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Blogs by Vena McGrath
Friday 26 September 2008 - 8.30 pm EST 9/26/2008 2:24:54 AM
Yeahhhhh tis POETS day - best day of the working week! The weather is starting to warm up with today reaching around 28c. The nights are cool enough to enjoy a decent sleep although you can notice the higher temperatures - around 8c most nights. September is a great month but not usually this warm during the days. Next week, after a hot weekend, sees the temperatures during the day dropping into the low 20s which suits me fine. I'm not a hot weather lover and yet in Sydney we experience many more hot days than cool ones especially when the humidity kicks in.
It was interesting to see on foxtel tonight some stats on Australia and how the citizens of this huge dry place we live in are starting to move around the country. Whereas Sydney has, in the main, been the number one city in the country for quite some time, the shift is on. I can understand why especially with high interest rates, the high cost of living, more expensive petrol due to the taxes we pay on top of the price per litre, and the feeling that we are being squeezed into smaller and smaller building blocks in suburbs that are sprawling into each other almost out to the Blue Mountains, some 60ks from the city of Sydney.
Sydney is also losing out on the visitor dollars which are going to the other states, and according to stats a few months ago, most of what we were losing was heading south to Melbourne. It appears now that both Melbourne and Sydney are losing out as the shift moves north to Queensland and west to Perth. Western Australia is the fastest growing state and it's sure got a lot of spare space to fill up, with a large majority of it not being where anyone would choose to live from what I've read about. But the big money is over there to earn with the huge growth in the mining and other industries and that's what people are looking for. Better salaries and shorter working lives are surely the dreams of most of us.
Tasmania has the largest growth in the baby business and that must tell its own story of a state that is more layback and stress free and a cheaper place to live. If you like the cooler weather, lots of rain and smaller populated cities and towns, then Tasmania would be the place to go. My son recently spent a week in Tasmania with a friend after travelling across the Tasman on the car carrying ship. The trip took some 11 hours and the sea was running between a 3m and 5m swell. The guys were feeling rather green when it docked at Devonport. They had a twin share room and tried to get some sleep but didn't really due to being scared ****less and being sick.
They drove from Devonport to Hobart, stopping off to see the sights and from all reports Tasmania is very green, as I saw in the photos they took. They also visited the Cadbury factory and brought back a pile of chocolates that were very reasonably priced. My son messaged me when they boarded the ship again for the trip back to Melbourne and said that the swell was 5m. He was feeling ill before they even left the dock. I had a couple more messages before midnight when he told me that it was very scary, that they were being thrown against the walls and furniture, and he was afraid the ship would tip over. I had little sleep that night worrying about them and when a message arrived next morning that they had arrived safely I was greatly relieved. He would never encourage anyone to take the boat over but would say to fly and hire a car in Tasmania. It cost them $760 for two people with a twin share cabin and a car return trip.
Queensland on the other hand has always been where most people in Australia would say they would like to live. I was one of them until my brother moved to the Redcliffe area and I realised, on my many visits over the years, that it is a very hot place in summer. The further north you go the hotter it gets so I finally decided that I would never live in Queensland. I did want to move to Western Australia - it was a fantasy I had. My younger son went to live there and work in an open cut gold mine for a year and then he hightailed it back east. I decided then that WA wasn't for me either.
Although I would love to live by the sea, not having a partner in life makes it very easy for me to stay put where I am. What's the point in moving away from my family if I'm going to be alone? None at all that I can see, even though I would love to see the sea every morning and smell it and listen to it at night. Life takes us on some strange roads if we choose to get off the straight and narrow as I did. But I am a believer in things happening for a reason and for there being a reason for most things happening, so acceptance is the only way to be as happy as possible.
Today was the end of another chapter in my life. I have worked at the same office for 13.5 years but we are relocating as of next Monday to new premises that will mean longer travelling time to and from work. I love where I work, or did work until this afternoon. We had acreage, a one level office building, and lots of free parking onsite. Sure we weren't near banks and post offices and most other services, but there is a shopping centre (small) with a supermarket, chemist, newsagent and a few other shops. Also doctors and a dentist. All you need really when you only get 1/2 hour lunch break.
This last week has seen us all packing our belongings and our files etc into crates that day by day have been removed to the new premises. Today we were scratching around trying to find things like staplers, pens etc to do last minute things and in the end we just all gave up trying and turned our computers off. We were only permitted access until midday when a team of people moved in to disconnect all our computers, pack them up, and move them over the weekend and set them up for Monday morning. I have this horrible feeling, after having seen how many crates have gone out the door, that we will be lucky to have any room to move in the new building when we arrive.
We have been given all this high tech office equipment and new age seating arrangements whereby we sit in rows at a continuous long 'desk' that has no dividers. Therefore we sit side by side just far enough away from each other so we don't fall over the other person all day. There's nowhere for us to store all the files etc that we use daily and I really think this culture shock is going to drive us all insane. Whilst we have always worked in an open office environment, we did all have corners on our workstations and therefore had enough desk space to work on and shelving etc for our files. Our workstations were also separate entities from each other so you felt you had your own little corner even though there were no walls. That's all gone now and it will be like sitting on a production line. So much for progress!
I went to see the new premises last week. No one has worked in this building before as it's only recently been built. All of the furniture and equipment is brand new so the place reeks of the smell from synthetics and carpet... something I believe to be quite dangerous to health and the wellbeing of workers. You would think that as we work for the NSW Government they would be mindful of the way the world is moving back to natural wood and flooring because of the health risks and green house gases. But no....
I guess if you are impressed by your surroundings then you would feel pretty excited about the new place. However I'm more interested in being comfortable, having no worries about parking, having less travel time, and plenty of room so everyone can work the best way they can with their workload. However, I'm classed as a grumpy old woman because I haven't applauded the powers that be that have decided how we will work in the future. I'm proud that I stand up and say it as I see it not how I know others want me to see it.
So Monday brings a new era to my life, well my working life. Once again I am thankful that my working days are coming to an end because I don't see myself being happy where we are moving to. I've done the working in a high rise in swanky conditions years ago. I'm not even sure how to get to this place yet and haven't a clue which is the best route for me to get there or how long it will take. I intend to borrow my son's satnav on the weekend and let it find a route for me and see if I like it or not or if it proves to be the best. I have heard that where we are going, NorWest, is a frightmare of a morning and evening to get in and out of and that you can be within 1/2 km of the place and it could take you 40 minutes to an hour to travel that last 1/2 km. That's a disgrace and a blight on our road system into a huge industrial area that is growing in leaps and bounds. It's also flanked by some huge homes, all built on top of each other, so they are trying to get out through the same circumstances we are trying to get in. Happy days.
One doesn't have to think too hard to work out why people are opting out of Sydney for better lives. Whilst just as many or even more are moving in, people who have lived here most of their lives are taking the plunge and leaving it to the masses that are like a huge invading army. The fact that the price of homes has dropped will stop many from moving in the short term, but if prices go up again I bet there will be hundreds upon hundreds moving out. I hope that I may be one of them! Rental properties are becoming so expensive that people can't afford to rent unless they share with other workers. This is the way the city is moving - densely populated areas with people sharing accommodation so that they have somewhere to live. Sad days.
Gloom and doom. I bet many of you reading this can't believe that anyone living in Australia with such a small population would be complaining about strangulation. But what they probably don't realise is that most of the population of Australia live around the coast while the centre is mostly empty of humans, with the exception of some farming and mining. And we only have a handful of large cities for people to live in and work and therefore these cities are becoming strangled by people, cars, trains, buses, trucks, industry and houses.
