Identity crisis

TASKS are so much easier when you have the right equipment for the job.

For months, we've struggled "making do" until our possessions arrived on the container. Any jobs I needed seeing to by my more-than-handy-hubby had to go on the back burner while he eagerly awaited his Snap On toolboxes full of forty years' worth of tool collection.

A particular problem I, personally, have been encountering has been the payment of my UK mobile phone bill. I wanted to keep it for the initial few months after arrival in Australia as it was my way of keeping a familiar sort of contact. A comfort blanket so to speak. An electronic soother.

So when it came to paying the UK-sourced bill each month, I was in between the devil and the deep blue Pacific Ocean ... literally. The first month, I had to get my brother to get out his plastic and pay it on my behalf but there's only so many times you can ask that sort of favour. So we decided it was a priority to get a credit card.

But it's only after being in the country for so long that you can apply for such luxurious items as credit cards. And to apply for one, you have to provide more than one form of proof of identity. One we had in our passports. The other was, however, not forthcoming.

Our UK driving licences were obsolete as we needed the Australian photo ID ones that come printed with a current address. We had only just moved into the house we're renting and so had not even had a utility bill with our name and address printed on it and the bank staff here didn't know us from Adam. Not like our local branch that used to speak with us on first name terms.

So the chicken and the egg problem has been ongoing and we've begun to appreciate how difficult and mind-numbingly exhaustive putting the legwork into a new life has become.

But now we've had a few bills and have posed for driving licence mugshots, we've got some plastic!! I'm beside myself. Excited. And feel back in control of my finances.
Now we've been here a few months, the roots we're putting down, although there's still a lot of watering to do, are growing in steady measures.

Transatlantic transactions have never been easier. I just went online to view the bank balance, went to the phone and used the mobile phone company's automated service, tapped in a few numbers and hung up. I got back to the laptop and voila! The payment had gone through before I'd got back to my seat.

Technology is a wonderful thing that I never want to be without ever again.