Saji, from India, introduced in Chapter 3, was an outgoing and energetic character. When we spoke on Skype, I could see a large world map pinned to the wall behind him in his home in a regional centre not far from Melbourne. When I asked Saji about the map, he said that he and his girlfriend Victoria placed pins in the map to mark the different places around the world they had each visited. At present, Victoria's pins far outnumbered Saji’s, but he had lots of plans to add to this map over the coming years, and to increase the number of places that he and Victoria visited together. Saji, whose career travails were outlined in some detail in Chapter 3, initially came to Australia, like many of the young migrants in this book, to obtain a tertiary qualification, leaving Hyderabad at the age of 17 for aviation school in the suburban outskirts of Melbourne. Education, and education that would lead to social mobility and financial security, was the driver, Saji explained, for his own mobility decisions, as well as those of most of his peers. For young Indians like him, from middle-class but not wealthy families, the journey was, according to Saji, about ‘return on investment’ for the family as well as the individual: “Education is probably like the primary reason why people think of, you know, going overseas, probably because it is a huge return investment. Because my family we were not in a situation at that time where I could think of just holidaying to go to Australia.”

Financial return and economic mobility were ultimately, however, of little consequence to many of Saji's future mobility decisions. Instead, such decisions were largely driven by one factor – a relationship Saji ended up forming with an Australian woman. Saji and Victoria met as co-workers at the fast-food franchise where Saji found his first job in Australia. Saji had not been abroad before and was initially crippled by homesickness and loneliness. The fast-food job was an important avenue to starting to feel settled.