Life + Times of Fenton et al.

For those that have been keeping score you’ll be aware that the end of this July will see the completion of my current employment contract. Further work with my current employer is not possible, mostly due to policy, bureaucratic and administrative reasons (You didn’t think keeping a Dutch-employed Australian in Germany was easy did you?). So, after a brief consideration of retirement, I’ve decided to press on in the workforce and am therefore currently engaged in seeking further work. I’d like to say I’m currently engaged in reviewing multiple offers but this hasn’t eventuated just yet. There are many factors that go into an employment situation when you are a physicist; a prime consideration is “Who employs physicists anyway?’

The answer to that question is found all over the globe with realistic locations including the UK, the US, elsewhere in Europe and possibly even Australia. As a family we have decided to try to restrict the options to either German- or English-speaking countries. The transition for the children is probably the most demanding and to ask them to change schools, cultures and to leave friends behind is big enough — let alone a new language where you have little to no idea about anything for the first six months. Most of the children, of course, opt for a return to Australia to once again enjoy a closer association with family, sunshine and brutal sports. In the near future though this doesn’t seem all that likely. Ultimately of course it will depend on offered employment or a decided change in career.

One of the big drawbacks at this stage is that we are in a sort of limbo. It’s more that we aren’t sure where we are going rather than that we are moving. Gaynor has become almost masterful at dealing with this condition — we’ve done it numerous times in the past — but still it’s not easy. Of course, this situation also means that those who were thinking of using a relatively cheap base for a tour of Europe should hurry up about it. 😀

Well strictly contacts. My most commonly worn pair of glasses recently defied any further attempts to keep them in one piece. Thus, requiring a new pair, I decided that instead I would see how I went with contact lenses. I have a trial period of a month with some soft, disposable lenses and I must say, after a short adjustment period, they are really quite comfortable. I’m also getting better at controlling my reaction to essentially sticking my finger in my eye when putting them in or taking them out.

The peripheral vision is excellent but it’s still taking a bit of getting used to seeing myself clearly without glasses on. The feeling of walking around without glasses is not as vulnerable as doing it with blurred vision but it’s still somewhat ‘naked’.

While not quite the dynamic title of a James Bond book, I’m nevertheless pleased to have completed the final hurdle — the practical exam. You may recall the earlier ones — to receiving my German driver’s licence. It was actually the second attempt having failed the first one on the last turn into the testing centre’s car park a week before Christmas. To be sure it was cruel (and I felt in error) given that we were expecting to drive to Spain a week later. There is a minimum two week wait between tests.

We agonised over our options for a couple of days and in the end decided I was too poor of a passenger to make it. So it meant that in the end we flew to Spain, instead of the expected total of 6 days in the car. Though more expensive it was, of course, much faster however we are still undecided if it was less stressful. It also gave me an opportunity to use one of my more recently frequent phrases when discussing the (now obviously simple) solution to a problem: ‘… and all it took was a whole lot of money.’ I’m still amazed at how many problems this almost trivial solution can be applied to.

So now I’m driving again, much to Gaynor’s relief (bad passenger that I am) and for those alert readers who remember my commentary on the Australian driving learner caught doing 177 km/h, I managed 130 during the exam I passed, mostly due to the short amount of autobahn and the under-powered car I was in. 😀

I still follow quite closely the news and current events in Australia, using the ABC website almost exclusively for this. Two recent stories in a row made me think a little about what Europe currently means to an expatriated Aussie.

The bombing at Madrid Airport made me sit up and take notice since Gaynor and the girls were only there the day before. Even though the bombed terminal was two kilometres away from the one the girls were transiting through it certainly made me stop and think about what it means to live and travel in such a place. While we feel closer, in some sense, to the centre of the world that also means being closer to world events, even the ugly ones. Certainly Europe has seen (and caused) more than its fair share of wars over the centuries and, in part, I put it down to the large number of sharply varying cultures crammed into a relatively small area. I am still amazed as how quickly culture and language change as you travel, even within a single nation. However, on the whole I think Europe does a pretty fair job of keeping it all in check — tolerance, building on common ground and the like — but incidents such as this bombing make you realise it’s not all roses yet.

A story about a 40 year old learner caught doing 177km/h — according to the police (and look he probably was!) — also caught my attention. Despite growing up in Australia with a fair amount of government and traffic authorities’ propaganda, I’ve never believed that speed alone is dangerous. Since driving in Germany, especially on the autobahns (I’m missing them already!), I’m even more convinced of it. In my opinion the Germans, at least, take a much more balanced and reasonable approach. There are very strict rules governing traffic here and they view their driving much more as a social responsibility than as a personal right. The cost to obtain a licence alone is enough to make one value it.

There have been many reasons why the time we have spent here has been very good for us and getting a different view of the world and life is certainly one of the top three.