 |
| Pacific Black Ducks |
It's been a pretty quite spring for us. There was a run of ~6 weekends in September through early October where we were doing stuff every weekend, so it's been nice to have a calm November. After our trip to Cairns we:
1) completed a 50 km bike ride as part of the Around the Bay event,
2) took part in the Mornington Running Festival - I ran a half marathon and Ross ran a 10 km,
3) I ran the 10 km at the Melbourne Marathon Festival (this was the weekend after the bike ride, I think...),
4) we went to the Royal Melbourne Show two days in a row, and
5) I think that there was something else, but I can't remember it right now...
 |
| In Williamstown, during Around the Bay |
 |
| After the Mornington Running Festival |
 |
| Enjoying the view and a well earned rest after the half marathon. |
 |
| Winning Cupcakes at the Royal Melbourne Show |
 |
| Possibly the greatest chicken ever |
 |
| World Cup show jumping at the Royal Melb Show |
I also applied for and was granted a four-year work visa, so we can stay in Australia for a while longer. Woo hoo! I say "I" because I am the main visa holder and Ross is tacked on as my partner, so he didn't actually have to do anything except send me copies of various documents. If I'm remembering correctly, I ended up submitting about 30 supplementary documents in addition to filling out a 22 page visa application. Good times.
We had to submit: passports, drivers licences, birth certificates, wedding certificate, proof of our relationship (i.e. - joint bank accounts, bills in both of our names, joint leases, etc.). We also had to have police background checks for any country that we had lived in for a year or more in the last ten years, so Ross had to get one from the US and NZ, while I had to get them from the US, NZ and Australia. Fun story - I managed to submit the wrong type of Australian background check (because there are multiple types...) so I had to get and submit a second one. I also had to submit my university transcripts, CV, contract from the company that I work for and letters of reference from previous employers.
Honestly though, one of the more challenging aspects of the visa application was listing the dates of entry and exit for every country that we have visited in the last ten years outside of our country of citizenship. It wasn't too hard for me but Ross had been flying to Australia about once a month since I moved over in May 2017, plus he has been to an impressive number of foreign conferences at this point. Needless to say, we made sure to keep that record, should we need to submit it again for any reason.
All-in-all, I am glad that it's done and that we were approved and we don't have to worry about that one again for a while, though technically I could apply for permanent residency (PR) in May 2020.... I'm not sure I'm ready for yet another crazy application so soon though. Plus I'm not sure how that would effect Ross since I'm the primary visa holder and he hasn't been in Australia long enough to apply for PR yet. At some point I'll call immigration and sort that all out but that's a task for another day.
As I said at the beginning of this post, November has been more laidback. Well, for me at least. Ross is so close to submitting his dissertation for external review that we can taste it. He's aiming to send it off on Wednesday or Thursday this week. So exciting!! This means though that he's been working until ~11 p.m. most nights and putting in pretty solid hours on the weekends too. He's planning on going back to NZ to help a friend with a couple weeks of field work at the beginning of December, so that has been his carrot to finish up the dissertation.
 |
| Just one of the friendly, neighbourhood penguins |
We're planning on doing a small Thanksgiving this week and I've told my co-workers that I'll bring in some pie on Thursday. I might try to get out of Melbourne the weekend that Ross is in NZ, but otherwise there's not a whole lot on the schedule for us until we head back to the States for Christmas on 21 December. My office shuts down for two weeks over the holidays and I took an extra week off, so we'll have three weeks to see family and friends and enjoy a cold, snowy (hopefully) Christmas. I'm most excited to meet my new nephew (sorry Mom and Dad...), who was born a little less than two weeks ago.
To everyone in the US, I hope that you have a fabulous Thanksgiving this week!
Cheers,
Annika
No comments:
Post a Comment