We've left Wellington and will shortly leave New Zealand and begin our journey back to the UK via Australia. Project Koru, our "year out" from life in the UK, has essentially run its course.

Watching Wellington's harbour disappear from the rear view mirror as we turned into the Ngauranga Gorge for the last time was a sad moment for both of us. Wherever we go next, we'll always be Wellingtonians, as the city at the heart of the world's edge has left a permanent impression upon us. We'll miss Wellington, we've no doubts about that. We had hoped to stay, as Wellington seemed to hold reasonable answers to a few of life's basic questions.

What to do?

One of the primary reasons for embarking on Project Koru was to allow Bruce to make a difficult decision concerning his career. Would general practice (GP) in New Zealand be a viable alternative to the same in the UK? Should he re-train in a non-clinical discipline such as public health, or leave medicine for IT (where everyone we know personally seems to be under high pressure). The opportunity to try out GP here helped Bruce be clear about his desire to move away from clinical work, and in this respect Project Koru was an unqualified success. Bruce decided on public health as a new career path, complementary to his experience in primary care and medical informatics.

Simone was quite happy to continuing working in her chosen speciality of family planning and reproductive healthcare.

Where to work?

Bruce applied for a training position with the Australasian Faculty of Public Health Medicine (AFPHM). Everyone he spoke to about the training was encouraging and, being home to the Ministry of Health, Wellington seemed like the ideal location in which to be based. By comparison postgraduate training in the UK has recently seen much turmoil.

Simone, meanwhile, looked forward to continuing in her role as Locality Medical Advisor (Wellington Region) for the Family Planning Association (FFA). This would allow her personal development to continue via a leadership role and via ongoing exposure to a broader range of conditions than typically experienced within the comparatively narrower service remit in the British National Health Service (NHS).

Where to live?

It's no secret we like Wellington very much, and appreciate the many positive attributes that a life in New Zealand has to offer. That's not to say life here is in any way utopian: smokers still drop butts in the street; supermarket fruit still goes rotten if you don't eat it immediately; shop assistants can ignore you and often don't know about what they're supposed to be selling; newspaper stories are full of violence; the small population hides environmental abuse; drunken louts vandalize property and disturb the peace; housing is too often inadequate; and hoons accelerate away at traffic lights with stereos blaring (to give but a few examples). These realities degrade the somewhat glorified image that being away from home for so long tends to foster. All the problems of elsewhere are here too. But good people outnumber the bad, and in comparison to much of the world it's still a relatively safe place to be.

The fact is we couldn't afford to buy where we would want to live in Wellington; what we could afford to buy is not where we would choose to live. Lacking the capital to pick up a waterfront section in Seatoun, a hilltop view in Wadestown, or a central city apartment means renting is the only alternative—but doing so means more disposable income with which to enjoy the likes of good food, entertainment, and travel. We reflected how nice it was to wake up on the weekend and not feel compelled to get away—as you're already in a "holiday" location. In sight of the sea you don't feel so trapped, whereas rows of houses in every direction may induce a desire to escape.

We could both say we're "from Wellington" with a sense of pride (how odd, after less than 12 months in residence). Conversely, saying we're "from Chesterfield" (after 13 years in residence) holds no such emotion, especially after the typical "So where's that then?" response. Because we came with the mindset we would be staying for a year only, we didn't invest in our environment (e.g. buying house plants, or a BBQ). It's possible this time limit may have had a negative impact on the formation of some potential friendships (e.g. not joining local groups/ societies etc.). We figured that committing for a longer period might overcome such issues.

On the downside settling in NZ would mean giving up the proximity of family/ friends in the UK and Germany. It would also mean reassessing the meaning of our "home" in the UK. We were not ready to let it go due to lingering insecurities and our shared history (a 7-year renovation), but it nevertheless seems to mean different things to each of us.

Formulating a "Plan B"

The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. So sure were we that our plans to continue living and working in Wellington would come to fruition, we didn't have an alternative lined up. Usually more careful, we fell into the trap of counting our chickens before they'd hatched. Bruce was declined a place on the AFPHM Training Program. It was a devastating blow, but nobody died.

We had only 6 days (3 of which we were working) in which to make new arrangements. We spent some of this time trying to come up with a viable "Plan B" that would enable us to return to Wellington, even if that meant Bruce self-funding papers in public health while working part-time. The numbers didn't add up and there were no suitable non-clinical vacancies. It felt like defeat, and there was the understandable bitterness of failure and a smattering of other volatile emotions to reign in. Being realistic meant returning to the UK where we had at least one certain income and no rent to pay. We could not "hang on" in NZ for a further year on the mere hope that Bruce might be more successful on the following intake.

We hastily cancelled some arrangements and made new ones. Instead of just a suitcase containing things we'd need in Europe for the next 6 months, we checked in 99kg of air freight.

Inland revenue asked us each to complete an IR3 (Individual tax return 2007 2008), an IR50 (Refund application - people leaving New Zealand), and an IR886 (New Zealand tax residence questionnaire).

As of this writing we're still trying to sell the car (we tried at the Ellerslie Car Fair, on the side of the road, and on TradeMe). We also looked at importing it to the UK, but by the time you add 10% UK customs duty (on the value of the car) and then VAT on the value of the car plus on the customs duty plus on the shipping costs (approx. $NZ3700) it doesn't make financial sense.

We're taking back 30kg more than we came out with, but also an unquantifiable wealth of experiences and insights.

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