boganbear

Its been a while since I've had my English corrected by an Aussie (usually English place names where I used to live) but I have the perfect comeback when asked "How do you pronounce it?" I simply say 'correctly'. If they try correcting my French, I just speak in French to them for the next 2 minutes. I haven't met an Aussie who actually understands French yet.

I may be wrong but at one stage, if you had a child at Uni and they were living away from home they were not classed as dependent but if they were living at home they were dependent. Something to be aware of.

The problem is not the new railway line but the fact that Queensland Rail and the government are too stupid not to think that more drivers would be needed and not to plan properly, so services have been cut on all other lines. The first few weeks after the new line opened on the Caboolture line were great. Faster trains and more of them. Now there are fewer trains, more packed than before and they take longer. It's nearly as bad as London. I'm considering moving closer to town as I'm fed up of it

Have to agree with that. There were thousands of people at my ceremony, there was nothing personal l about it at all, just one of a huge crowd packed into a souless room, all repeating the same words together, or just not bothering cos no one knew whether you were saying it or not. No reception, not even a bar open, had to listen to some random polirician going on about how Australia gives peole bett opportunities than anywhere else in the universe, and got given a tatty paper bag containing a random twig and paperwork about signing up to vote. Bag fell apart on the bus going home and the twig died in the garden.

Complete waste of an evening from my point of view, and its rather nice to hear someone else with a similar view!

hahahah my plant is thriving but it was only a funny occasion as the MP sat on stage waswearing a short skirt and with her legs crossed in a way which didnt leave much to the imagination. There was a local 'singer' belting out aussie songs badly - "That's a no from me" but i did win a huge bouquet of flowers for getting the largest cheer so all was not lost!

I do t know why you think it is easier. I have no family here so if anything goes wrong, I'm in my own. Imagine trying to deal with cancer with no family or friends for support

I found the wait for the deer only the most infuriating part of getting citizenship. It took 3 days from submitting my application to get the paperwork and test done and I can't see why it takes 6 months to do the ceremony. The ceremony itself was laughable and in reality, pointless.

I would advise anyone to get all of their dental issues fixed on the NHS before you go. It costs a fortune here. However the quality of treatment is far superior to the UK...and look after your teeth!

Using the third person singular instead of the plural to describe sports teams..

 

Liverpool has beat Tottenham instead of have for example.

 

Pronouncing debut as dayboo.

 

Both drive me crazy when watching sport on telly.

Another is correcting the pronunciation of English place names and telling me that I am wrong, despite growing up and living there before coming to Australia! I know how to say Launceston, Devonport, Ascot and Exmouth properly!...and Maroon!

A friend of mine in Adelaide managed to get a gammon joint. she had to go to the butcher, describe what it actually was and which part of the animal it was from and wait 3 weeks for the butcher to find a supplier. All of the people I know of who want gammon come from up north so it must be a northern thing.

Dont ever try to get rid of them as they do eat mozzies and other bugs. They are perfectly harmless. Just be thankful for that

I.ve just had a look at the Australian Customs website http://www.customs.gov.au/site/page5549.asp#Calculating. If you import goods over $1000 you are charged duty at 5% and GST n the cost of the goods and shipping and duty so make sure your goods are under $1000 and if they can be split up into smaller parcels, make sure they are not sent at the same time as they may consider them to be one lot of goods. Sending/ordering them a week apart might be a good idea. $1000 is about 680 pounds

Just use a UK website or send cash or lie about the value. It is pretty crap but you can blame the UK government AND the EU for that. At least in Oz you can buy stuff abroad up to $1000 before you have to pay duty etc.

If you buy things from the UK or EU to go to Australia remember that VAT does not apply and should not be charged. Some sites I've been on still charge VAT when they shouldn't so I avoid using them.

We ended up buying nearly everything from Ikea as places like Nick Scali, King furniture, Adriatic were very nice but incredibly overpriced. Fantastic Furniture was cheap and looked cheap - think student houseshares, dodgy landlord cheap. Ikea wasn't too expensive and depending what you buy (some of their stuff is crap) looked not bad either. When you have to buy TVs, fridges, freezers, washing machines, dryers etc as well because they are not included in rentals you have to make sacrifices somewhere.

Thomy mayonnaise from Coles is lovely. Much better than that Hellmans crap.

I think the bacon is cured or semi cured, probably to stop it going off and i find it lovely and its great to have huge strips of bacon too. I've not found gammon or a decent pasty

6 weeks from submitting the application to getting permission. It could have been sooner but there was a technical hitch with my x rays. we thought it would take 6 months so when it did arrive we sorted everything out to move in 6 weeks too which gave us an extra month to have a holiday in Oz/freebie holiday with the family before having to look for a house/jobs

We are going there for a holiday in a couple of weeks and from what people have said at work and I've seen on the internet it all looks very lovely and a bit like living in Devon - slower pace of life, bigger and cheaper houses and more of a small town/villagey feel with plenty of beaches, country walks etc. No one has said a bad word about the place at work but i get the impression that if you work in the city then it might be a bit too far out but if you work more locally then no probs. It seems to be more of an up and coming area with more younger people moving in and more facilites/motorways etc are being built which can only be a good thing