Working.... in Australia

Never in my life that I ever thought that I'll be working overseas.

Ah well, I did travel a lot in my first job, where I went to Indonesia for a month, and then Vietnam for 11 months, before I decided to quit the job and got myself another job that doesn't need me to travel often.

Now that we moved to Australia, it's truly God's blessing that I can get a job in such a short time. I consider myself really lucky to work in this company. It's a small local company that does survey collection and I am hired as the Business Intelligence Analyst who is supposed to help with the IT support, data warehouse, data analysis and reporting.

My office is only 5km away from my house. When I first started work and while we're still staying with my aunt, I took bus to work most of the time as EG needed the car to chauffeur Eunice to/back from kinder. But ever since we move to our own place in June, I've been driving. It's only a 10 minutes drive. And the office hour is from 9am to 5pm, hence I could still cook lunch, and prepare breakfast for everyone, and only leave home around 8.45am.

Many have told me about racism in Australia. Deep inside me, I used to fear to work in a whole new environment in a whole new culture. However, I over-worried! My colleagues are most young chaps, so they're really a fun bunch. Of course, they have their unique working ways (foul words, relax, take-it-easy) but so far they treat me really well. I have a few female colleagues who have children and we have total different topics when we bump into each other in pantry, or during lunch. I have heard stories of Asians being discriminated in the work place but not for me. Most of my colleagues greet each other in the morning when they came in, and when they leave, they'd even come to my place to say bye to me as well. :)

Communication used to be a little bit of problem as we're still adjusting to each other's slang, but after 3 months here, I think I have picked up the right way to talk here, and now I can chit chat with my colleagues pretty well. But ah, most of them are young chaps so they have their jokes that might be too "modern" for me to comprehend but nevertheless, it's still good. I am pretty happy about it.

For my bosses - I report directly to my MD and a director. They're really nice to me and have been very accommodating. There are times where I need to go and settle some of the children's stuff and they let me have my time-off. Besides, they also trust me and allow me to work from home for 2 days a week so I could save cost on the childcare. I am really glad and thankful for their trust. Besides, they treat me with respect and lots of courtesy. They are really courteous when talking to me (maybe I have the good-girl look) but so far, I am very thankful for them.

None of my colleague eat out. Most of them bring their own lunches from home so I did that too. And we normally sat on the table in pantry for lunch together. I joined sometimes, but half of the time, I took the 30 minutes lunch break for a walk at the nearby shops near my office. Just to have some window shopping and looking for things that I might be interested in. Besides, the lunch break walking also helps me to take a break apart of sitting at the computer the whole day.

I wouldn't say Australians are very laid back, but it is probably more appropriate to say that Australians are very understanding, or accommodating. There are times when my director would ask if I am overloaded before passing me more work, or even ask me to pass some of my work to others when they see me looked really overwhelmed. Besides, they are very family oriented. Never once in my 3 months of working experience here that they request me to work over time. Most of the time they'll just tell me to do it the next day when I come back to office. I was so worried for the children arrangement when EG found a good job, and was thinking hard for 2 weeks to think how I should tell my director that I'd wish to work from home since childcare is just too expensive. When I finally gathered all my courage to tell her, I could be very frank on the reasons, and all she said was, "Hey Winnie, no worry, go ahead! Just let me know the plan when it's all confirm." You cannot imagine how relieve I felt deep inside me at that moment.

Anyway, this is a small company that I am working in. Probably this is why everything is more relax as there're less red tapes or processes. But so far I really enjoy myself working here. I do have job satisfactions, keeping some of my technical skills intact, earning some income to help paying bills and buying food, while still be able to mind our children is office is nearby to home/school/childcare.

As a summary, I'd say I am really, really lucky and blessed to get this job. And I am really thankful that it's an all awesome good experience for me. :)

The bus station that I waited for bus for first 2 months before we moved

The busy street

Right outside my office entrance. I love the sunlight in Melbourne in the cold weather. Ironic, I know. :)

The side street that I walk everyday from carpark to my office

PS: If you're curious, EG is enjoying his work place even more than me. He works in Melbourne University with all the technical teams, so the buildings are awesome, good facilities, nice colleagues and fantastic team members and colleagues.

I really can't ask for more. :)