News from Melbourne

Glad to see all is well in New York and everyone looking as lovely as ever. Wish I could have been there to have a drink with you all. I am in the middle of four weeks vacation from university. The semester finished with a blizzard of assignments and I can't remember much of June except that I was sitting here typing, typing, typing. I was also teaching Grades 7, 10 and 11 math at a nearby high school. I think that went pretty well and by the end I was beginning to feel comfortable in front of a group of teenagers and had begun telling little jokes that none of them understood. I had one of those teacher moments when one of the kids in my class got his highest ever mark for a math test in the subject that I was teaching. He said, "You're a legend, Mr Nicholls!" How sweet! Next semester, I will be teaching math and history at our local high school - the one that Hannah and Sam will go to if we still live in this neighborhood. I just hope I don't have to teach my babysitter - that might be embarrassing.

We didn't get to go to Sydney after all. Rachel too busy at work, so that trip may have to wait until September. We are planning to go to the UK for Christmas to see Rachel's Mom and the rest of the family. I've been running a bit more often but it is difficult to get away at this time of year because it gets dark so early and Rachel doesn't get back from work until so late. Also, this area has hardly any street lamps - I'd be running in pitch black. Australia's a fairly rich country - surely we could invest in some lights! I may have to start getting up at 6 and running in the early morning. Ick.

The kids are busy with swimming and football. Sam has decided that he is going to be a footballer when he grows up. They are both getting rather tall. Sam has lost his first tooth. His accent is now distinctively Australian, but I think Hannah has hung on to her Englishness. They both gave performances at the end of semester keyboard recital. Both played Abba's "Mamma Mia" very well.

I'll be posting six months worth of photos on the other blog soon and I'll post a link to it here. I haven't posted on that site for six months and I think Rachel's Mom will be getting rather cross with me if I don't get something on there soon.

Tom Cruise is in Melbourne at the moment. You would have thought the rest of the world had simply stopped. All we get is Tom Cruise went shopping, Tom Cruise went to the footy, Tom Cruise had dinner in a restaurant. There was some other news about some pop singer having died. Then we got Tom Cruise's reaction. The Australian media is even more awful than it was 20 years ago.

I went to the doctor's the other day for a checkup. We've been in Australia for a year now and the doctor asked how we had settled in. I said we were all fine and described all our activities. Then I explained that it was a bit different here because everyone in Melbourne lives at the back of their house and in their own backyards. Every single social event has to be arranged in advance. There is less opportunity to meet neighbors or socialize when simply running into people who are sitting in their front yard watching kids play or reading or barbecuing, and there is no central focus such as Prospect Park or Central Park like there is in New York. The doctor looked at me for a few seconds and then said, "Australians are just not that friendly. All that mateship business is a myth that we have created. We are just not that friendly." Hmmm. I'm going to have to think about that. Maybe he is right.