Working it

So how was the first week at work I hear you ask?

First off, the entire staff is absolutely wonderful. They are obviously a tight knit team, but they welcome us with open arms and smiles. They are kind, funny, and patient with the new Yanks. They have volunteered to help us house hunt, give references, suggest restaurants, and discuss any and all aspects of Melbourne living – in short they take an active interest in seeing that we are settling in. They have also already learned to poke fun at out foibles (few that they are). In short – we feel right at home!

Here’s how the week went:
Monday: half the staff was at an off-site event for the day, so we were able to ease into things. After a spin around the office (10 minutes) and meeting the staff who were in (20 minutes), we got down to some actual work. Matt’s blackberry had been buzzing with a few minor disasters over the weekend so he was especially eager to respond to some pressing issues. There as a small welcoming lunch (Japanese, yum) and at the end of the day we all went over to the Crown Hotel for a happy hour.

The Crown Hotel is part of the Crown Casino complex, which is a Vegas like casino in the heart of Melbourne, just on the south side of the Yarra River (the river cuts through the southern part of the city the central business district is to the north). The happy hour was held in a special floor normally restricted to high rollers (someone know someone?) that had two story windows with 270 degree panoramic views. I never realized the amount of neon in Melbourne. Anyway, a few free drinks and some get to know you chat we took a cab back to the pied de terre and went to bed. We stayed awake until 8!

On Tuesday we attempted to get our visas stamped at immigration. After arriving at 1 PM, were given # B198. They were currently serving #B150. After 25 minutes they were on # B153 so we decided to bag it and try again on Friday.

Tuesday afternoon the office threw us a "Welcome Tea" towards the end of the day. The theme was an "Aussie Feast", which consisted of (American translation in parentheses):

Fairy Bread (white bread with butter and colored sugar sprinkles on top). Kids love this!
Shrimp from the barbie (duh)
Vegemite on toast (brewer's yeast extract on toast)
Chicken skewers (self explanatory)
Spring rolls (ditto)
Tim Tams (really good cookies)
Meat pies (baby size pastys. Makes us long for the UP and a real pasty)
Champagne, beer and wine ("tea" to Australians after 4 PM)

This led to the following exchange the next day:
Anthea (co-worker) - "Hi Marlys, do you want a piece of fairy bread?"
Marlys - "No thanks, Anthea, I just had a Tim Tam."
Perfectly normal in Australia, perfectly odd in the US.

Matt likes vegemite. No, he’s not just trying to fit in - he really does like it. He is now having it on his breakfast toast most mornings.

The people from the office seem to get together as a group fairly frequently. On Wednesday, Jen (who picked us up at the airport) had organized dinner and tickets for Phantom of the Opera. We went to European for dinner, whose cuisine was, as you might expect, European - Italian pasta, German schnitzel, French fois gras, etc. It was delicious. Aussies are great dinner companions. They are very outgoing and conversational, and opinions are to be shared, not held. It was just like dinner with Matt’s family.

"Phantom" was in a very old, recently restored theater – the Princess. Our seats were 4th row, dead center. Jen pulled a string or two I think. It was an excellent show, and Marlys screamed a very lady-like, "holy crap!" when the chandelier came down, which was Matt’s favorite part (he’d seen it before so knew it was coming).

Thursday – we collapsed into bed after work. No event. Very nice.

Friday we went to immigration the minute it opened. Took a grand total of 10 minutes. Timing is everything, even at the DAIC. Then with two rather plain looking visas in our passports we went to the bank to access our account. We had opened the account over the internet and deposited a nice sum there for our arrival, but couldn’t access the account until we could show our passport and visa. This 10 minute process took about an hour and a half. We were "helped" by a woman named Chitty and, you guessed it, we got Chitty service. Eventually we had an open account, but no checkbook, ATM card, etc yet. Ugh.

Did we go out and party Friday night? No, we made dinner, read and watched a little TV, and researched neighborhoods to start the apartment hunt the next day. Stay tuned….

Aussie phrase-of-the-day: "rug up" means "dress warmly". Lately it’s been chilly so we’ve had to rug up.