Did we ever live in China?

Yesterday marked our first month as a repatriated Australian family.

As ex-Beijingers.

As jiaozi-addicted, faux-handbag-toting, latest-DVD-release snaffling expats.

It feels like we never lived in China. It feels like it was truly another lifetime ago – a marvelous, culture-encrusted dream, where children were educated in boutique multicultural schools, toilet bowls were scrubbed by magical pixies, food experiences were interplanetary let alone international, and where neighbours and friends made up segments of a patchwork quilt that blanketed the world.

When I look back, this expat life in China was certainly paradise in my eyes.

Our family is also in paradise here. It’s just a different kind of paradise. It’s a lot quieter, a lot cleaner, a lot more convenient. I can speak the language fluently, for one thing, and that always helps things move more smoothly. There’s also fewer cultural sticking points to navigate and the range of ice cream flavours is truly mindboggling.

The thing is this: we weren’t worried about coming Home. We were worried about leaving Home. Leaving our Beijing Home. It’s always hard to leave home and Beijing became Home for us.

Yet coming Home to Aus is also wonderful.

The paradox. That standoff between feeling thrilled to be back in Australia and devastated to leave China has kind of neutralized itself into simply feeling numb.

Hence, we are still torn. All four of us. We are settling in nicely here but we are also howling like dingoes at an outback moon for the Jing. Our feelings shift and change daily. Sometimes we delight in the endless blue Canberra skies, lung-pinkening air and kookaburras, yet other times we just want clouds and to throw an old boot at that cackling be-feathered menace outside our early-morning window.

The house is now in some semblance of order. The boxes are all officially unpacked. We had few breakages, nothing went missing and I’ve already made a fortune on eBay selling off the junk. I’ve almost managed to cram our Life into cupboards – some stuff is still free-floating, as most expats collect more than they can cram. Not to worry – two more small cabinets, and she’ll be right, mate.

All of us seem busier. My husband has settled into his new role well but finds himself hooked up to the laptop under well after the late movie each night. He, like the wonderful man he is, also chips in around the house and has become an overnight veggie patch expert. We even harvested potatoes on the weekend, can you believe that? And on my kitchen bench lies a small crop of fresh peaches, ripening and fragrant. This weekend we’ll be transplanting coriander, parsley, carrots, cucumber, lettuce and capsicum, all grown from seed.

In Beijing, all I did was kill orchids. Feels good to get my hands into the earth again.

The kids have fallen into a rhythm at their new school and my only concern is that the curriculum may not be challenging enough. I’m giving it time and watching them carefully. In the meantime, the school, despite being quadruple the size of BSB Sanlitun, is just wonderful and both kids have made friends.

Riley took longer than expected to achieve this, which was a shock. Perhaps it was his well-travelled, expat intensity but the laid back Aussie kids at school would take one look at him and run. This terrorized me for a while. But then my husband said this to me: “He will soon learn how to fit in.” This also terrorized me, but fitting in, he is.

As for me, yes I’m ironing, scrubbing loos and even cooking. My dear sweet family is gobbling down dinner with much patience as I attempt to retrain myself on the time required to steam broccoli as opposed to carrot. Trust me, there has been many a dodgy dinner disaster of late, but I’m getting better.

Oh how I miss Din Tai Fung.

Although I’ve had the odd day where I’ve wanted to fold myself up like a sheet and lay on the bed and avoid it all, I’m surprised to be coping with the housework ok. It’s not that I don’t like housework, it’s that it happens to take time. Suddenly the kids are scuffing their school shoes up to the front door and I haven’t even put a comb through my hair let alone work on my next book.

THAT is my challenge right now. Creating eight more hours in the day.

Speaking of which, I must go wash the sheets. How do you fold a fitted sheet again?

Tania McCartney