It was pouring down rain in Adelaide 19 years ago today. I don’t have a good memory for the weather, but I remember that day clearly. On 4 April 1995 Adelaide welcomed its newest migrant.
Prior to April 1995, Padma and I had been living in Cali, Colombia but things got a bit rough as my boss had been kidnapped and we had seen one too many dead bodies along the road. It was time for a move and Australia beckoned us. Padma was keen to be closer to her family while I had tired of living in developing countries. We returned to the States and I began the long process of applying for permanent residency in Australia. When my application material arrived in the post there was a glossy page headed ‘Adelaide welcomes new migrants’. The photo moved me as I could see myself settling down and having picnics with our children while overlooking the city. I clipped out the coupon and sent it in for the info pack.
I had forgotten about South Australia and Padma and I started making plans to move to Brisbane as the semi-tropical climate appealed to us. Finally my Adelaide information pack arrived. It was jammed packed with photocopies from the local newspaper showing the cost of milk, the cost of home rentals and job listings. The Office of Multicultural and Ethnic Affairs even offered to help us pre-arrange an apartment and meet us at the airport. Padma and I decided at the last moment to change our flights to Adelaide partly since we thought our savings would last the longest there.
Neither Padma nor I had ever been to Adelaide. We had no friends or family there and knew absolutely no one. We didn’t have a clue whether we could find jobs. We had no idea what life was like in Adelaide but something spoke out about it which made us feel we could settle there and make it our long-term home.
When we arrived on that rainy April morning we were met by our meet and greet team. Steve was a man about our age who had been doing some volunteer work for the government. He arranged a taxi just to carry our luggage and then drove us to our pre-selected apartment. He said he’d be back in two days to get my ‘paperwork’ done. As a new migrant I had lots to do to get into the system. It would have taken me weeks to register at the tax office, Medicare and the employment service. With Steve we got it all done in a morning.
Our next challenge was to find a place to live. I asked Steve where the best place to live is and he said, ‘The Hills’, which is where he lived. So the next day Padma and I took a bus up to the Adelaide Hills. We ended up at a real estate agent in Stirling and by the end of the day found a beautiful home in Aldgate which we rented.
We had nothing but an empty house and in the next week had to buy a car, furniture and everything else to make a home. Other than Steve, we knew no one. While we were exploring Aldgate, Padma saw a church and went there on one of our first Sundays. The church ‘greeter’ welcomed her and learned of our story and by the time the service ended we had our first dinner invitation and our first friends – John and Judy Petering.
We were happily unemployed but knew eventually we’d need jobs as we were living on savings. Padma applied as a relief teacher at the local schools while I applied for jobs all over the country. Within a couple of weeks I got a photo assignment in Sydney and Brisbane from a US client and Padma started getting a trickle of relief teaching jobs.
The Australian government wanted me and other migrants to be fully employed so it offered to provide me with a training program so I could learn to set up and manage my own business. So for the next six weeks I had one-on-one sessions with a business consultant who helped me formulate a business plan that would put me in full employment. The assistance I got was invaluable and yet I paid nothing for it.
Things were looking good for my new business venture but then I saw a vacancy for an editor of a wine publication. I wasn’t sure about the job but on the application due date I handed in my CV and eventually got the job. The idea of a regular pay check sounded too good so I accepted the job and was then a fully employed and integrated migrant.
Australia had indeed welcomed migrants and I felt blessed to be one. But I was eager to lose the ‘migrant’ label and become a true Aussie. Ten years after I arrived, I won a hotly contested footy tipping competition (that’s an office betting pool for Australian Rules Football). It was at that moment that I decided if I could beat the Aussies in their own national pastime then I was finally truly worthy of becoming one of them. I gladly accepted my winnings from the poor Aussies I beat but decided to use that money to pay for my Australian citizenship.
In September 2005 I took the oath to become an Australian citizen at a ceremony and accepted all of the responsibilities and privileges of being a citizen.
The tipping competition was the culmination of a long journey of becoming a fair dinkum Aussie. Earlier I had become indoctrinated into Aussie sports by sitting for hours and hours and hours – and more hours – in the hot summer sun while watching a cricket match and I had joined other Aussies in using foul language at both a Port Adelaide and Adelaide Crows footy match, except my foul language wasn’t directed at the players but the ferals sitting behind me. I have peppered my vocabulary with Aussie words and now call the garbage ‘rubbish’ and I fill my tank with ‘petrol’ rather than gas. I have mastered the art and science of the outdoor barbeque and I own an Akubra hat and a Driza-bone. The journey is still not complete however as I’m still struggling to develop a true Aussie larrikin spirit and I still wouldn’t be caught dead wearing tight short shorts.
I have taken some wrong turns in my life and have gone down many deadend paths but when I got off that plane and stepped into a downpour 19 years ago today I was certainly heading in the right direction and feel truly blessed that I can call Australia home.
