You may have read how I closed my RBC bank accounts after having the accounts for 21 years due to poor customer service.
A week ago I transferred my private medical insurance membership that I've had my entire life from one company to another, again due to poor customer service and not just because of the increase in premiums from 1st April 2017.
Fed up with misallocations of my payments against my membership and income protection policy and alignment, suspension and resumption mistakes as well as spending too much time chasing corrections to mistakes made I had to cancel my membership with HCF. It had been on the drawing board to do so for a very long time since I purchased shares in Medibank Private when it became a public company. It doesn't make sense to belong to a different private health insurance company to one which you own shares in. The other major reason for making the switch was keeping up with the times and technology - ie benefits. HCF had none - they did not sponsor major sporting events nor did they offer any "perks" to their customers. Medibank Private is more progressive having sponsored fun runs and offering membership for a free month as well as being affiliated with a loyalty program. Technologically HCF is still behind the times - cheques are still issued and posted out to you rather then direct debit or credit. It is still early days as I just joined Medibank Private and so far I am just as unimpressed but I mentioned to HCF that I will give it 6 -12 months amd if unhappy will return to them - my income protection is still with HCF although hanging by a thread.
I wish I could close my account with Citibank but this is a little more difficult.
They will be next on my chopping block and black list. Again this bank has caused me great frustration and there has been fradulent activity on this account on several occasions. At the moment there is a block on my internet banking which still has not been rectified. The only reason I am still with Citibank is because of the perks that come with their dining program.
After spending a great deal of my afternoon at Citibank and making no progress, I spent the rest of my afternoon at Hyde Park Barracks.
Being a member of Sydney Living Museums entitles you to free or discounted entry into all of their properties under their umbrella.
It has been raining for the past 2 - 3 weeks now with only a few sunny days in between - today was no exception therefore I had a think of where I could go on a wet day - Hyde Park Barracks or MCA were both good options as they are both indoors.
I decided on Hyde Park Barracks as I have never visited this tourist attraction before.
I booked myself on the scheduled 2 pm guided tour of the barracks only to find I was the only one on the tour - it was a Monday after all.
I was surprised that there were quite a number of people visiting the barracks today mostly opting for the self guided tour using audio devices supplied at the ticket desk. About 10 minutes into my guided tour which met in the ticket office/barrack shop and commenced outside in front of the main building in the court yard , I was joined by an older couple. We actually had 2 guides who took us to one of the front rooms on the ground floor next to the entrance and explained to us the importance of the colony of rats (thankfully long dead and fossilised) that resided beneath the buildings floor boards and the items they collected for their nests and how ideal the conditions beneath the floor boards were for breeding rats and preservation of artifacts found during excavations restoration and archeological digs of the buildings in the barracks over time.
Our guide also explained about the history of the usage of the barrack's buildings over the years which began as convict quarters housing hundreds of single men (who only "bathed" twice a week according to history) most likely causing mischief when let loose - in cramped dormatories sleeping in allocated low hang hammocks spaced very close together so there was very little privacy - interestingly these dormitory rooms had quite high ceilings yet there was no second level of hammocks to maximise the number of occupants . Later the barrack buildings were used to house women immigrants - orphans of the Irish famine. Living conditions were an improvement with iron beds and matresses replacing the hammocks the men slept in previously. The ground floor room was used as a hiring room to these women who arrived here. Unlike the previous convict men who resided long term at the barracks, the women were shorter term occupants often hired to be house servants. The barracks were then used as a type of "nursing home" for ill and elderly women before becoming legal buildings. Court 24 near the rear of the barrack is an example of the barrack's legal usage in history.
We then went upstairs to the top floor - the 3rd floor via the middle set of stairs and noted the high ceilings beams and rafters , white washed brickwork and arched windows.
We were taken to the larger of the 2 recreated male convict dormatories which housed about 70 in rows of hamocks. One of our guides demonstrated how to get in and out of one of these hammocks for which there is a trick to doing - I can imagine the easiest way to at least get out of one of them would be to be turfed and turned out of one of them by a fellow dormatory mate rather then use the straddle method. Once in the hammock, it looked comfortable but in reality was not as there was no room to stretch or move your body as you would be able to on a bed with a mattress. There were probably no pillows provided although a blanket was provided according to history and convicts slept in their work clothes.
The barracks holds "sleepovers" in these hammocks for groups of school children occasionally to teach children about what it would have been like to be a convict living at the barracks. Children even get to dress up as convicts.
Our guides take us to 2 other rooms - one with a 1830's census of residents of Hyde Park Barracks and another room with convict cut outs which were respresentatives of convict "ghosts" perhaps staring out the windows to freedom.
In the room with the census - it was interesting to note the types of trades and professions these convicts had prior to transportation and their crimes mostly petty such as sealing and pick pocketing however there was a bit of embezzlement going on too. I had a quick look at the surnames of all the convicts on the census and there were only 2 with my surname - it is highly unlikely either of them would have been ancestors of mine as our family history in Australia only started during the gold rush era where we were merchants selling our wares and not gold diggers according to my family history.
"Should we meet one of the convicts ?" one of our tour guides asks - we visit a second room and here we meet the story of a rather stout convict who was constantly in trouble with the law - he was constantly receiving upto 100 lashes at a time and getting into trouble for his drunken behaviour during his 7 or so year stay at the barracks. When the remaining convicts were shipped off to Cockatoo Island many like this convict were not heard of again hence it is unsure what happened to this convict after he left the barracks.
This ended our tour and we were free to riam around the grounds of Hyde Park Barracks and the 3 floors of the main barrack's building we were currently in.
I spend quite an amount of time taking a look at every room accessable. I took countless photos and later ventured out into the courtyard to take a look at any other rooms open to the public.
Rating 8/10 - definitely worth a visit if you like history architecture or just interested in your family's ancestors. "........a UNESCO world hertiage landmark in the heart of modern Sydney"
(Photos attached)
Apologies I have attempted to upload my series of photos taken 5 times and all attempts have failed therefore I will limit uploads to a few at a time in my next attempts and see what happens.
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