Self portrait

Whilst everyone always has someone glamorous hiding in their family tree, my relative of infamy is Oliver Cromwell.  You might not know who he is unless you’re from the UK.  He was a military leader and the leader of the uprising against the Royal family and resulting English Civil War.  He then became Lord Protector and “ruled” for a few years before he died.  He’s more than a tad controversial (he shut down all the theatres in London, made everyone dress like puritans and basically committed genocide in Ireland) but he’s my claim to fame.

Anyway, the point of the story is Oliver Cromwell was one of the first rulers ever to have a true likeness painted of them, instead of the usual flattery.  Apparently the phrase “warts and all” is attributed to him because he told the painter to capture him as he truly was.

Hi there, great-great-great- ad infinitum- uncle!

And then this is me.

I tried to make sure I got the family lock of hair and furrowed brow.

NB: It took several selfies to get a picture that I was happy to put up on the internet.  I don’t think Ollie would be impressed.  Vanity was one of the things he detested.  Hopefully his brother (who I’m actually descended from) was a bit more chill.

Personality Quiz

Because Abigail demanded it, here is another blog.  I was prompted by Jenni’s Blogtember for this blog post.  If left to my own devices, I would probably just whine about work and no one wants to hear that.

So for this post, I went to this page and did a short personality quiz.  The results came back that I was an ISFJ.  I was very strongly introverted but the others came back around the 50-40% mark. 

It’s interesting to note (well maybe just to me!) that I used to be an INFP.  And now I am an ISFJ.  The last time I did one of these, I was in high school so it’s almost ten years ago that I did it and I guess we all change.

However, I can’t imagine ever changing from an introvert to an extrovert!  The ‘F’ part has also stayed the same.  This means that when I have to make a decision I will take into account the feelings of myself and other people, as opposed to what is best logically.  And apparently the ‘feeling’ vs ‘thinking’ aspect plays a big part in your career choice. 

The ‘sensing’ over ‘intuition’ part has changed though.  I would definitely agree that I prefer to look at concrete facts and what is happening NOW when processing things rather than trust a hunch or look at the bigger picture.  Although this mark came back as 50% so I guess I could swing either way :)

And apparently I like to ‘judge’ now rather than ‘perceive’.  This means that I prefer to have things ordered and structured rather than spontaneous and flexible.  I would like to think that I was open to being spontaneous though!  I definitely think that I have had to change this aspect of my personality due to work.  I have to be very organised and everything must be structured- although trust me when I say this does not come naturally to me!! 

And ISFJ people tend to gravitate towards certain jobs such as nursing.  So there you go!

Blogtember- Day 1

Linking up with Jenni to do her Blogtember.  This prompt was ‘Tuesday, Sept. 3: Describe where or what you come from. The people, the places, and/or the factors that make up who you are’.

It’s actually something I’ve been thinking about fairly recently, the idea of where I come from.  I grew up travelling because of my dad’s job.  To make a very long story short, I was born in New Zealand, lived there for the first five years of my life, moved to Bahrain, lived there for three years, moved to England just before my eighth birthday and moved to Australia just before my 16th.

So you can see why I have somewhat of an identity crisis.  Australia and New Zealand have a “friendly” rivalry.  I use the term “friendly” in inverted comments because sometimes I think people go a little too overboard on the Aus vs NZ rivalry.  When people find out I’m not Australian, someone else will usually pipe up “oh, she’s from New Zealand” and the jokes begin.  And technically I am, you can’t fault them.  But I don’t feel it.  I left when I was five and who remembers much of what happened in the first five years of their life?

(The view from my dad’s place who is now living in NZ again)

In my head, I identify very strongly with England.  I like its history, its culture, I even have a soft spot for its crappy weather (she writes whilst it is currently gloriously sunny and warm outside!).  I get their sense of humour and their pop culture references.  I really “get” England in a way I will never get New Zealand.  I did most of my growing up there, I went through my moody teens there.  And even now after twelve years in Australia, I still ‘think’ in English: music videos, not film clips or chips, not hot chips.  (If you’re not Australian, just ignore that last part!).

However, there is now a definite part of me that is “Australian”.  I lost my English accent in about six months so there’s no mistaking what part of the world I now live in.  When I travel, I have no problem saying I’m from Australia.  I think Australia has a pretty decent reputation.  Yes, we’re known for drinking and being obnoxiously loud but I think if you spent any amount of time with me, you’d see that’s not a part of who I am.  I think Australians are also known for being laidback and willing to help someone out, and that’s certainly something I can stand for.

Who knows where I will end up later on and if another country will play a part in making up my very mixed up identity!