me? I thought long and hard about that. In the end I decided it would be selfish to put her through all that stress, 24h on the plane, then I would need to find a place for her until I have a new flat as my parents hate cats and also I'm planing to go back to Australia so the same thing would happen in reverse. In the end I decided to find a good home for her here. I love that little purr-monster and I only want what's best for her. Besides she's an Australian girl and doesn't speak German. So if she would start with "G'day, mate" all the other cats would pick on her...

But again a stroke of luck: Chey, the girlfriend of my flatmate was looking for a cat. Not a kitten but a cat. And Lo! and behold: Spunkie usually doesn't like female humans (she's jelaous I guess) but she and Chey just hit if off. Spunkie even climed on her lap, cuddled up and went to sleep. So this was love at first sight for both of them. So Spunkie will go to Chey and as she's still young (just turned 3) she will forget me sooner or later. But still I will miss her. Spunkie was my first cat and you never forget your first love. It's strange, when I think about it I get sad but I'm also glad that she will have a good home...

That's a good example for my general emotional state nowadays. On the one hand many things trigger this thought "this is the last time you do this-or-that", for instance I had my last Australian haircut on Monday, and then I get in a quite buesy mood. But on the other hand I am really looking forward to see my friends and family and live in Europe for some time. It's strange that I can't really 100% enjoy those thoughts because they go hand in hand with things I will loose -at least temporarily.

I know that I will miss the friends I made here but I am wondering if I will miss other typical Australian things. Ok, I know I won't miss Cricket on TV but I guess that I will think "why arn't there some guys dressed in white standing around and drinking beer?" when I will see a park in Germany on a weekend. To be fair, there will be guys standing around and drinking beer but they won't use Cricket as an excuse to do so. I won't miss Australian soccer, sorry guys but when I feel like I wanna see something in that quality class, I'll go to see Preussen Muenster playing in the 3rd German soccer legue. I'm not sure if I'm going to miss AFL but I'll miss the rugby. I will miss the beach and all the surfboards I'm going to see will have a sail stuck in them...

Ok, this is enough for today, now I'm going to get myself a suitcase and do my laundry. Next posting tomorrow...G'day to everyone!