Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Apr 15th 2007 | 8:36 am
#1
Thread Starter
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 3,994
Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Not sure if any of this will be interesting to anyone BUT thought I would write it anyway 
BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play.
From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in
I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas!
Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.
Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive
Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands!
Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well
) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.
Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer!
Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.
Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.
and finally..........................................
Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)
People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop!
All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families
Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.
Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey?
DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also
Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?
BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play.
From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in
I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front
Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas!Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.
Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive
Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands!
Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well
) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer!
Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.
Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.
and finally..........................................
Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)
People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop!
All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families
Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.
Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey?
DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also
Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?
Last edited by daunted; Apr 15th 2007 at 8:37 am. Reason: more
Apr 15th 2007 | 8:51 am
#2
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 652
From: Somerly, Perth
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Excellent post although i had a little trouble reading the text at 5am
Glad you enjoyed perth, thanks for sharing.
Di
Glad you enjoyed perth, thanks for sharing.
Di
Apr 15th 2007 | 9:27 am
#3
Forum Regular
Joined: Feb 2007
Posts: 121
From: Butler/WA
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Thx for this nice impression of Perth. I enjoyed every single word of your essay.
Cheers,
Morko
Cheers,
Morko
Apr 15th 2007 | 9:44 am
#4
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Feb 2006
Posts: 25,277
From: Gold Coast
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Not sure if any of this will be interesting to anyone BUT thought I would write it anyway
BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play.
From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in
I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas!
Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.
Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive
Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands!
Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well ) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.
Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer!
Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.
Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.
and finally..........................................
Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)
People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop!
All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families
Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.
Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey?
DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also
Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?
BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play.
From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in
I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front
Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas!Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.
Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive
Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands!
Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well
) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer!
Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.
Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.
and finally..........................................
Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)
People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop!
All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families
Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.
Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey?
DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also
Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?
glad you had a brilliant time
Apr 15th 2007 | 10:21 am
#5
Forum Regular
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 43
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
great post
we are going out on a reccie in oct and will be going to perth as we have family there and hubby wants to go to gold coast.
thanks for the info and glad you had a good time
we are going out on a reccie in oct and will be going to perth as we have family there and hubby wants to go to gold coast.
thanks for the info and glad you had a good time
Apr 15th 2007 | 10:37 am
#6
BE Enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2005
Posts: 526
From: with the Carnaby cockatoos
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
We were over in Perth about the same time as yourselves to validate our visas.
Funny but we also noticed the price and size of chicken breasts, everything else is pretty much the same price as the UK.
We did manage to find some reasonably priced wines though. A nice sparkling Shiraz for under $8 went down well. Certainly a good selection of wines available which we will enjoying sampling over the coming years
Funny but we also noticed the price and size of chicken breasts, everything else is pretty much the same price as the UK.
We did manage to find some reasonably priced wines though. A nice sparkling Shiraz for under $8 went down well. Certainly a good selection of wines available which we will enjoying sampling over the coming years
Apr 15th 2007 | 11:56 am
#7
I'm watching YOU...
Joined: Oct 2004
Posts: 844
From: Searching for The Doctor
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
[F Antiqua]Not sure if any of this will be interesting to anyone BUT thought I would write it anyway [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play. [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well ) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]and finally..........................................[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey? [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also[/FONT]
[F Antiqua][/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?[/FONT]
[/FONT][F Antiqua]BabyDaunted (Rachel, 14) and I returned for 2 weeks in Perth last night. When it was booked last year it was planned to be just a holiday to see my brother and take Rachel to swim with the dolphins, but we tried to use it as a reccie of sorts without being all work and no play. [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]From the moment we landed I felt completely at 'home' and relaxed. Well apart from facing the immigration guy at the desk! He was pretty scary - but he let us in
[/FONT][F Antiqua]I have a bit of a tip for those arriving for fast processing through customs - Take a couple bars of unopened chocolate packed in your suitcase! You need to declare them on the form that is given to you on the plane, and then go to the something to declare queue. Very nice man just wanted to know exactly what we had and as long as it was unopened and no more than a couple bags of chocolate buttons we by passed the long waiting queue and got to skip straight to the front
Apparently my brother had the same experience when he went back after christmas![/FONT][F Antiqua]Touristy bits: we did all the usual stuff, Perth Mint, Swan Bells, Ferry down the Swan river, Rottnest Island, Hillarys, Cahunu, Perth Zoo, Perth City, Kings Park (tree top walk was open!!), lots of beaches and swam with the dolphins at Rockingham, It was all fantastic, reasonably priced, clean and tidy. Everyone we met was friendly and approachable.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Food Shopping: I dont think there is really a lot of difference when you have a full basket. BUT i couldnt believe how cheap chicken is!! I bought a pack of 5 MASSIVE chicken breasts (looked more like emu size) and it was only $12, i did work out the price per kg but have forgotten LOL just remember being amazed at how cheap it was. Bad news though was that I found wine to be expensive
[/FONT][F Antiqua]Snakes and spiders: Didnt see any snakes other than those in the zoo and only saw one Huntsman (apparantly was a baby!) in the toilets at a remote camel farm and 1 beautiful Red Back which was under the chair Rachel was sittin on LOL. It only came out cos i was ribbing the house owner about the amount of cobwebs on the furniture in the garden so they sprayed it with some spider stuff which peed the spider off. Sand flies are horrid little sods! i was bitten on every knuckle of my left hand and my fingers were a bit of a mess for most of the holiday. Lesson learnt there was that when spraying insect repellent make sure you put your glass of wine DOWN so that you do BOTH hands![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Housing Availability: Renting does seem to be as big a problem as i have been reading about on here. They are available but it seems you have to be ready to move quickly and fight dirty. There are lots of houses for sale. Talking to a real estate agent at a bbq, she said that people sell their investments at this time of year for tax benefit reasons (cant elaborate more than that as I dont 'do' financial stuff to well
) I have been reassured on the housing market that i will be able to buy again in Oz. After reading about the housing boom i was worrying that I may not be able to afford to buy anything. SURE there is a lot more choice if you have lots of money to spend BUT there are also houses available at the lower end of the market and not all necessarily in the 'bad' areas.[/FONT][F Antiqua]Jobs: HUNDREDS!!! Its true! There really are Hundreds of jobs every Wednesday and Saturday in the Western Australian newspaper. You can subscribe on line to the paper which is probably a really good idea even if only to alleviate concerns about what is available. Most annoying i found was that they dont seem to advertise the wage with the job advert BUT there are lots of jobs available, they may not all be top of the income pile BUT work is definately available. I spoke with a catering recruiter who said that he could guarantee me work the day after having stepped off the plane. There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Kids: Those i met were all wonderful confident kids who welcomed Rachel. They spent hours talkin about school and what they do for fun. All of those i spoke to enjoyed school. I lost count of the number of kids i saw riding home from school on bikes, it was great to see kids able to do that still, instead of getting a lift in a 4x4, each block seemed to have a playground which was covered by a large parasol type thingy and most importantly the areas were clean and equipment well maintained. over the 2 weeks I came away with the impression that the kids in Australia were quite simply 'happy' - sure there are problems every day too but i didnt see any of the local attitude that i see on a daily basis here.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Safe?: Only on one occasion did i feel slightly 'unsafe'. We had taken the ferry from Barrack Street Jetty down to Fremantle where we shopped etc and then walked to the harbour for fish and chips. We walked straight into a group of 4 people who were shouting and fighting culminating in one of them getting stabbed. I think what shook me more was the fact that people who were also around seemed to accept it as if it was an every day occurence. I was later told that Fremantle isnt somewhere to be after dark. That may or may not be true BUT it felt like good advice from our experience.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]and finally..........................................[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Fish have no facial expressions!!! Cant quite decide whether i prefer being able to see what is swimming underneath me or not! Bought a lovely new snorkel and mask on Rottnest Island, after a couple hours of snorkelling i now need a new mouth piece from biting so hard LOL (maybe im not as tough as i pretend!)[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]People: 99.9% of people we met were lovely. Everyone was willing to help and one lovely guy even accompanied us off the train in the city taking us to the information point to get a CAT timetable and then took us to the first stop![/FONT]
[F Antiqua]All you expat people that I met, even though briefly, THANKYOU for beign so welcoming, im sorry i didnt get to spend more time with you all - families
[/FONT][F Antiqua]Transport: Dont bother running for the bus or train - the next one will only be 15 mins and it will be on time and clean. Fantastic service and so easy to use.[/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Well that is it for now, i think i need to get to bed - it really is a LLLLllllllllooooooooooong flight hey? [/FONT]
[F Antiqua]DISCLAIMER: this is all based on my 2 week trip, I have no rose tinted glasses on and i know damned well that 2 weeks cannot give a full impression of a permanent lifestyle so please dont shoot me down if your experiences differ but feel free to post them here also[/FONT]
[F Antiqua][/FONT]
[F Antiqua]Bloody hell - that was a lot of writing hey?[/FONT]
Did your friend take the job offer?
Good luck with the rest of your visa application
Sam
Apr 15th 2007 | 12:55 pm
#8
Account Closed
Joined: Dec 2003
Posts: 2,375
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Rose tinted to perfection ...
It all changes when you have to work & live here
Crack on.
It all changes when you have to work & live here
Crack on.
Apr 15th 2007 | 1:56 pm
#9
happy to be here!
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 2,732
From: Ellenbrook, WA
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Nice post
It was good to meet you, shame it wasn't for long, but I understand.
Glad your trip went well.
Tracey
It was good to meet you, shame it wasn't for long, but I understand.
Glad your trip went well.
Tracey
Apr 15th 2007 | 2:21 pm
#10
BE Forum Addict
Joined: May 2004
Posts: 1,586
From: Tapping, Perth
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
If I miss my train the next one is along within 5 mins!!
I haven't seen one snake, lizard or big spider, thank God
The kids around here all seem very happy and nice, well behaved kids.
If I still have my rose tinted glasses on well so be it. I love it here
.Tracie
Apr 15th 2007 | 3:43 pm
#11
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 3,596
From: Mountain Creek,Sunshine Coast
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Mandy - you sure packed tons in hun!! If a two week update is two A4 pages long (I had to lift it onto a different document and change the font, as the text made my eyes go funny.bit early in the morning) can you imagine what a 12 month after landing update would be like. lol.
Apr 15th 2007 | 4:16 pm
#12
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Aug 2006
Posts: 3,318
From: WA but NOT Perth!!!!!
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
There is construction work going on everywhere you look - though i did wonder how a new migrant builder would cope in the heat of the middle of summer, it was April and upper 20degrees but you could actually see and feel the heat coming off the sand and bricks, i cant begin to imagine what it would be like in mid summer![/FONT]
Apr 15th 2007 | 4:39 pm
#13
I'm watching YOU...
Joined: Oct 2004
Posts: 844
From: Searching for The Doctor
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
i have to say I've been living and working here 6 months now and agree with every word the OP said. I use the public transport most days and find it fantastic.
If I miss my train the next one is along within 5 mins!!
I haven't seen one snake, lizard or big spider, thank God
The kids around here all seem very happy and nice, well behaved kids.
If I still have my rose tinted glasses on well so be it. I love it here .
Tracie
If I miss my train the next one is along within 5 mins!!
I haven't seen one snake, lizard or big spider, thank God
The kids around here all seem very happy and nice, well behaved kids.
If I still have my rose tinted glasses on well so be it. I love it here
.Tracie
Sam
Apr 15th 2007 | 5:26 pm
#14
Karma earned, not whored
Joined: Apr 2004
Posts: 1,001
From: Perth
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Apr 15th 2007 | 5:47 pm
#15
BE Forum Addict
Joined: Feb 2007
Posts: 1,905
Re: Perth through the eyes of the Daunted
Wow, sounds like you had a great time.
Well done for the posting, give me a little hint of what Perth will be like.
Im not in the UK at the moment and find the price of meat in the UK shocking! Especially chicken.
Thanks for the posting, some good honest points. Ive got kids so your bit about kids being happy puts my mind at rest a little.
GEMS
Well done for the posting, give me a little hint of what Perth will be like.
Im not in the UK at the moment and find the price of meat in the UK shocking! Especially chicken.
Thanks for the posting, some good honest points. Ive got kids so your bit about kids being happy puts my mind at rest a little.
GEMS
