Corkonians Abroad: The beach is up the road from us in Oz

Tell us about your early life in Cork, Aoife:

I’m from Bishopstown and grew up the youngest of five. My parents were of Kerry, Tipperary, and Waterford stock. They used to live in Summerstown, near Wilton, but moved to Bishopstown the year I was born in the late 1970s.

I would say I had a great childhood in suburbia. I spent my time playing rounders or tip-the-can out on the road with all the neighbours’ children, most of whom are still friends. We would go home for dinner or when it was getting dark.

We played tennis in Murphy’s Farm sometimes, rode our bikes, and climbed trees on the green near the old Dunnes Stores.

I always loved in later years, when it was Christmas, one of the neighbours would host drinks and the now adult children would have their own drinks party in another house on the road. We had such craic having not seen each other all year.

Where do you currently live?

I currently live in Bunbury, Western Australia. It’s a regional coastal town about two hours south of Perth. The population is around 90,000.

When and why did you move there?

I moved here with my husband and toddler in 2012. We had both done the backpacking thing in the early 2000s (we met in Sydney) and had always talked about coming back to Australia in the future.

I took redundancy from my job in Dublin in 2011, so we decided to make the move.

We had originally planned on Perth, but my husband was offered a job and sponsorship visa in Bunbury.

I we looked it up on YouTube as we knew nothing about it! We took a leap of faith and made the move and haven’t looked back.

How is life in your new home?

For me, we have a beautiful life here and I am so grateful for it.

We had three more children here and I honestly don’t know if we could have afforded to do that had we stayed where we were in Dublin.

The pace of life is slower here in Bunbury, well, as slow as it can be with four children in the mix! There’s rarely traffic and everything is always about ten minutes’ drive away. The beach is at the top of our road about 800 metres away. We have good friends.

We are lucky enough to have a backyard pool, which is fairly common here. I still pinch myself some summer evenings, sitting in the pool looking at the stars. I can’t quite believe I get to live here and this is our home.

What has been the biggest challenge? And how have you tackled it?

The biggest challenge I have found was not having any help when my children were small.

I would often feel envious of other mums with grandparents or aunties around the corner who could give them a break.

I probably wasn’t great at asking for help either (think it’s an Irish thing maybe) so it was just me or my husband and we were a tag team.

It is relentless most of the time, our youngest is five now and even the thought of a night away together without the kids is impossible.

My friends are really my family here. When I first got here, I found a playgroup full of mothers from Ireland, the UK, New Zealand, and . That was my saviour every week.

We all understood the experience of moving to a new country and having young children.

Nowadays, I do ask for help and rely on others. So, it is getting easier in that regard.

How might you spend your weekends?

It’s winter here at the moment and, contrary to what people might think, it does get really cold here. Mostly because the houses aren’t well insulated and still have single glazing.

Friday evenings is ‘footy’, which is Australian Rules. My youngest does a little skills training and they provide dinner in the clubhouse after.

Saturdays are taken up with football (or soccer as they call it here) and tennis, or taxiing my eldest to and from her part-time job.

Sundays are slower. We will usually go to Bunnings, which is like a massive Woodies. They do a sausage sizzle outside every weekend run by different community groups or sporting clubs and the kids love the hot dogs. Cheap and cheerful!

We probably buy more gardening or lawn items than we need and head home to work in the garden or around the house.

We try to get out for a walk somewhere with the kids later in the day.

Tell us a bit about the culture of where you live? What are the main differences from Ireland?

The culture here is different in the sense that Australia is such a new country, that there isn’t that long history that Ireland has.

Although, Aboriginal history and culture is really interesting and also pretty sad, given how they’ve suffered under colonisation, much like the Irish did.

Aussies are pretty laidback though and like their beer, barbecues, fishing, and backyard fire pits.

Our friends are a mix of Aussie, English, Swedish, and Irish and I like that.

They are big on the outdoors here, so we’ve bought a camper trailer tent and taken some long driving trips up north. I’m not sure it’s for us though. It’s a lot of work with the kids and not very relaxing for us.

The weather is a big driver of culture. We can take it for granted that it will be sunny most days in summer and autumn. We live near the beach so our kids do surf club weekly in summer to learn surf skills and lifesaving. Sporting talent seems to be highly valued here, above almost all else. I’m not sure it’s as revered in Ireland.

Tell us about your line of work/career?

I did a degree in English Literature in UCD by night while I was working full-time in the IFSC in Dublin. Then I moved into pharma sales in 2006, which was a good job but not terribly fulfilling.

I spent nearly a decade having babies and also home-schooled two of my kids for two years.

In 2022, I decided to go back to study and did a Cert IV in Community Services where I studied family and domestic violence, alcohol and other drugs, suicide prevention, etc.

I began working as an advocate in a women’s refuge, which I loved. I’ve just started working part-time for another organisation in primary prevention so I go into high schools here and talk to teenagers about healthy relationships and consent. I’m pretty ionate about it.

I just wish I’d had a clue decades ago that this was the area I should have been working in. It’s been a long journey to find what gives me purpose.

What has been your most memorable moment in your new location so far?

Probably having my last baby at home in our new house was memorable. We rented for a long time here and moved seven times in seven years, which was really challenging. We finally bought a house in 2019.

My son was born in the sitting room in 2020 and the world changed about three months later when covid hit. We lived in our own little bubble for a while which was lovely.

Any special mentions to friends or family back in Cork?

My family are spread out now in Limerick, Kerry and Cork. My mum, one sister and my brother are still in Cork. I have lots of nieces and nephews too.

Most of my primary school friends are still in Cork. We went to St Catherine’s NS near Model Farm Road. We still have a big WhatsApp chat group which is great to keep up with everyone. It’s even called ‘Corkies’!

What are you looking forward to in the coming months?

We are going to see the British and Irish Lions play rugby in Perth in a few weeks, which should be good.

I’m looking forward to spring. Winter is pretty wet here and can feel more like Ireland than Australia! The weather is one of the biggest draws to living here. Spring and autumn are my favourite times of year.

Is there anything that you especially miss about Cork?

I miss the accents. I sitting on the bus into town once and feeling so joyful hearing all the people talking around me. I miss just driving or walking the roads and streets of my childhood and teenage years, how familiar it all is, and how it always seems smaller than it felt to me back then.

What is your ideal day if you were back in Cork for one day while living abroad?

I’d probably begin with a fry in my mum’s kitchen. She still lives in the house I grew up in. It would have to include her brown bread, a big mug of Barry’s tea and Clonakilty pudding too.

Then into town for a wander of the English Market and to generally just soak in the Cork accents all around me. Then onto Kinsale and probably Fishy Fishy for lunch.

If I had time, I’d go to Goleen and have a drink in Billy’s in Crookhaven looking out at the water. It’s been nearly six years since I’ve been home so I probably wouldn’t know all the good haunts in Cork these days. So I’d probably head home to Bishopstown for an evening barbecue in mum’s back garden that would have to include her homemade coleslaw. Can you tell I miss the food a lot?!