For all people planning to emigrate (however far into the process you are) I would just like to offer a little bit of advice. This is entirely based on my own experiences and may be a result of a couple of emotional years that i have recently had. As i say this is not a whinge about Australia (as it is a great place here and everything I imagined) everyone will have different reasons for emigrating (family-friends here, job to go to, skills that are easy to get jobs with) it is just some things that i wish i had thought about in the past two years (while waiting for my visa). I first came to Australia 12 years ago and first thought about emigrating after that, it was only about two years ago following another holiday with my wife that we started the emigration process and we have recently made the move (we now have 2 young children).
Once i started the process for about 2 years i was totally focused on geting the visa, after my medicals had been requested i was checking my e-mails every morning and on this group all the time. Once the visa arrived that was it didnt consider any other options just Plan A get to Australia ASAP so we did all the following: - house on the market (much reduced offer accepted) - shipping company booked - flights booked - old stuff sold or thrown away - resignation handed in
What i really wished i had done is not been so hasty in thinking that was the only option. We now wished we had considered other options before making such a mbuttive move. We wish we had: - maybe taken a long holiday to validate the visa and get a real feel for Australia (that would have given us the full 5 year option before making the big move). - I could have taken unpaid leave from work for a year as opposed to resigning (which would have given me a job to go back to if things didnt work out). - Renting out the house furnished may have been a better option that selling it at a lower price and paying shipping costs.
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As I say we really like it out here so this is not a moan and it is a great place for the kids who have settled in really well. However what i did was only look at Plan A (e.g. get out here as fast as we could as we had waited so long already and we will never want to go back to England) rather than consider all the other options that we had open to ourselves at the time.
People will have different reasons for making the move (ours was to start a new life) and may not have the same options open to them or possibly have other ones. We entirely hope things will work out for ourselves, however we only wish we hadnt been so hasty in some of the decisions we had made (which may come back to bite us).
To me waiting for that visa seemed like such a slow process. One thing I learnt, the visa will come when it comes, whlle you are waiting try and consider all the options open to yourself and also try and see and do as much in the UK as you can. What i should have done in the UK (it really is a decent place) while waiting for the visa : - Visit Scotland (climb ben nevis) - One last walk in the lake district - Take my children to cornwall - Spend loads of time with family
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Anyway we are planning to make up for it by doing lots of new things in Australia.
As I say this is not a moan or whinge it is all probably down to my character, how stressful, emigrating can be, and how I adapt to change (i ahve pretty much lived in the same place all my life). But as i gained a lot of advice from this group if someone else benefits a little bit from this from my views and experiences that would be great.
