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Tasmania Journal

Friday, August 3, 2007

We’re finally here! After months of planning we’ve finally arrived in Hobart. We landed yesterday afternoon at 4:10 pm and met Jim in the airport. It’s a tiny airport – reminds me of Burlington’s airport when we first moved there. There was only one Jetstar flight a day from Sidney (8:45am) and we missed it. They stop checking people in a half hour before departure and that’s about when we arrived. Ah well, some very nice people promptly rerouted us on Quantas, and we left at 2:20, about 6 hours later than planned.

 

We had a lovely view of Tasmania as we flew in. The mixture of rural farmland and wooded hills reminded me a lot of Vermont, but there was something more wild and empty about this land. Perhaps I was just influenced by all that I had read about the wild southwestern part of the island.

 

Jim (my host) had stopped by earlier, turned on the electricity and the fridge, and supplied us with some essentials from the grocery store. That was just wonderful! He had gotten us enough things to ensure a light supper and breakfast in our own place. We had scrambled eggs, carrot sticks and toast and honey (Leatherwood!) for supper and toast with homemade blackberry jam for breakfast. He had also picked up coffee and tea, as well as milk and OJ. I tried out the French Press coffee maker at breakfast and we had tea and cookies at teatime this afternoon.

 

Our accomplishments so far:

1. finding the post office
2. picking up all of our boxes! (with all our warm stuff! And more reading material)
3. Finding Eileen’s school (just a few blocks away!)
4. Exploring the downtown
5. Driving on the left side of the street
6. Filling the gas tank (boy that was expensive àA$69!!)
7. Buying food for dinner and breakfast (pasta and fixings for sauce for tonight, “middle” bacon for tomorrow)
8. Running the dishwasher (Rama!)
9. Setting up internet access (Rama!)
10. Mailed a postcard

 

Saturday, August 4, 2007

This all brings me to Salamanca market, where we went today. This was mentioned in all the guidebooks and turned out to be just a fun as they said it would be! It was interesting. I expected something like Haymarket or a European market, but in fact it was much less crowded and busy – more like the Burlington Farmer’s market on a much larger scale. Still lots of people, but the aisles were farther apart than Haymarket, and people didn’t push or shout. In fact it had all the same kinds of stalls as the Burlington market: hot lunch food, pastries, handcrafts, flowers, homemade jams, candies, and local fruits and vegetables – just 5 times as many stalls. The big addition was that there were several stalls that sold espresso drinks. Much of the stuff sold there was local Tasmanian made crafts and food (including locally grown and cured olives – who knew!).  I made one splurge purchase: a cool bracelet! I love bracelets and this one was quirky and one-of-a-kind.  Eileen also bought pink thinsulite gloves (it’s been pretty cold here!), we bought olives, fresh bread, two kinds of Eastern European pastries for tea, spinach, half a winter squash, Kennebec potatoes, basmati rice, red dahl, two organic tangelos, strawberry jam, a bunch of purple irises for the table, two chocolate marshmallow cones for the kids (a sweet – kind of hard to describe), a cappuccino for me, a dagwood dog for Eileen (a large corndog), bratwurst for Anna, an English sausage for me (beware the spicy old English mustard!!!), a vegan pie for Rama, and two lemon sodas for the kids (not in that order!). Whew! We also tasted lots of jams and various sweets. The kids have already decided what their snack will be next time!

 

Still no internet connectivity, but Rama is working hard on it. So many differences – it’s hard to know where the problem is. The phone lines are different, the software – really, the problem could be anywhere.  Ah well, we’ll call on Monday and try to get it worked out. Rama wants to head to an internet café tomorrow. Monday we’ll also try to call the schools and set up a bank account.

 

The Dining room/living room

 

Sunday, August 5, 2007

Probably the biggest difference for us to get used to so far is the way the house is heated. The houses are all heated the way they are in San Francisco (in the older houses, that is). There is no central heat, but there are heaters in some of the rooms where the fireplaces used to be. What this means for us is that there is a warm gas fire in the lounge/dining area, and if you close off the door to the hall, that area warms up. There is also a space heater that can get moved from room to room. Since it snowed the last few nights on Mt. Wellington (just behind us) that gives you an idea of the temperature of the unheated areas! I think we’re finally figuring out what to do to warm things up, and to get used to the switch from summer to winter. We also bought a small space heater since we are heating up 3 front bedrooms, rather than the 2 that the owners are used to. That has made a big difference.

 

The house and car

The house is really lovely, though. It reminds me a lot of some of the old buildings in San Francisco. Ben and Brenda, the owners, are clearly in the process of stripping the old paint to reveal the lovely wood beneath it. They’ve also added beautiful pieces of old furniture that fit the rooms perfectly. Annapurna’s room has a lovely molded ceiling. There are window seats in the two front bedrooms and stained glass along the top. The living room/dining room are at the back of the house, looking out across the backyard with a view of Hobart, the bay and the hills behind it – it’s just lovely!

 

Although it’s winter, the gardens still have flowers and leaves – again, it’s a lot like San Francisco with a lot of familiar plants, trailing rosemary, jasmine, etc. However, there are also tulips and lots of unfamiliar plants as well. It’s also very hilly. My legs are getting in good shape walking down to the shops and back! It’s also like San Francisco in that you get a beautiful view from almost every place you go.

 

The view down Melville St. toward our house

Thursday, August 9, 2007

Boy, there’s a lot to catch up on! Basically, once the work week started we got started on our enormous list of things to do to settle in! First thing Monday morning, I set up an appointment for the afternoon at Eileen’s school, Rama and I opened a bank account (takes ONE month for a foreign check to clear! So won’t be much use to us for a while!), figured out how to get to Eileen’s school and bought more food. Basically, since we haven’t started driving and don’t live close to a large supermarket, we shop at least once a day – sometimes more! Oh yes, and we got connected to the internet! (yayy, Rama!)

 

That afternoon we visited Eileen’s school, Goulburn Primary School, just a few blocks from our house (but two of those blocks are so steep as to need a handrail! Think Lombard St. in San Francisco). We bought her uniform (there were several choices, but she picked the navy blue pants, school sweatshirt and two shirts to start. We’ll add more items when she figures out what else she wants.) The principal, Mrs. Mackel, gave us a tour of the entire school and told us all about it. It sounds lovely! Eileen started school the next morning and has already met some nice girls in her class and another class. They all eat lunch together and play at recess.

After some discussion, they placed Eileen in a 4/5 class. It’s a very small school and the only other options were a 3/4 and a 5/6 class. The girls in the 5/6 class were much older socially and that would not have been a good fit. The 3/4 was clearly too young (since Eileen just completed the 4^th grade at home) and would have been too easy. However, we now see why the principal was trying to put Eileen in the 3/4 class. The 4/5 class has a student teacher and is just starting her solo month. She started on Monday. The regular teacher, Mr. White is great! We all really liked him. But the student teacher, Mrs. Fiveash, is less settled with the class and they are definitely testing her limits! Also, that is one of the largest classes in the school – Eileen makes it 31 children! Most classes are around 24. This also means that the teacher has less time for getting Eileen settled by remembering to pair her with someone or to tell her what is happening next. Mostly, she tells Eileen how she was supposed to do something right after she’s done it a different way… So Eileen is definitely having a rougher transition, but she has found several girls she likes. Fortunately, this is only for a month. And the work is VERY easy for her, so it's just as well that she didn’t go into the 3/4 class.

 

Tuesday (Eileen’s first day of school), I took Annapurna down to Taroona High School to get her enrolled. This entailed taking the bus, which entailed figuring out HOW to take the bus, including which bus (or buses) and where to catch them. All successfully accomplished and we ended up after a gorgeous busride 6 miles down the coast (south) in the little town of Taroona where the high school is located, right on the beach! After much discussion (and a look at her report card!) they placed her in the 8^th grade. Each class has a coordinator, and hers is Mick Arnold, who helped us to get her all settled and met her the next morning to get her schedule set. We also bought Annapurna her uniform – a cute skirt and sweater. She’s not too keen on it, but like Eileen, looks very cute, and they certainly help the girls to fit in and feel part of the pack!

 

At Eileen’s school we had met the head of the PTO, Caroline something, who has a 7^th grade daughter at Taroona. So she told us where and when the bus passed through our neighborhood in the morning and said she’d tell her daughter, Bec, to keep an eye out for Annapurna. So she did, and Annapurna was at the right bus stop and caught the bus on time. I think it’s much more fun for her to be waiting with a lot of other kids for the bus than at home, where she waits by herself. Sounds like everyone from our neighborhood takes the bus there. It’s a city bus that does a special school bus route in the morning, just like in Burlington.

 

Annapurna had a WONDERFUL first day! She met lots of great girls, said even the boys were nice and that there were no behavior problems either on the bus or at the school! Certainly, I don’t think the school has as socioeconomically mixed a population as Burlington. She had LOTS of fun and said the school work was very easy. Sounds like they don’t do much homework either in Primary school or High School.

 

Part of Taroona High School

 

The beach at Taroona High

And yesterday was also the first day that we made it to the university! It’s a 35-minute walk, but the easiest we’ve done, as it basically involved no hills! We walk Eileen to school down the really steep hill, then continue on to the university. Found Plant Sciences and met Jim pretty easily, got a key to our office and to the building, had tea/coffee at 11am with the department (a very civilized custom!), then lunch at the University club with a few people from his group, then hurried back to meet Eileen at school and Annapurna at home. All worked well, and everyone we met at the university was interesting and helpful.

 

We met the woman, Julianne, whose office we are borrowing and had a very enjoyable conversation about wolves, Tasmanian herbivores and children. She is going on maternity leave as of this week, but the baby is not due for 2 weeks. Today there was a department lunch for the 3 women in the department who are all expecting a baby in the next month or two: Julianne, Claire and Eloise. Lunch was at Jam Packed, in an old jam factory down by the wharf - delicious food in an interesting, converted old stone building.

 

5:30pm Annapurna had another great day and Eileen had a good day too! Mr. White took the class today since the student teacher wasn’t feeling well… Now to try to post my blog and make dinner! Got soaked on the way home, so Rama has gone off to the store. LOTS of wind and rain last night. Everyone keeps apologizing for the weather – quite funny, really, since there’s nothing they can do about it!