London Life, New Years 2012

A traditional part of New Year's Eve, besides fireworks, champagne and singing Auld Lang Syne; is to reflect on the year gone by and think back to where you had been the previous 31 December and the resolutions made and how quickly they were subsequently broken.
As the clocks ticked over into 2012, we reminisced on the year that had been - moving from Melbourne to London, kicking off a series of weekend trips around Europe, starting new jobs, meeting new friends and absorbing ourselves into a new city with its culture, food and history.



New Years 2011
A year ago, our last day of 2010 had been spent on a plane travelling back from Mackay, QLD after a week cruising on a 100 year old tall ship in the Whitsunday Islands. The timing of the trip was quite fortunate, as we narrowly missed the flooding and cyclone that hit not long after.

On that evening, our plane had landed close to 10pm and adhering to the speed limit, we reached back home with 10 minutes to spare before 2011 arrived. We joined neighbours on the embankment opposite our house to watch the sky light up with fireworks over the city. And seeing Melbourne light up as the clock struck midnight, both of us reconfirmed that the year would result in a considerable change in our life and we were committed 100% to the relocation to London - in addition, the non-refundable one-way plane ticket was also a sign that we couldn't back out.

New Year's Eve, 2011 - Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank

Welcoming 2012
We saw in the 2012 year at a New Year's Eve party at Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank. The party had the interesting name of 'Guilty Pleasures Party' and we hung out with our Melbourne expat friends - May, Francis, Yvonne and Jason. The night involved performances by the 'Britain's Got Talent' - Dream Bears performers - a trio of men that dress up in costumes - Google and YouTube will be able to enlighten you with the quality of 'talent' that they possessed; and other 'acts' and dancing.

The firework display (rumored to cost £100,000 per minute) was spectacular. Fireworks were ejected from the iconic London Eye that was about 500 metres from where we were standing. However we were still close enough to the action on the Festival Hall terrace to be hit by ash debris on our clothing and into our plastic cups of Prosecco.

As anticipated (Mei refusing to wear heels that night), the 'free' public transport system fell into chaos and we ended up walking the entire 3 miles home, passing by many intoxicated individuals and people in heated confrontations with cab drivers.

The Eye just before midnight

Fireworks being projected from the Eye

The smoke and light made it as bright as daylight

Then the sky turned pink

And bright red to welcome in 2012

Reflecting on 2011
Our recollection of January, twelve months previous began with the memory of how 'hot' Melbourne was during the peak of summer. It was even hotter due to us voluntarily shutting ourselves in a garage painting planks of pickets for Project Fence. Perhaps the most under-estimated project that we had ever embarked to replace the 400 or so pieces of timber surrounding our front yard, double coated in off-white Solarguard by hand. This project (originally estimated at a week at most) stretched for most of January and into February.

February was the month of us 'selling' everything from the car, PS3, TV and sorting through our entire clothing collection into piles of 'charity', 'bin' and 'consideration for UK'. For Mei, this took several attempts and the local Salvation Army dumpster was the beneficiary. February was the month that both of us finished up at our jobs in Melbourne and bid farewell to colleagues with many 'farewell drinks' and then had days of 'free' time to pack up the house for rental and relocate 10 minutes down the road. Both of us took a trip to Sydney - Mei heading out with the girls for a boozy weekend away, Olie joining up on the Sunday to catch up with his cousin; and both of us overlooking the gate-closure time for the flight and almost missed our plane back.

March came around the corner quickly. With bridesmaid duties to attend to, two weddings, our official farewell drinks and a combined family dinner partnered with Mei's dad's 65th birthday - it was a month that flew by. The final week was spent weighing our luggage to try and reach the magical 20kg each imposed by Malaysian airlines and looking back, it was all the possessions we were taking to start our new life in the UK. March 29th  came and with tears we said goodbye at the departure gate and waited for our flight to Kuala Lumpur.

And as for the rest of the year, we can point to the respective blog entries - the food, the places we have been to, the hours spent at airports, the people we have met and the activities we have experienced as a tourist, made 2011 memorable for many reasons. Countries visited from then to now: Malaysia, Thailand, UK, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, France, Germany, Poland, Belgium, Italy, Vatican City, Spain, Austria.

And what does 2012 bring? More new experiences, a milestone birthday for Mei and a milestone big day in the month of May.

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