Twenty five years ago today Susan and I boarded a KLM flight in Sydney, on our
way to a new life in England. We were travelling light, carrying one piece of hand luggage
each, and we checked one suitcase of clothes, and a roadcase containing two
bass guitars.
The flight was to Amsterdam via Singapore, and we had
enough time for a shower at Schiphol (Amsterdam) before boarding our flight
onwards to Heathrow.
I had booked 4 weeks holiday accommodation in south London through an advert I had found in "In Britain" magazine. Before the internet that involved receiving a 3 month out of date magazine in Australia, writing a letter to London, and hoping there was a vacancy. Thus we ended up in a one bedroom flat in a 1900's house in Forest Hill. The plan was to spend a month there while we looked for a rental, in the end we spent 7 weeks there, because even in 1997 rental accommodation in London seemed eye-wateringly expensive, even for places you wouldn't neceesarily use as a dog kennel.
Thinking about this has alerted me to a number of things. My "throwaway" Hotmail account is now 25 years old, as are my sportscoat and overcoat. Two of these are evidence that you should spend money to save money, one is evidence that I never throw anything away.
3 comments:
Very Brave in my book... Interestingly a lot more green around that area than I thought and my Google streetview reads June 2021... If its still good keep it, I still wear shirts that are 20+ years old. And I regularly use tools I had as an apprentice and some of my Grandfathers to. Never thro owt away...
Was this your first big adventure together? Interesting lives you two have led and are leading.
Carolyn: I suppose it was our first big adventure together. Depends how you look at it. We'd been overseas for 3 months on holiday together before, and camped in the wilderness for a week in Australia and stuff like that.
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