Older Parents adapting to Oz

[Toni]

I was at the bus stop the other day and met this lovely older lady and we got to chatting. She had a lovely accent and I asked her about it and she said she was from Manchester. She told me she had only been in Adelaide for about 4 years and living with her daughter and son in law. Well I tell you she was a pretty amazing woman. She must have come over on a visa “last remaining relative” I suspect. She said she had been all alone in the UK as her sister etc had passed away and her daughter organised to get her over. She had joined several clubs including Probus (which I don’t know much about) and had met a lot of friends through that and was pretty much out and about most of the time. She loved Australia and just felt that it had given her a new lease of life and had never dreamt she could feel that way about being here. Just thought it was a nice story because I hear so many people on this forum talking about bringing their last remaining parent over and this lady was full of beans and really happy to be here.

[Hayshake]

As older people who have tried it out in Adelaide, I can give you our experience. We have many friends around the world and my wife has many close friends in England, and although we lived in Adelaide for 3 years and have permanent residency. We have made many friends in Adelaide and joined numerous organisations, but my wife always felt that she was really missing her close friends in England. ( I think this may be a female thing).

We also live on Pensions which come over from England, and with the devaluation of the pound, meant that it was very expensive to live in Adelaide, hence the reason for our return to The Cotswolds.

We still have many friends in Adelaide, and try to visit on an Annual basis, as we have family in Aus. Our friends put us up, they loan us a car to use whilst there, and we have a great time. We still say that maybe we will return if the currency improves, but as we are now approaching our 70's, I doubt if it will within our lifetime!!!.

[Toni]

This lady's mentioned that many of her friends had all passed away too, so she was pretty alone in the UK. I think her age bracket would have been mid to late 70's She did say it was expensive to come over here, that the visa was expensive and she sold her house in the UK to fund it. She is also living with her daughter and looked quite fit to me, and was relying on public transport to get around. So I think being able to live with her daughter and not having a need for public transport it was quite a "doable" thing for her. She was just so positive and had a real twinkle in her eye that I left that conversation feeling quite uplifted by that and thinking that it really is never to late to have such a huge "change" in your later life with the "right" circumstances and family support.