By EK Wills
Bula everyone! This Milestone Birthday Bash is our version of Fiji!
As many of you know, this party was meant to be in Fiji but as adventures go, plans change and we brought our version of Fiji to us to create a Tiki Cocktail Party!
Now I’d like to take you on a trip through my time travel adventure over the years.
As early as 4yo, I was introduced to travelling when our nuclear family, as it was then, took an extended trip to Europe. We lived in a Bedford van for over a year and spent winter on a Greek island. Luckily, my sister and I were close!
Primary school was where I got to know the Inner West of Sydney- from Annandale North to Summer Hill Opportunity Class but the adventure moved further afield when our family became extended and the beach became the stomping ground for my teens.
I spent the summer in the surf club and the nights babysitting my younger siblings. This was where I learnt my nappy changing skills and became the responsible oldest sister!
Dad’s entrepreneurial influence saw me to a business degree and a jaunt as a manager of a little resort in FNQ for a year. At this time, I met my uni flatmate and long standing friend and since then we’ve survived a cyclone, the death of a baby lamb and many travel tales.
At this point I put into play my ‘2 year travel trip overseas’ that became a 5 year stint away…. I ventured out on my own initially but my stepmother’s family helped soften the landing for me in San Francisco. Then I toured with my longest standing school friend, in a van I purchased in Canada. It was a red ‘combi’ bought in Alberta that became known as Albert the Big Red Tomato. We did a hippy trail across the continent for about 6 months, venturing from Canada down to Baja Mexico and eventually across to Baltimore.
A change of continents, searching for employment, I secured a nannying job in London, a ski resort gig in the Alps and a cruise attendant position in the Caribbean but didn't do any of those.
I ended up teaching English in Germany, learnt the language while there and did translations for a market research company called icon. Germany became my base with my German partner, Thomas, who I’d met in Mexico. We toured in a green VW van with a windsurfer box on the roof to places like Scandinavia, the UK, then went Greek island hopping and did a circuit of Spain and Portugal, with the addition of a trip to Egypt, and a few concerts in places like Prague and Munich.
On return to Australia, and being a bit of a drama queen, I decided that film was where I wanted to work but wasn't crazy enough to go in front of the camera. I didn’t get into directing (even though many would think I was bossy enough to) but rather production design.
I spent a mad year making 10 short films then met the future father of my children. Steve and I worked in the props department on The Red Planet, so we affectionately tell everyone that we ‘met on Mars’ and subsequently the birth of each of our children was punctuated by a film that Steve worked on: The Matrix, Superman and The Wolverine.
The result is 3 very mature willing assistants at my Fiji soiree as bouncer, waitress and cocktail maker.
As they grew in school, we shared the journey with other parents who become part of our lives. Thanks to the community buzz at their schools.
I remember I had grand plans such as vacation care and weekend markets for the school to raise funds.
There were personal projects like writing a book about the birth of my first child (now self published on Amazon) and an innovative nappy pack product that went from prototype to interview with a multinational nappy company.
Continuing in the vein of not doing anything conventionally, we made sure our kids attended our wedding. They were flower girls and ring bearer at our Asian inspired event that I micromanaged. I even managed a swoon the night before the big event when putting up the decorations, receiving medical attention that night from my brother in laws.
But as all good stories go, the twist came when another adventure presented itself – the prospect of doing medicine in 4 years in a post graduate course at Wollongong University, commuting from Sydney with 3 small children and one supporting freelance income. What a fabulous idea!?
Thankfully I have found some kindred spirits to help keep me on track during the vicissitudes of medicine, some from my cohort in medical school as well as my current compatriots. Mostly long telephone conversations now replace study sessions or stolen moments for catch-ups on campus. And colleagues are the new bearers of my complaints about the health system and its inherent lack of apparent organization.
Probably the influence of my mother inadvertently led me to psychiatry. Mum has always suffered my venting sessions, tried to be supportive and advocated for holistic care.
The one person that has truly been the grounding in this adventure is my partner of many years, now husband, father of my children and facilitator of many of these lofty plans. I have him to thank for his support while I tended to hours of study, planning and execution.
My family helped to facilitate this latest incarnation of events: my milestone birthday bash. My stepmother over-catered with multitudes of canapés, my sister made a highly alcoholic coconut cocktail cake, another sister helped serve and another sister helped with the days of lead up preparation.
I am grateful that many came from different corners of the country to celebrate, like my in laws from Tasmania, friends from Queensland and family from the state’s border. Getting so many people from my life together in one room was an amazing logistical feat that can only be achieved at momentous occasions.
At this point, we come to another milestone in the road, so it will be interesting to see where the journey leads now and naturally I have a few crazy ideas brewing as I creep up to the line for advanced training in psychiatry.
Maybe I’ll turn my blog into the next installment of my career. Maybe we’ll end up on a holiday in Fiji, but that will be another story…?
For now, let the adventures continue!
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