@RandomUniverse: Hello again. Mark is okay with me if you prefer to use that name. Australia and New Zealand are separate countries with close ties based on locality, history, trade, tradition and genuine mateship, something like the relationship that exists between the USA and Canada. The locals see the differences but everyone else sees the similarities. I meet a few Americans down under but not as many as one might think. My honest opinion is that very few Americans ever really want to leave the "Home Of The Brave". In fact I am sure there are more Australians who want to live in the US. I am not ready to give up yet on America just because it has appointed a silly leader. The American constitution contains checks and balances such as the Emoluments clause to affirm that no American president can serve two masters. If you choose to live below the equator remember that about 90% of the Australian mainland is permanently uninhabitable. Just this last week Australia experienced a heat wave with temperatures rising above all previous records and with catastrophic fire hazard indexes that were off scale. At the same time, during this last week volunteers tried to rescue hundreds of pilot whales that beached themselves in New Zealand with questionable benefit to the surviving whales. Nobody seems to know for sure why whales do this. As far as I can see Americans who decide to live down under adapt better than the whales to our way and have no particular trouble finding and keeping work and friends once they adjust to driving on the left hand side of the road and using metric units of weights and measurement.
Australia has a large land area with a relatively small population. It is something like the total land area of the USA occupied by about half the population of California with about 80% of people living near the eastern seaboard where residential housing prices are second only to New York. If you live near one of Australia's big cities Google, Apple, Microsoft, phone- out pizza franchisers and Japanese cars are ubiquitous. The further you live from one of the big cities the lower the price of residential housing, but it takes a special type of character to endure the isolation of life in a remote area with few of the benefits of civilization. As you may have already guessed I like my internet and pizza. I agree Trump lacks political experience and diplomacy and I think he faces a serious risk of being impeached for conflict of interest between his personal business and the affairs of state. His handling of foreign affairs with Russia does not fill anyone with confidence either.
I may always call Australia home but it is not perfect. We have our problems too.
