diary of a pommy immigrant

Hieronder het dagboek van een Engelse migrant tijdens zijn eerste weken in South Australia...

August 31 - Just got transferred with work from Leeds UK to our new home in Karratha, Western Australia. Now this is a town that knows how to live! Beautiful, sunny days and warm, balmy evenings. I watched the sunset from a deckchair by the pool yesterday. It was beautiful. I've finally found my new home. I love it here.

September 13 - Really heating up now. It got to 31 today. No problem though. Living in air-conditioned home, driving air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun every day like this. I'm turning into a sun-worshipper.

September 30th - Had the back yard landscaped with tropical plants today. Lots of palms and rocks. No more mowing lawns for me. Another scorcher today, but I love it here.

October 10th - The temperature hasn't been below 35 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least today it's windy though. Keeps the flies off a bit. Acclimatizing is taking longer than I expected.

October 15th - Fell asleep by the pool yesterday. Got third degree burns over 60% of my body. Missed three days of work. What a dumb thing to do! Got to respect the ol' sun in a climate like this.

October 20th - Didn't notice Kitty (our cat) sneaking into the car before I left for work this morning. By the time I got back to the car after work, Kitty had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag and stuck to the upholstery. The car now smells like Whiskers and cat s**t. I've earned my lesson though: no more pets in this heat.

October 25 - This wind is a b*****d. It feels like a giant blow dryer. And it's hot as hell! The home air conditioner is on the blink and the repair man charged $200 just to drive over and tell me he needs to order parts from bloomin' Perth ....

October 30th - The temperature's up around 40 and the parts still haven't arrived for the bleedin' aircon. Been sleeping outside by the pool for three nights now. Bloody $600,000 house and we can't even go inside. Why the hell did I ever come here?

November 4 - Finally got the ol' aircon fixed. It cost $1,500 and gets the temperature down to around 25 degrees, but the humidity makes it feel about 30. Stupid repairman.

November 8 - If one more smart a**e says 'Hot enough for you today?' I swear I’m going to throttle him. Bleedin' heat! By the time I get to work, the car's radiator is boiling over, my clothes are soaking bloody' wet and I smell like baked cat!

November 9 - Tried to run some errands after work, wore shorts, and sat on the black leather upholstery in the ol' car. I thought my bleedin' a**e was on fire. I lost two layers of flesh, and all the hair on the backs of my legs and my bleedin' a**e. Now the car smells like burnt hair, fried a**e and baked cat!

November 10 - Weather report! It might as well be a bloody recording. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny, Hot and bleedin' sunny! It's been too hot to do anything for two bleedin' months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week.

November 15 - Doesn't it ever rain in this damn place? Water restrictions will be next, so my $5,000 worth of palms might just dry up and blow into the bleedin' pool. The only things that thrive in this hell-hole are the bleedin' flies. You don't dare open your mouth for fear of swallowing half a dozen of the b*****s!

November 20th - Welcome to HELL! It got to 45 bleedin' degrees today. Now the air conditioner's gone in my car. The repair man came to fix it and said, 'Hot enough for you today?' I had to spend the $2,500 mortgage payment to bail me out of jail for assaulting the stupid idiot. Bleedin' Karratha! What kind of sick, demented bleedin' idiot would want to live here!

December 1 -

WHAT!!!!

The first day of Summer!!!!

You are bloody kidding!

Nog even de oorsprong van de term ''pommy immigrant" meegeven. Toen de (vnl Engelse) migranten destijds toekwamen in Australie kregen ze al snel de kleur van een granaatappel (pomegranate). Aangezien de Aussies zo goed als alles afkorten werden de Engelsen dus al snel pommy immigrant genoemd.