Life in a different culture
Hi all, here is a quick update on the latest news.
First, for all of those who remember that I had a house in Brisbane… now I don’t. That’s right, I signed a sale contract for it today and it will be sold before I leave Australia. This means I will leave Australia not owing a cent. It also provides me with the possibility of reinvesting to provide an income while in Argentina.
Continue reading “Australia – An Australian Update”
That’s right.
My friend Andrew is getting married in one week and I have arranged to be in New Zealand to see it. As I wrote this message I was about to board the plane for NZ from Sydney. Now I am in Auckland about to head north. You can read more at www.GroovyGuppy.com
Talking of that site, there has been some more information put there, including maps and further details about my up-coming trip. It’s all there under the RobAbroad menu.
So if you are in NZ then drop me an email and I will do my best to catch up with you. I return on the 3rd.
Take care, Rob.
Hi all,
Having a week of rest was wonderful for the soul. I read voraciously during that time and prayed heaps. It was very refreshing. In only one week I leave to spend 10 days in New Zealand (23th) to catch up with many good friends and see one of them married. I am really looking forward to that.
After much ado and lots of liaising with my friends around the world I finally have the ticket that will carry me around the world to my destination of Argentina – booked and paid for. The main destination countries I will travel are listed below.
Continue reading “Australia – Now I really know I am going…”
Three months after leaving New Zealand for my temporary stop-over in Australia I have much to tell. The things you would like to hear though may have to wait a little longer. I cannot give you definite dates for when I will leave, nor can I tell you how I am getting there. I can give you my current ideas, but just as they have changed from my first ideas, these too are likely to change until they are finalised.
So what has happened over these three months? Lots actually.
Continue reading “Australia – A Voice from Down Under (Part 1)”
The God Factor
Since arriving in Australia I have found myself growing strongly in God. Many bad habits that I could not seem to break during my time in New Zealand are completely gone. I am dreaming many dreams that hold significant meanings and information important to helping people resize their situation just comes to me – things that I have never heard or known of before. The voice of God is much clearer, and my desire to spend time with God keeps growing.
Continue reading “Australia – A Voice from Down Under (Part 3)”
Aprendiendo Espanol
After checking out my body and ensuring I was ready for my journey, I turned my focus toward the language of Argentina; Spanish.
Not knowing a word of Spanish initially, I trot off every Wednesday morning to see Don, my private language teacher. A typical lesson involves lots of stories about Don’s history. It is very interesting. My one hour lesson often stretches further. Don says he doesn’t mind spending the extra time because he can see that I am learning fast. With only a few months to learn I am pleased for the speed.
Continue reading “Australia – A Voice from Down Under (Part 2)”
In 1998 when I was working in Cairns Australia, God called me to go to New Zealand. About eight years before that I had seen a short video on a place called Lifeway College* over there. This was now the same place that I believed God was calling me to move to.
At the end of that year I sold up all my gear and bought a one-way ticket to New Zealand. Once at Lifeway College I studied for six months on their core course which was called the CE course. After this I moved onto the college staff. I remained there until leaving four years later.
During my time in New Zealand I had started to plan for a long term stay in the country. It was around this time that God then called me to go to South America. To be sure I understood this was important, He told several other people independently of me that I was going too. When they told me, not knowing anything of what I was thinking at the time, any doubt I may have had, had vanished.
Realising I was leaving my many friends behind and wanting to remain in contact with them, I started RobAbroad, an email list that sends to everyone at once. This way I could tell everyone at once what I was doing regarding leaving for Argentina. It has been a wonderful tool during these days of constant change.
The contents of the emails have now been placed on the internet. Not so everyone in the world can see them, but to make them more accessible to those of my friends who don’t have email but have access to a computer somehow.
In the interests of continuing friendships and maintaining contacts.
Rob.
* The Lifeway College that I knew is now sold to a NZ church and in a very different location. For that reason, I have linked to the original website through the Internet Archive. I have also provided a link to an image capture of the old Lifeway website.
First Stop – Australia…
When I left New Zealand I had no idea of the trauma it would cause me. I guess it is only natural that the more you love the more it hurts to let go. I learnt to love a lot during my time there, so it follows that I also hurt a lot too. But let me take you back a few days first and lead you into my move…
Continue reading “Transiting Australia – First Stop”
Sometime later in 2002 a feeling started to grow inside of me that told me I was leaving soon and should get ready. But leaving to where? Get ready how? I didn’t really know. My decision at that time was to throw away and sell any junk that I was hording and I thought this would be sufficient. Little did I know how much more I would have to do.
Continue reading “The Call – Late 2002”
After wanting to learn a language for a long time I decided to take a language course at University. Having considered German and Japanese first I finally rested on a course that included Spanish, French and German in a combined degree. I thought that by taking this course I could concentrate on the languages I wanted (being part-time) and therefore learn them faster. However this was not to be.
Just after this, I started making plans to visit Japan. My younger brother, Brodie, was living there and during a phone conversation the previous year I had promised him that I would visit. So without the funds to do so I was making good on my promise and looking forward to spending time over there with Brodie and John, our eldest brother, who also decided to join us.
With the feeling that God was going to move me on soon and not knowing where, I considered this trip to be a great opportunity to see what Asia was like in case this was where I would be going. So I made plans to visit China and Thailand on the way back but never made it there. It was too difficult or too expensive to work in with our planned trip, so Japan was it.
After returning home from Japan, my interest in the place had increased dramatically to the point of considering living there. I started looking for opportunities to go. I found none, but was in no rush.
One day as I was driving to work, I was thinking through the money I owed in various areas. As I was praying, I had a distinct feeling of urgency to pay out all of these debts. Although it took a while to start this process, once I became serious with it a strange thing happened. Instead of only wondering if I was moving on and if so then where, I started to get some definite directions about it all, and it happened very quickly too.
