Pawel came here in April and then got back to Poland in July for our wedding, and now we are here together as a married couple. Seven of us have been employed by the same Irish company having one of its working branches right here. The company creates software for insurance companies and it is going to start its activity in Poland with the business office in Gdansk. For this reason there were needed especially Polish engineers, who would get into work in the company and then come back to their country and help to manage things in the new office. Among women only Sylwia works for the company (in the administrative sector), so she and her husband are the only couple employed at one workplace. The remaining part of the group are the workers' families.

We all decided to come here for similar reasons. What we have in common is mostly the desire to discover the world and, at the same time, to come back to Poland after a year of experiences on the southern hemisphere. In spite of all what is being said about the disorder on our political scene, growing living costs with only slightly growing incomes, the flow of people going abroad is luckily beginning to slowly withdraw and at the moment it is definitely not the politics that determines new migration wave, they are rather economic purposes. And even in this matter, according to Dawid, situation in Poland is improving.

Undoubtedly, opinion on going abroad is gradually changing – it stops being such a “promised land”. Obviously, Western Europe, USA or Australia itself offer better conditions in some professions – but at the same time strong Polish currency diminishes the difference, and there are usually also higher living costs with homesickness, which is impossible to compensate.

Our curiosity about the world reveals itself mostly in intensive exploring of Melbourne and some distant areas. The first trips have just come back from the Northern Territory and The Great Barrier Reef. Some of us also visited (or plan to visit) New Zealand. We try to make use of every free moment to see something new. Michal was the only one to buy a car here and he drives thousands of kilometres on his own. The others rent cars and of course travel by trains. Additionally, Tomek and Mateusz have constant opportunity to pride themselves on their photographic skills.

During these six months of stay there appeared various observations on living in Australia. First of all, as Mateusz remarked, living conditions in Australia are not so seemingly different from those in today's Poland, some aspects prevail here, others there. In which fields does Australia, in our opinion, fail? Cost of living here is much higher, flats in the city are very expensive and renting requires many documents.

Multicultural cuisine in Australia surely does not match up to the Polish one in prices and healthiness. Good food is of course possible to buy, but it is more difficult and expensive than in Poland. Construction and thermal insulation of flats leaves much to be desired, same as technological level of mobile telephony and internet banking. And what can Poland envy Australia? Definitely being more open to people of different nations, friendly service in offices, hospitals, among taxi drivers, ticket collectors... Myself got a bit scared once when at a tram stop a ticket inspector came to me... I thought at once (“in a Polish way”) that maybe I crossed the street in the wrong place, but it appeared that the man only wanted to advise me on which tram I should take...

In the city young mums appreciate friendly attitude towards children and the huge amount of parks with playgrounds. Also “cultural sport supporting” made a very nice impression on us. We live close to the stadium and we very often see the crowds of people of different nations from the youngest to the oldest, who march together agreeably although everyone wears a scarf of different colours. In Poland it is a view rare to see.

As an English philologist, I could express a little regret that it is so hard in Melbourne to find “a typical Australian”, just like English language spoken in the streets is far from any standards. I think it is the cost of the previously mentioned “multiculturalism”. There is similar situation in USA and England, but Australian English is additionally “more foreign” for us because Polish schools teach mostly British English and media are overwhelmed with American English. Requirements for teachers here are completely different from those in Poland, and Polish M.A. degree does not have practically any value itself.

“The pass” to teaching here is (almost unknown in Poland, with only one training centre in Cracow) finishing the course for the so called IV Certificate TESOL (Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages), which is taught in a very interesting way and opens doors to working in teacher's profession all over the world, but it also demands additional exam from a non-native speaker with a lot of money and time for right preparation.

Weather definitely surprised us, especially the three of us coming in July. In Poland it is widely believed that in Australia there is always hot, burning sun. Our kith and kin are still astonished seeing our photos on the Internet where we wear jackets and caps... Myself, in spite of having read a lot in touring guides about temperature here in winter, did not expect this cold to be so bitter. I have not looked forward to spring so impatiently for long. We also experience in real constant weather changes, which do not appear on such scale in Poland (though lately our climate has been gradually changing too and it is sometimes hard to distinct spring and winter...).

Also, none of us expected most of flats to be unfurnished because in Poland it is very rare. That is why the 4m3 that the company gave each couple for the transportation of additional things was not so optimally used. Some of us found fully-furnished flats but others had to buy practically everything and will have to take all this to Poland. Additionally, Michal (to his misfortune in this case, the only bachelor among us) came across an interesting “practice”... His landlord sent him the information about the “inspection” planned for the exact date, giving the list of things Michal ought to pay attention to (with such details as “cleaning the sink of soap traces”...). So he set to work, with a great success, as afterwards he received a letter with thanks.

Flats in the city centre are expensive, but also living standard is in many aspects higher than in a typical Polish tower block, which is usually dirty, neglected and inhabited by unpleasant neighbours. Our tower block here has 26 floors, on the last one, together with flats, there is a gym and a swimming pool, and the first five floors are garages for the residents. Our landlord, who happens to live next door, really works hard seven days a week to keep the lifts and corridors spick and span.

The conditions offered here by the employer are undoubtedly very beneficial both for employees and whole families (paid flights, accommodation, decent earnings). These of us who work for the company emphasize friendly atmosphere and the possibility to gain interesting contacts within the multicultural companionship. We most often meet here in our Polish circle of friends but there are parties and after-work meetings organized too. Especially nice was the hearty welcome we received from our Polish group and many Pawel's foreign co-workers on getting to Australia just after our wedding: as a bridal gift we got an entry for a balloon flight over Melbourne, which we are going to make use of soon.

Yet, as far as the company's activeness is concerned, it may be a bit surprising that most of us admit that in Poland they often worked on more ambitious projects, with more advanced technology as well as had more powers and possibilities of independent action at the same post. Maybe just because of their comprehensive abilities Polish specialists are valued all over the world.

All of us have higher education, practically everyone in our group can communicate in English freely and we came to Australia with secured living for the next year – so it would be hard to say that we experience emigration to a large extent – at least not in the old meaning of this word. As someone rightly stated in one of the previous Polish Weekly's issues – our generation, if they leave abroad, usually have the comfort of doing this not under any compulsion but because they consciously choose their place to live. In our case Australia is only a temporary living place and a chance of learning about another culture and another world.

For me personally it is also, unfortunately late, journey towards my uncle Zbyszko Hanelt's place of living, who spent the last 25 years of his life in Papua-New Guinea working hard as a missionary, and died the day before his comeback to Poland for retirement. It has already been 10 years from his death, and just after my arrival in Australia I got the information about father Kazimierz Muszynski's death, who was uncle Zbyszko's close friend and left with him to work in Papua-New Guinea.

PS. You can email me: aniakaszkowiak@gmail.com

We also currently publish our observations and relations from trips on our blogs – visit us!

kierunek-australia.pl/

mrozewski.pl/

hello-mowi-olek.blogspot.com/