What does $1,850 AUD in rent get you?

• Roughly 1,100 sq ft
• An older 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom house
• Only 2 of 3 bedrooms with built in robes (we call them closets)
• No dishwasher (unless Jeremy counts)
• No place to put a clothes dryer (oh wait, we have a clothes line outside and we spent $6.50 on a clothes hang dryer for our house to put in front of our one heater on the wall for when it's cold) - However, this is actually more common than having a dryer here at all. Most people don't have them or use them.
• No A/C - Summer in the heat at Christmas doesn't sound pleasant
• One small heater on the wall to heat your whole house *It is also more common NOT to have air conditioning and heating.  We were told to make sure we have lots of blankets for the winter.
• No double pane windows so the insulation is not good (again... no one has these here)
• No garbage disposal – I haven't seen anyone that has one yet. Even the million dollar apartment we lived in Kingston didn’t have one.
• Internet takes a month to get hooked up (we are still using the wi-fi connection that we pay for by the download.
• My phone already doesn't have anything special on it... no call waiting, no online connection
• We live in the very last city of the ACT (Australian Capital Territory) before we are no longer considered in the ACT.
• It takes 15-20 minutes to get anywhere

(Update 5/7/12) We turn our heater on in the morning and at night for a bit before we turn in. It is between 30-40 degrees Fahrenheit (0-3 degrees Celsius) here and sometimes colder at night; so it gets pretty cold. I worry if the boys are warm all night long. We have been hanging our wet clothes from washing in front of the heater and it makes them dry so much faster. So, it hasn’t actually been too bad not having a dryer. However, when we were at church yesterday, none of my family wore coats. I’ve never had to wear one at church before, but everyone else had one on. The church hadn’t turned the heat on during church time. Also, our bishop’s wife came over to babysit on Saturday night so Jeremy and I could have a night out for our anniversary and she came over with a blanket and was surprised how warm it was in our home. She said they haven’t turned their heat on yet. Jeremy and I started getting nervous how much we had used our heater. Today at work someone told Jeremy that they used their heater as much as we have been using ours and their quarterly bill for gas alone was $1,200. (sigh) So, today I bundled the kiddos up for winter and we turned the heat off.  I don’t want to end up with a $1,200 bill as a surprise. It’s weird to see how much the cultures are different in America in that regard. I’ve been told that in Utah if you don’t pay your gas bill and if you have kids, they still won’t turn it off in the winter. I don’t know if that’s true, but it is definitely not the same outlook here. People just don’t even turn their heat on. Now I’m for sure going to worry how warm my kids are all the time during the coldest parts of the year. We have lots of blankets and warm pajamas for them, but they all kick the blankets off all night. We are always putting the blankets back on them.


(Update 5/27/12) A couple of people gave us electric space heaters. We still try to use them sparingly because I remember if we would use them too much in Utah, it made the heating bill go up there. Who knows what it would do here. You pay your utilities quarterly here, so we still haven't gotten our first bill. I'm still grateful for the heaters though because sometimes it is hard to get warm right before bed.

I feel like this is a story you would hear when someone goes on their mission. I had a perspective change when writing about our own story. I only ever looked at mission experiences as a short term "experience" in your life. But the reality of it is that people are really living like this every day. I know you may think, "Duh Tara"... but, it didn't hit me the same way until we were actually here living so differently than at home. It's not like we are even in a third world country or anything, but I sure do appreciate all the things we have grown up with. We've never known any other way. I will post pics of our house soon.