Parcel Post

Heh heh, there should be some actual bearing of that title with something in this post if I remember to write it.

So, busy few days. My agent friend Ivy has found new tenants for this flat, so I get my bond back. I used the diplomatic clause to cut out at the six month point, which lets me give one month notice or pay that months rent in lieu. Chose latter, and was going to forfeit the bond for that. But now will get it back, also Ivy has sold my furniture so get a couple of hundred for that as well.

Have to sort out what accounts hold what money before I book flights and hotel back there. Everyone has offered to pick me up from the airport, but the city council provides a free shuttle mini-bus to the CBD and drops you off in front of your hotel. I will probably book a room in the Chiffley on South Tce as it's quite cheap. Stay a few days to sort stuff out, then mum wants me to visit her for a week. Might take Radar down as well, then we can both help Noel with any stuff on the farm and we can network my two computers and play into the night. Then back to the Chifley (one 'f' or two?) until I get a new contract and some cash in the bank.

I am planning then on taking a studio apartment in the city centre so I can walk to work and don't have to maintain a car. So my dog stays with my ex (cos he is happy with her and I don't want to keep disorienting him by taking him back) and my car stays with my mum. But for the price that a modest apartment in SG would set me back I can have a HUGE two level apartment with its own roof garden in Adelaide. So maybe I will...

Anyhow, I have managed to collect rather a lot of books in my short stay here; they fill a large storage box. So will need to send them, some software, some clothes, maybe a few oddments, back by courier. Have looked at SingPost, DHL, and FedEx; looked at a few others, but these three are the ones that survived the first elimination. FedEx seems to be cheaper and offer more options. I just want to send one box, maybe 25 kilos, by surface - it doesn't have to be express by air, the time is not important, it can take a week or a month, I don't care, but do you think anybody's website offers these options? No, it is all air express for hundreds of dollars. Still, since FedEx has passed the first hurdle I will go to one of their offices and ask. Best for DHL or SingPost seems to be over three hundred, best from FedEx seems to be less than two hundred.

I will be SO GLAD to be out of this HDB. Not that it is any worse than the non-HDB apartment that I was in before, but that was not a 'condo'. But it will be nice to be somewhere clean and quiet, and by that I mean the city, the suburb, the estate, the general environs. I am sure that there are plenty of such places in Singers, just that I haven't lived in one yet.

It will take a while to get used to working again I guess. I took seven months off work a few years ago and moved back into work afterwards quite easily, so maybe it will be okay (by a "few years ago" I mean the time between the two breaks was more than two but less than three). In fact, given how much I earn (in Australia that is, having established that I can not survive on what Singapore offers) I can easily take six months off every other year. So maybe I will just go back and do a couple of contracts then go live in Hong Kong for six months. Then back to Oz to work for a year or two before trying an extended holiday in Seoul. I could get used to such a life style for a while. There are parts of it that won't work for me; I really want to be out of Australia on a permanent basis since I think that Western culture and society is going down the gurgler, and I really want to be in some sort of permanent relationship that leads to children. But we have to settle for the best that we can, and maybe experiencing the world this way is the best that I can hope for?