Down Under with Jan Mikaela Nora and Ella

Something had to happen. Everything was just going way too well....   In just one week and four visits to IKEA we managed to turn our empty house into a nice place. Although our container with the rest of our stuff is not expected until half October, we already feel at home here. We now have a couch, a table, some chairs, some lamps, kitchen gear and a sofa-bed to sleep on. It looks like a showroom of IKEA, but we're proud of it ! The first days at work for Jan were also good. The Eclipse office in Adelaide has opened just over a year ago, and currently hosts six local employees. But there are constantly people flying in from other parts of the country. With about 230 colleagues across the continent, the company is a lot bigger than his previous employer, and that will take some getting used to. Jan will take over the project management for the South Australian customers. Mostly Microsoft Navision implementations in the food processing industry. Next week he will...

Thanks for the congratulations on our new home. It’s nice to hear that many of you are following this weblog. Today we moved in at last, and it feels great. It’s a classic house, built in the 1920’s, with high ceilings and stone walls, so it should stay nice and cool in the summer. The atmosphere reminds us a little of our previous house. And the best thing: after almost three months we can finally unpack our backpacks, and try to live a ‘normal’ life again. Although ‘normal’? We are sitting in our living room now, in front of a borrowed TV, sharing a single beanbag, which is the only piece of furniture in the house. Life is so simple this way. What more do you need?!? A job?!? Ok, ok, since many of you have been asking about it (wonder why? was it that distressing to read that we were still taking it easy, doing nothing?), we have some comforting news for you: from next week you are not the only one who is working. Today Jan signed a contract to join the Adelaide team of Eclipse Comp...

Our integration goes step by step, but we are getting somewhere: we got ourselves a house and a car! As from next week we’ll be living in North Adelaide. After quite an intense search around many area’s we found an atmospheric two-bedroom townhouse, on a great location. Just outside the popular Melbourne St (restaurants and bars) and only a 20 min walk through the park to downtown Adelaide. It’s the hip place to be around here. The previous tenant is a girl around our age, with whom we get along with really well. She and her boyfriend have offered us to use their spare furniture and equipment, to bridge the time until our container arrives. Thanks Lani and Jay, for this heartwarming Australian hospitality! Another integration challenge was the purchase of a car. Drive out in any direction, and you’ll find tons of used-car dealers everywhere. However, most of them have this typical 6 cylinder 3.8L motor that most Aussies seem to love. Why all this horsepower? Do they still think that pe...

Every morning we overlook the city from our small motel room in the town centre. As the sun rises and Adelaide wakes up, we are thinking: “Soon we’re going to be part of all this, as if it’s the most common thing in the world”. But now we still feel a little like outsiders, realizing how much it took to get here, and how special it really is. For all of them out there this is home, and for us it will be. But just not yet. There is so much to organize and to get used to, now that we landed here. We really didn’t know where to start: housing, transport, banking, shopping, food, work, insurance … In fact we had no plan at all. The only thing we had was this motel room: our own little universe of 4 x 4 meter. And the knowledge that it will be like this until somewhere in October, when our container will arrive with all our belongings. And you know what, that fine with us! So what did we do this week? We basically went around like a headless chicken, looking for apartments, uses cars, job ...