December Update

Merry Christmas friends and family!
Our container of household goods arrived at our doorstep the last Saturday in November. It is was like Christmas had come early! I missed our sofa and bed the most. I think for Rachel it was her piano and bedroom furniture and for the kids it was their toys.
Well, the kids have just finished up school for this year. They are now on summer vacation (again) for 6 weeks and then they will begin a new school year and a new grade at the end of January. Rachel has been accepted to the University of Queensland to study Marine Biology. It is a three year course so she will be able to get work in her field before we return to the states in 2012. She begins school in February. Duane will get two weeks off during the Christmas break. We are planning some snorkeling on Morton Island, visiting Underwater World, two nights in a hotel at Noosa beach and rain forest, visiting the Mt. Coot-tha Botanical gardens and lookout point, and hiking some trails. The kids are very excited.
On Sunday, Dec. 21, the kids will be participating in the Children's Christmas program at church. Duane also wants us to schedule an open house during his time off. We also need to get our Christmas shopping completed before this next week. Duane will be ready to get back to work and rest by the time his break is over.
We miss not having Michael with us. I know he misses us also. If any of you get a chance, please send him an e-mail just to say hello. I know he would greatly appreciate it. mhengst3@gmail.com
I do not have a mailing address for him. He is stationed for the next three years in San Diego California on the USS Nimitz . It is grounded for renovations and repairs and is due to go out to sea in June. In October, Michael and Lauren became engaged! They both want to wait to set a date sometime after Lauren finishes college which will be a couple of years.
I am on the veranda typing this blog. The birds are incredibly chattery this morning. The Currongs, Ravens, Kookaburras, Noisy Miner birds and Lorikeets are all competing for airspace. It's wonderful to listen to them. Many of the baby birds are leaving the nests for the first time. I enjoy watching them as they visit our veranda looking for bread or fruit. For awhile the ravens would come and peck on the windows for food; talk about spoiled! A few nights ago we were visited by a Powerful Owl. That was neat!
Our family wishes you all a very merry CHRISTmas as we celebrate our savior's birth!

A new animal

I have a new animal for you all. We were at our South African neighbors house last night for dinner when we saw this opossum. This is actually the second one we saw, the first one left without eating anything. We were having dinner outside on the deck, when this one appeared on the tree. It climbed towards us and watched for a few minutes before it seemed to decide that we were safe enough to eat next to. Our neighbors have this bird feeder hanging right over the edge of the deck, and apparently opossums like bird seed. We also threw in some cheese and apple spice cake, which it enjoyed. The spice cake seemed to be a favorite. Even though we have opossums in Texas, I always thought that they were pretty ugly. But these two guys (girls?) were so cute! Anyway I just thought I'd put up some pictures that I took of it.

Settling In

G'day mates!
We have made good progress this past week as far as getting settled. Just this week we purchased a fridge and a washing machine. Duane bought a bike to tackle the ever rolling hills and for exercise. Yesterday, Rachel and I took the train into the city and attained a Queensland driver's licence. We also stopped by the Australian blood bank and both of us donated blood. Rachel applied for a job yesterday at Australian National Geographic store and by evening they called her for an interview for this Saturday. She has applied for schooling at three universities this past week. They will contact her in January to let her know if she gets in or not. We also held a bible study at our house on Friday evening. The month of November, I will be teaching Sunday school for Our Redeemer in Kallangur. Yes, I think we are finally settling in.
Our furniture has not arrived as of yet. The last we were told, the ship is stuck in heavy traffic trying to get through the Asian port and will hopefully make it to Brisbane November 6th. We just hope that it makes it to port and clears customs by Christmas! The children have done remarkably well without their toys. We are sleeping with our travel size pillows in sleeping bags on beds that we are renting. A friend of Rachel's loaned her some sheets and a blanket for her bed just this week. I think sheets and regular sized pillows is the only thing that I really miss and perhaps a clock. We also purchased a patio set for the veranda. Our furniture rental is up the 10th of November so we will probably not renew it. We have everything that we need now except a sofa, TV, and beds. We will purchase some air mattresses to get us through.
By the way, my e-mail (Stacey's) was finally cut off last week.
Please e-mail me at hengst1962@gmail.com.
To celebrate Rachel giving blood for the first time, We are going out for lunch today. There are no familiar chain restaurants in our area. They do have fast food chains, but nothing like Denny's, Red Lobster, or Olive Garden. Just an interesting fact: Out Back is not in Australia! Australians have never heard of Out Back Steak House. I thought that was funny!
There are plenty of KFC, Mc Cafes (Donalds), Pizza Hut, Dominoes Pizza, Hungry Jacks (Burger King), and Subway. Their chains are called names such as Hog's Breath and Pig N Whistle. Sounds appetizing, huh?
Most of the nice restaurants are pubs and very pricey. There is no place for good affordable family dining, at least we haven't found any. That's alright. Nothing beats home cooking anyway!
Driving has gotten so much easier. A roundabout is simply an intersection in the form of a circle without stop signs or traffic lights. Sounds thrilling doesn't it? It is! Australians are not big on traffic lights or stop signs. Roundabouts are popular. Downtown Brisbane does use lights rather than roundabouts. I have driven through downtown Brisbane more in the last month, than I ever drove through downtown Houston in the thirty years that I lived there.
Yep, Our gracious Lord and Savior is certainly watching over the Hengst family! We are missing our piano and our Lutheran Hymnal. We have family devotions every Wednesday evening and we would love for Rachel to play some hymns for us. We will also us it for nights that we host Bible study. The Hymnal here is alright, but we miss what we are familiar with. We do sing hymns without the piano but it would be nice for Rachel's playing to keep us on key! We are certainly not the Von Trap family singers!
We are settling in just fine, finally, but we do miss all of you. We would love to get e-mails from you! Sally, would you please give my new e-mail address to Jeannie so that I can still receive the prayer chain? Thanks!
May the Lord keep you all in His gracious care!

A very late post

Sorry for not posting in so long! We've all been busy and I don't think that any of us have even thought about it for a while. Everyone is doing well. Amy and Caleb have been back in school for a week after their two week spring break. They are both still enjoying school and seem to be doing well. Mom and Dad have been trying to continue the settling in process although I think some of it at least is pretty frustrating. The house we are renting and moved into is working out okay although I for one am upset that it is for sale already. Yesterday we found out that our shipment from the states is delayed again and will probably not arrive in Brisbane until the 2nd week of November. We them have to wait for it to get through customs which could take another 4 weeks! As we keep telling ourselves, at least we'll have it by Christmas. We've found it very hard to get much of anything done. As we try to change our address with companies in the states, we've found that it is nearly impossible. Mom and I have also found that getting me a bank account is difficult. They need a certain amount of Australian I.D. to open the account, most of which I don't have and never will have (e.g. an Australian birth certificate). Getting a Queensland driver's license has been confusing also, although we think we may have found a way now. Mom is more comfortable with driving around Indooroopilly now and I don't think she gets out of the car with her legs shaking anymore, which is good news. I myself have driven twice and I think scared Mom to death the first time (for no good reason, I might add) but she seemed fine with it the second time around. For once I think that Dad is the one in the family with the least driving experience. Because he only drives occasionally and is still set in his American driving ways, Mom has passed him up! That may not last long, but it will hold up for now. I have been busy applying for university and jobs. I am nearly sick of them, but have to perservere if I hope to be able to pay for school. Because I am not completely sure what I want to study (although it has been narrowed down), I applied for something a little different at each of three universities. At the University of Queensland (UQ) I put my two preferences as being 1) Bachelor of Science (Marine Biology)
2)Bachelor of Science/Laws (Psychology/Law)
At the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) I put three preferences.
1) Bachelor of Behavioural Science/Laws (Psychology/Laws)
2) Bachelor of Justice (primary major - criminology, secondary major - law)
3) Bachelor of Applied Science (primary major - forensic science, secondary major - biochemistry)
I also applied at a third university (Griffith University) where I put down three choices of study.
1) Bachelor of Forensic Science/ Bachelor of Criminology and Criminal Justice
2) Bachelor of Psychological science/ Bachelor of Criminology and Criminal Justice
3) Bachelor of Marine Science (marine biology)
If I get accepted into all three universities, I'm not sure how I'll decide which to go to. They all cost around the same and while some are closer to my house than others, the difference is not that big. One of the factors that I'll use is how long it takes to complete the degree. A degree of psychology and law take between 1 and 2 1/2 years longer to complete than the other degrees. If I took that major, I'd have to obtain another visa because mine expires after 4 years and I would want to finish the degree here. Anyway, aside from that not much is going on. Hopefully I will be able to convince Mom to post soon. We hope everyone back home is doing good and we miss y'all!

Our House

For some of you who do not have contact info for us, here it is!
Our address. 129 Russell Terrace
Indooroopilly, QLD, AU. 4068
Stacey's e-mail hengst@sbcglobal.net
Duane's e-mail 1981cougar@gmail.com
Duane's work duane.hengst@toowoombapipeline.com.au
Amy's e-mail amyehengst@gmail.com
Rachel's e-mail oxfay321@yahoo.com
Michael's e-mail mhengst3@gmail.com
Caleb's email is the same as mine (we share)
If anyone sends a letter through the mail, please write air mail on it and pay postage accordingly, otherwise the mail comes by ship and takes weeks to get here.
Our house is pretty neat. It is an old home but has been updated. The floors are all timber except in the laundry room and loo (toilet area) where it is tiled. Amy's room has carpet.
There is a huge veranda off from the dining area and we spend time out there watching all of the beautiful birds. The Kookaburras are the most fun to listen to. They sound as if they are laughing. It is quite contagious. There are tons of Cockatoos also. They are so pretty and very noisy. Both the kookaburra and the cockatoo will fly as close to you as they can. They are not a bit bothered by humans. A Kookaburra landed on some play equipment that Amy was on and she could have reached out and touched it. It stayed there for a long time with her playing all around it. It even began to make its hilarious laugh for us. It flew off once and then came right back flying between Caleb and I and almost touching both of us with it's wings. Cockatoos are also very entertaining. If you can get the attention of a bored Cockatoo, they will perform for you; showing off spreading their wings and hanging upside down on a branch or dancing on a limb bobbing their heads and turning them 360 degrees. The Lorikeets are also beautiful but not as much fun to watch. Anyway, we like to spend time on the veranda. I'll have Rachel post some pictures of our house. We are renting it. The owners put it on the market to sell last week. I hope for their sake that they sell it quickly. It is a nice house. The owners have assured us that they will honor our lease agreement.
Our furniture is still on the ship. It left Italy a couple of weeks ago and is due to arrive in Brisbane on or about October 9th. Customs will have it anywhere from two weeks to a month before we get it. We have been renting beds and sleeping with our sleeping bags but it is nearing summertime here and it is getting very warm. We may have to break down and borrow some sheets from church members who have offered them. There is no central air or heat in the house. There is a ceiling fan in the living room and all of the bedrooms and their is a wall unit in the master bedroom. I suppose that when it gets very hot that our bedroom will be the living and sleeping area.
Rachel's bedroom is down stairs. She has her own bathroom and a huge living area down there. Of course there is no furniture yet. She also has a veranda right out the back of her bedroom. The master bedroom also has a very nice veranda.
Mt. Cootha Forest is just up the street from us; within walking distance. It has lots of hiking and biking trails and some horseback riding trails. I still need to check it out! There is also some Aboriginal art work that is open to the public at Mt. Cootha. Just about six houses up from us and across the street , is the Green Hill reservoir and from the top of it, (at night), you can see downtown Brisbane's lit up buildings and the valley so clearly. We live up a hill but to get to this outlook it's an even bigger hill. Duane asked if i wanted a bike for leisure. I had to say no. It is tough enough walking up and down these hills. I can't imagine biking them although I see alot of men biking. Duane loves a challenge . He is actively looking to purchase a bike so that he can fully enjoy the terrain. I admire his spirit!
I hope this blog helps you to see and know more about where we are. We would love to get e-mails from you and keep in touch! If there is something that you would like to see on our blog, please let us know. By the way, Queensland does not change their clocks twice a year. It is bright daylight here by about 5:10 am. It is getting daylight earlier and earlier as we approach summer. We wake up early and go to bed early!

laundry adventures

Our house is set up with a washing machine and a clothesline. The clothesline is on a hill therefore I really have to stretch to reach some of the lines in order to hang out the wash. This is not a problem unless I am taking the wash off of the line after dark and as I'm stretching to reach the clothespin with my mouth open, I notice something running across the line directly above my face. It was only a lizard, but before I realized that, I quickly let go of the line and it flung the poor lizard right off. I'm just happy it didn't fall into my mouth! Our neighbor just informed me that he has a Carpet Snake (Python) living under his house. They average six and a half feet in length but can grow to 10 feet with no dramas. He said it was huge! I would not mind it living under our house and eating rodents and other snakes as long as I didn't step on it on a dark night while retrieving the laundry from the line. I understand that pythons of that length and especially carpet snakes as common as grass snakes. One website said that there was only one report that a carpet snake tried to eat a seven year old boy. I think with all of the bush turkeys around here that all of carpet snakes stay well fed! I have noticed that cats are not popular around here or small dogs.
I'll post pictures of our house on the next blog.

More Australian Animals

These are just a few more pictures for you all to see. One of them is another picture of a cockatoo, which I already posted a picture of. The bird that is running is a bush turkey. We get several of them hanging around usually. They particularly like to hang out in our neighbor's backyard. The frog (toad?) was in the park one time when we went. I don't know what kind it is, but maybe one of us will find out soon. The last bird is a Kookaburra. We have just recently begun to spot these birds in the trees. I got lucky enough to get some decent pictures of this one at the park because we spotted it land in a nearby tree. No kangaroo or koala spottings yet, but hopefully they'll show up eventually!

Aussie Nature

These are just a few pictures of the local Australian nature. The smaller black and white bird is a magpie. We see them around frequently and they can be pretty agressive during nesting season. Just yesterday one of our neighbors was "attacked" by one at the park. It left a mark on her cheek. The lizard is a water dragon. I took this picture by the Brisbane River. They also hang around by the creek that runs through the campus of Amy and Caleb's school. The white bird in the tree is a cockatoo. We have seen many of them in the trees surrounding the school and park. They are very noisy and if you can keep the attention of one, they will show off for you. The tree in the next picture is called a parasite tree. It takes over a regular tree and starts to grow roots from the branches. They grow until the reach the ground and make the tree seem even larger. In one of the local parks they have several of these type of trees. I am not sure what the bird in the last picture is called, but they hang around some of the parks and outdoor shopping areas. They walk around with the pigeons looking for food and Caleb has a lot of fun chasing them around! They may look big, but they are easily scared away by running boys, magpies, and the much smaller miner bird. I will hopefully put some more pictures on soon.

Shopping experiences

There are two major grocery stores in Queensland, Woolworth's and Cole's. They close at 9:00pm M-F and close at 5:00pm on weekends. The malls and all other retail stores close at 5:00 everyday except Thursdays. On Thursdays they close at 9:00pm. You can imagine the crowds!
Restaurants, petrol stations, and bars are open late. Actually the bars are called hotels and they are open all night. After 3:00 am the bars lock the doors and continue to serve alcohol until 6:00am. Then they unlock the door and let their customers go home. Legal drinking and smoking age is 18.
I miss my Walmart one stop shopping.
One can purchase groceries at the grocery store, first aid creme, band aids, vitamins, and make up at the Chemist, wine and beer at the liquor store, books at the book store, school uniforms at the school, photo developing is done in various stores in the mall. You can't purchase a shop vac from a hardware store, you must go to an appliance store. Appliances and electronics are sold at the same store but you must check out in different lanes according to what you purchased. Oh, how I miss my Walmart! (and they say, "no dramas")

Australianisms

Here is brief list of some different word usage:
casual vacancies mean that a business is hiring part time help
a mystery bag is a sausage
How ya goin is the standard greeting
water table is a ditch
car park is a parking garage
a sink mixer is the faucet
windscreen is the windshield
no worries and no dramas are a favorite!
tow bar is a hitch
boot is the trunk
flat batteries instead of dead batteries
when you get gas, you top up your tank
chase up means to look for something
hash is the pound key on a phone
arvo means afternoon
prang is a car wreak or crash
Everything gets shortened such as Woolworth's is Woollies, brekky is breakfast, Maccas is McDonald's.
We will add more as we hear them!

Indooroopilly State School

Amy and Caleb survived their first week of public school without a blemish. They are required to wear uniforms and if they are outside for morning tea (recess), they must wear their hats. Both children have made friends and seem to settle in quite nicely. Caleb did mention that nobody else prays at lunchtime, but he still does. I hope that he continues! The school is just a short walk down the hill and up half a hill. We do not cross any streets. It is great! They walk to and from school every day. They went to school for one week and then took one week off for Spring break and have one more week of break left before they go back. Caleb was put into the 3rd term of 1st grade because he is so much bigger than the prep kids. Because school begins here in February and Caleb Has a late birthday for the states, he is actually a year behind the other children. The same is for Amy but they went ahead and put her at the end 2nd grade instead of 3rd . Caleb is doing well. This area is a melting pot of foreigners. Children are put into regular classes without being able to speak or understand English. The teacher said that Caleb is doing just fine. No dramas! (They love to say that here)

There is only one school district in the state and it is the Queensland school district. State schools do not provide transportation for the students. There are no school sanctioned athletics. The private schools do have sport programs but not the public schools. Since there is no public transportation and all the schools are in the same district, parents may enroll their children in their school of choice as long as there is room. Indooroopilly is always filled up and you must be put on a waiting list if you live outside of the catchment area. (immediate area around the school) If you live within the boundaries or catchment then the school must let you attend. Some people put their children on public buses to get them to school and some arrive in taxis. We walk!

I thought you might enjoy pictures of Amy and Caleb in their school uniforms and a couple of pics by the river. They both like their school so far. I'm pleased with it also. I do wish we could get Caleb into something physical. He stands on our fence and climbs up on neighbor's metal roof. I'm afraid that he is going to loose a foot. He also can climb straight up the veranda pole which is very tall. I'll keep you posted...perhaps they have stunt man activities locally!

Home at last

Hey everyone! We hope all of you Houstonians are doing okay after the hurricane and we've been thinking about you a lot. We have moved into our new house (as of 2 weeks ago, actually) and we are enjoying being out of the motel. An interesting thing we've learned is that we were definitely staying in a motel and not a hotel. According to some of the people at church, in Australia a hotel is a pub, not a place where most people would stay the night. Anyway, our house is quite nice after the month in a motel and we are enjoying the space we have here. Hopefully one of us will be posting more pictures soon. We have just gotten internet service again and that is the reason for the long delay in posting. Amy and Caleb have both started school and just in time too as they are now on a 2 week spring break! They seemed to like the one week of school that they attended and have both made friends. Caleb has gotten especially lucky because a boy who is also 6 lives right behind us, and they are already great friends. More updates to come soon!

Housing in the Brisbane area

Just a blog to note the difference between what we are used to in the states and the housing here. Most of the houses close to the city are very old. To get the more modern homes, you have to move farther away from the city. Most of the older homes do not have central are or heat. They have one or two units in the house to cool and heat. Bathrooms and garages are not so important. A house can have 5 bedrooms and one bathroom and either no garage or a 1 car garage. Most of the flooring is either timber or tile or both. I only saw one house with carpeting while we were house hunting. Closets are also not important. Many of the houses only have a closet in the master bedroom, either a built-in or a free standing wardrobe. Verandas are popular! Queenslanders are very popular and old. A Queenslander is usually a 2-3 bedroom house on stilts with timber flooring, no closets and a wrap around porch. Parking and storage is under the house along with the laundry room.
The clothes dryers are not vented out of the houses so you can imagine the humidity on laundry days. Every yard has a clothesline to dry laundry.
All of the toilets in Brisbane have two buttons on top of the tank. One is for a half flush and the other is for a full flush. This is part of their water conservation efforts. Many of the toilets are down the hall from the rest of the bathroom. Hmm. Sinks are not necessarily built into the counter. Some have large bowls that sit on top and are plumbed into the counter.
The power here is 240 volts. All of the outlets have a on/off switch for each plug. The outlet must be turned off before plugging anything into it and turned off before unplugging anything. We are never to leave an outlet on when not in use.
Some of the bedrooms are very small. We struggled finding a house with 2 bathrooms and a house that could hold our size furniture. The furniture here is much more condensed. One house that we looked at had a built in toddler bed and just room enough for a small chest of drawers. and the other bedroom had a built in twin bed with storage under it and room for a small chest of drawers. Absolutely no room for toys or walking room. We have two long dressers with mirrors and night stands so it wasn't easy to find a big enough master and a room big enough for Rachel's furniture.
There are no neighborhoods here. They are called suburbs. Sometimes the suburbs are big and sometimes they are tiny. They are all accountable to the Brisbane City authority. You can go through several suburbs in just minutes.
The house we found has two stories, 4 bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, 3 verandas, timber flooring, a one car garage, laundry off of the kitchen. 2 bedrooms have closets and there is a airconditioner in the master bedroom and I can't remember if the living area has one or not. It is a short walk down the sidewalk to the park and primary school without crossing any streets. Mt Cootha Forest is down the street in the opposite direction. The train station that Duane will use to travel to work is about a mile from our house. I will probably drop him off and pick him up on workdays. We get the keys tonight so I'll post pictures at a later date.

Driving in Australia

Every motor car ride is an adventure, whether your the driver or the passenger!
The terrain is very hilly, much like San Francisco only much larger. Anyone sitting in the back seat has to have their windows partially opened so that they don't get ill. road signs appear only at the intersection, never before. If you are familiar with the roads, you better have plenty of time on your hands. there is no such thing as turning around on the main roads. you need to have a key map with you to find roads that intersect with the road that you need to be on. We bought a vehicle today in Fortitude Valley which is maybe a 10 minute drive. It took us well over an hour to find our way back to the hotel. "You just can't get there from here."
The turn signal is on the right side of the steering wheel so we are constantly turning on our windshield wipers (much to the embarrassment of Rachel). You would think that after the 50th time, that we wouldn't do it. That's what 30 years of driving will do to you. The hills pose problems of their own. Automatic transmission vehicles have a truly tough time chugging up a hill loaded with people. Folks driving with stick shifts find it terribly tough to stop at the top of a huge hill and not roll backwards into the car behind them when the light turns green. When we first arrived here in Australia, I thought that the roundabouts were scary. Now I think that driving where you have not been before is scary. I'll have to take a picture of some of the road signs and put them on the blog. Never seen anything like some of them before. I have no idea what they mean.
Duane said that he is determined to enjoy AND appreciate this whole new on road experience. My prayers are with him!

More pictures

Way Different

As a fellow Texan in the office related today, some things here are surprisingly like those back in the states, and other things are way different. The way cell phone service is purchased is confusing, but so is simply making a phone call. Prices/costs are through the roof for rent, for most food items, for a coca-cola, but laptops, mowers, and other food items are similar in price. How about this, for 6-month savings deposit the bank will pay 8%pa. And that's not for huge sums either, how about for only$10k deposit?!

Autos on the other hand are some of the expensive items. A new Honda Legend (yes HONDA Legend!) runs $75000, that'd be more like $50,000 in the states. But then a new Honda Accord Euro runs $32,500, very similar to the States again.

We don't hear a whole lot of what is going on in the States, we hear mildly about the Presidential Election, but we get the US Open tennis tournament every day, match after match.

Some public policies are interesting: it is the law that every bicycle rider must wear a helmet, but 18-yr olds are allowed to purchase cigarettes and purchase alcohol - i suppose the purpose is to get more purchases AND more GST (that's goods and services tax). Of course income taxes are referred to as PAYG (pay as you go) taxes. What is kinda cool is that prices, such as laptop computers, etc. are listed in the stores to include all taxes, so whatever the advertised price is, that is the total you pay at the register.

Gotta go...more later.....perhaps.

Hi everyone! These are a few pictures that I have finally managed to upload for the blog. They are pictures that I took of the river and the city from the CityCat (the city ferry). I am also trying to get my parents to add something to the blog, and I hope they will do that soon. We have found a house to rent this past weekend and we hope to be moving in very soon. Our furniture and other belongings probably won't get here until mid October, so we are looking into renting furniture until that time. The house we're going to rent is a 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom house in the Brisbane suburb of Indooroopilly. This location puts us pretty close to both the city and the university where I am planning on applying. Hopefully there will be some more pictures and updates coming soon.

We're finally here!

Okay, so we've been here for about 2 and 1/2 weeks now, but still! We are all so excited and what we've seen of the city so far in pretty cool. I (Rachel) have decided to start this blog so that anyone in our family can tell everyone back home what we've been up to. I will try to post some pictures and other things soon so if you check in and there isn't much here, check back soon. Hopefully we will regularly update this page with a little something. I hope everyone is having a great day and one of us will be back soon with more!