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Saturday, June 16, 2007

If are happy and you know it clap your hands!


And for my one thousandth post, some happy news.


According to Leon Gettner I live in the
happiest of happy capitalist countries, Australia.



The report says happy societies have 10 signs:

1. High degree of trust in fellow citizens.

2. Low amount of corruption.

3. Low unemployment.

4. High level of education.

5. High income.

6.High employment rate of older people.

7. Small shadow economy.

8. Extensive economic freedom.

9. Low employment protection.

10. High birth rate.

Australia scores highly in most of these categories.

I certainly think that it is a nice place to live and I trumpet it on my blog header every day.

We ended up in Australia, not by design, but by the impact of some loonies flying 747s into the World Trade Centre. I have a vivid memory of being woken up by our next door neighbour in Sacramento. She knew that we did not have a television and wanted to share the dramatic news. I had recently moved back to America, with the company I had worked for for over ten years.

Most recently I had spent time in Singapore, where I had a nice life jetting around Asia advising on environmental and land contamination issues. I extricated myself from a previous unhappy marriage, got a divorce, met my current wife and we had two kids after living in Singapore for over five years. Singapore was very stable and a very easy and comfortable lifestyle.

I had a Green Card, which meant I had no issues with immigration into the US. My family were with me, although their long term visas had not been processed yet. We bought a house, a car, a fridge..., everything you need to get going in a new country. I just assumed that everything would work out.

Well that dramatic event put paid to our plans and to cut a long story short, visa processing for immigrants and temporary residents went into the slowest of the slow lane as all immigration resources were poured into rooting out potential subversives.

During our trip to Canada to renew my families temporary visas, my family were denied reentry and forced to decant with their bags to Australia through Singapore immediately. So I was in America with a job and all of our stuff and they were in Australia, with nowhere to live. My son was only one at the time and my daughter was three, so my wife had a lot on her plate.

After finally extricating myself from this odd situation, giving up my job, house stuff etc, I ended up in Adelaide. Elizabeth got a job with the Government, which gave us some stability and I started the process of applying for residence. Adelaide was nice. It was possible to do a lot of stuff without a lot of money. It took me a while to get over it all, but over time I rebounded.

That is all resolved now and I am an Aussie Permenant Resident. After four years staying home with the kids until they went to school, I am now gainfully employed part time in the same field I was working in before. I arrange my schedule so that I can take the kids to school, pick them up in the afternoon and do my domestic tasks. I have a nice work environment with nice colleagues. I volunteer at the school and am on the Governing Council. I do all the shopping and most of the domestic chores. Life is relatively uncomplicated and stable.

So yes I feel lucky here in Australia. We have a good life and I am generally satisfied with my lot.

As Crushed mentioned in the last post, Australia is very familiar for British people, something I never felt, living in America for all those years. I think that has a tremendous impact on your level of happiness. Having lived in many countries there is always the feeling of not really belonging.

So for me happiness in no particular order is having a stable family life, cultural familiarity, not worrying too much about where the next dollar is coming from, nice weather (we have a lot of that here), being able to get up early and have some quite time to myself, nice work arrangements with pleasant coworkers, access to a computer and broadband and what that allows, a dishwasher, a garden to fiddle around in, a few pets, a reliable car, being able to spend time with my kids, a few pets, a smooth commute to work, access to a beer now and again, nice food and having time to be around my wife.

As one of the commentators on Leon's blog said, it is all relative.

Happiness. It's all relative. Take the Soviet diplomat who said, "When I am not abroad, I live with my family on the 16th floor of a high-rise apartment building in Moscow. I am sitting with my son on my knee, reading him editorial from 'Pravda', when I hear 'knock-knock' on door. I open door and there stands Secret Policeman. He says, "You name Ivan Ivanovich?". I say, "No! He live upstairs...". That's my idea of happiness."


Although I am not really the upbeat or particularly optimistic type and can be quite depressed at times, I think what it really boils down to, is to be happy with what you have and always look on the bright side of life.



Now that always makes me laugh.

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

What a beautifully reflective post. I'm glad you ended up in Oz.

From Megan who's tried to live everywhere else too but is in love with Australia and its diversity.

Colin Campbell said...

Thanks. I am too. It is a great place to bring up a family.

ashleigh said...

I was born here, I've travelled a little both Australia and Overseas, and I dont want to live anywhere else.

I've had the offer at work to relocate overseas and turned it down. The odd trip away is ok, but here is home.

Of the cities in Australia, Adelaide, and Brisbane and Perth seem to me to be the most "livable", and Adelaide is probably the place with the lowest cost of living. Apart from the occasional bizarre murder its a pretty quiet place, but WAY too introspective. People here need to get out more.

Your tale of the USA is terrible - treating people like that is appalling. So much for the land of the free! My sister lived there for a time - some of tales she tells make it sound more like a police state.

Good on you for coming to Australia, you have a somewhat unconventional life (being a mainly-at-home-Dad) but thats not such a bad thing.

Thanks for the story.

James Higham said...

I went through the criteria of happiness, one by one, wondering when your wife would come in to it. She made an appearance at the end of the list, so that's a relief.

Colin Campbell said...

It was definitely in no particular order.

geoff said...

colin we're glad you ended up down here in Oz and we'll even overlook that it's Adelaide you're happy in!

A lot of folk from UK end up in Perth, the most isolated capital in the world. That fact alone gives it a special character. My welsh ex-boss made the comment that Perth's got the climate the Californians boast about.

Then there's Melbourne, acclaimed "most livable city" along with Vienna & Vancouver. And sports capital. And culture and coffee and...

Sydney's got a bridge and opera house and harbor.

And you end up in Adelaide! Capital of the Dump State. City of murders (as another of your correspondents mentioned). Place for pie floaters and Stobie poles. But there's something nice about its eccentricity, nevertheless.

Well done & God bless!

Colin Campbell said...

Thanks for your kind words everybody.

I have lived and spent time in many other places including some of the great cities of the world and enjoyed it. I'm a country boy at heart and Adelaide is like a big country town. Uncomplicated, wholesome, affordable, nice climate and as for those stereotypes, well that is just part of the charm.

My wife and I both earn about what we would earn doing the same jobs in other parts of Australia. Why not appreciate the lower cost of living here.

I laugh when I hear all the put down stuff. City of Churches, Wacko Murder Capital, Stobie Poles etc. and as for pie floaters, I have still to try one.

I am not really trying to boost Adelaide. I can remember living in Washington DC and almost never visiting any of the great historical, political and cultural things. What I did have to deal with were outrageous comuting, expensive housing and a nutty work environment. Ditto London, San Francisco, New York.

Places like Kathmandu, Manila, Singapore have their charms, but they can be either disfunctional or culturally isolating.

Wherever you are with your family and whatever you are doing, try to make the best of it.

Sandi McBride said...

Wonderful post, thoroughly enjoyed it.
Sandi

Cath said...

I thoroughly enjoyed this too and got here a year and a half later than others via authorblog.

America's loss is Australia's gain. Just wish I had had the courage. My one regret - I lost my bottle. But then, I wouldn't have what I have now.

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