Last night I tried to sit and take stock of the last week or so because quite simply I do not know whether I am coming or going just now. That wasn’t easy either as there was some kind of cleaning frenzy taking place chez Von Trapps. Every now and then the activities of a tribe of mess-making kids, me and the Phantom Untidiers who inhabit our house leave just too much to clear up and so the Great Clearer-Upper gets to work and turns the whole place inside out to clean it. So it was that I had, for part anyway, to join in.

Anyway some things are quite clear. I received a welcome phone call last week informing me that my situation d’emploi is set to change for the better and see me in a new office somewhere on the south-side of Sydney, Australia.

Excellent news indeed but merely the beginning of the increasingly complex process to actually get permission to go there. Gone are the days when one could simply call up the Embassy, make an appointment to see someone and fill out a standard form to confirm you actually were the person you said you were, get a stamp in your passport and book your flight or your boat ticket.

These days it’s incredible what has to be done. So much so, that I wouldn’t even dream of describing it here, suffice to say that we need photos of everyone, medicals for everyone, X-rays for some of us, proof that we are who we say we are (that’s going to be hard for the Phantom Untidiers), lists of what we’ve done at work confirmed to be true by the people who employed us, copies of bank statements, copies of qualifications, copies of letters to us, copies of photos of us and more official multi-page forms all filled out with even more copies and lists. And everything that has to be copied has to be a genuine certified copy that it is a real copy. Certified by someone who everyone knows is really and truly who they say they are. Thus ruling out the Phantom Untidiers as people who can certify our documents.

You get my drift. You can also see why it’s necessary to take stock because no matter how we try to simply make a checklist of things to do that we can tick off as we get them done, it seems like the process for getting to Australia is at the moment stuck in first gear revving its nuts off.

We will somehow find a way to change into second gear, that is assuming I don’t get felled by the mop handle sticking through the banisters, left there by the Great Clearer-Upper as I came down the stairs last night…