hannahnjonty Posted March 19, 2015 Share Posted March 19, 2015 Hi folks, my husband and I are spending one short week in Perth in November this year to try and gain as much of an insight into life in Australia as possible before we decide whether or not to emigrate with our three children. Just wondered if anyone could advise us of things that are a 'must do' in our week,any good schools to potentially try and look around,any nice suburbs to look around for property etc,any suburbs to avoid,any info would be gratefully appreciated. thanks in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
northernbird Posted March 19, 2015 Share Posted March 19, 2015 Think about where your work might be and work from there. Perth is a city of almost 1.5 million people, hard to answer your questions really without knowing job, potential salary, willingness to travel, ability to travel etc etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
benj1980 Posted March 19, 2015 Share Posted March 19, 2015 Make sure you have a job on the sol list and are eligible! After that it is personal preference. I researched areas, schools etc and then went to those places. I am a teacher so visited a primary and a secondary school. I also had a meeting with the WA education department, I also tried out the public transport which I found really good! We went for 15 days so we had days at the beach and went sightseeing as well! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newjez Posted March 19, 2015 Share Posted March 19, 2015 Hi folks, my husband and I are spending one short week in Perth in November this year to try and gain as much of an insight into life in Australia as possible before we decide whether or not to emigrate with our three children. Just wondered if anyone could advise us of things that are a 'must do' in our week,any good schools to potentially try and look around,any nice suburbs to look around for property etc,any suburbs to avoid,any info would be gratefully appreciated. thanks in advance. Kings Park is a must The zoo Freemantle Cottesloe beach Perth City South Perth on the cats Wouldn't bother with rotto York, Lancelin, Mandurah if you want a drive. Where to live is very specific Careful around Northbridge, Vic Park etc at night - basic common sense - stay in the light where there's people. Not many no go areas in Perth as long as you're sensible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ali Posted March 19, 2015 Share Posted March 19, 2015 Agree with northern bird, very difficult to suggest places. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flag of convenience Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 Surely you want more than the tourist sights? Plenty of time to see those if/when you immigrate. Look at the cost of housing and what you can afford rather than a list of burbs, which may be nice but out of reach. Then test out public transport. How it is after hours. What is the feeling after dark. Check out the locals at play. Look at ordinary day to day life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul1Perth Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 One week is barely enough to see anything and just about enough to confuse you. You won't have time to relax and take in the place. Perth and suburbs are huge and it could take you a day to just travel North to South extremities without even stopping to see anything. That's a decent list that Newjez has put together but you could easily spend a day in Kings Park and not see it all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bungo Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 I know they do it on wanted down under, but I am not sure that a weeks reccie is the right way to actually make a decision like this. Still you are going to be there and need to do something, my recommendation is to work on the assumption that your interests are not going to dramatically change by moving country. So think about what you like and look into doing those things in Perth, so if you like shopping go to the mall, if you like swimming go to the pool or beach. On a more practical note, think about what you might be earning and then look into housing costs and see what suburbs might be in your budget, then have a drive around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docboat Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 Let me rephrase what @Bungo said: 1 week is not nearly sufficient for such a decision. That decision - do I want to emigrate - is made at home in the UK, a result of a cold clear series of thoughts and decisions that result in the unemotional conclusion that emigration is right for you. I think what you meant to say (correct me if I am wrong) is that you have made a decision on emigrating (probably to Perth by preference), but want to spend 1 week in Perth to see if there is anything here that turns you off the idea, or is a deal breaker. And again, 1 week here is not nearly long enough. You will be barely off the plane before you get back on again. It is not just Perth, but WA as a whole, to which you are emigrating, and at the very least you will need to "feel" what our state is like. The contributions above are all correct, many good ideas to be chased down. You will have a good holiday, but that does NOT mean that you have a good idea of what life here is actually like. Do you have any friends who are resident here? If so, stay with them and talk long into the night about what makes them happy, what makes them mad about Perth. People like myself love Perth, would not live anywhere else, so our opinions are biased. Find someone who hates Perth and ask them. Their opinions are biased too. Sit under the shade of a tree at the beach here, with a beer if you will, and imagine what it would be like here if you lost your car, and needed to use public transport. Or could not find a rental house, and needed a hotel for a while. Or your employer folded ... what would you need to do? Or if you wanted to drop in on the parents but they are at the other end of the world? My suggestion is that you consider making more time to really absorb what it means to live in Perth, and look at more regional options as well, Geraldton, Bunbury, maybe even Northam or York. At least travel to a few places. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docboat Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 Hi folks, my husband and I are spending one short week in Perth in November this year to try and gain as much of an insight into life in Australia as possible before we decide whether or not to emigrate with our three children. Just wondered if anyone could advise us of things that are a 'must do' in our week,any good schools to potentially try and look around,any nice suburbs to look around for property etc,any suburbs to avoid,any info would be gratefully appreciated. thanks in advance. But if you want simply such information, there is a nice website here: http://www.livethelifeinperth.com/ Schools - looking from the outside is not much use. Look at the suburbs, in particular, if you had time, go shopping in the area shopping hub, and listen to the conversationsof the mothers at checkout, or in the playgrounds. Sit in a playground near such schools, and let the kids play while you speak to the parents. Suburbs to avoid - there are lists of crime areas, on the web. No info on sites at the moment from me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newjez Posted March 20, 2015 Share Posted March 20, 2015 One week is barely enough to see anything and just about enough to confuse you. You won't have time to relax and take in the place. Perth and suburbs are huge and it could take you a day to just travel North to South extremities without even stopping to see anything. That's a decent list that Newjez has put together but you could easily spend a day in Kings Park and not see it all. I remember when I was a kid my father telling me that it can take a day to drive from north London to South London. Living in Perth, I couldn't imagine it. Are we there yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scrutineer Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Hi folks, my husband and I are spending one short week in Perth in November this year to try and gain as much of an insight into life in Australia as possible before we decide whether or not to emigrate with our three children. Just wondered if anyone could advise us of things that are a 'must do' in our week,any good schools to potentially try and look around,any nice suburbs to look around for property etc,any suburbs to avoid,any info would be gratefully appreciated. thanks in advance. I would deliberately go to the "suburbs to avoid" one afternoon, just to get a proper understanding of Australian life. We have a much higher standard of living here, but we also have our bogans as well. You'll go home much better informed than if you just spend the week looking at nice houses and drinking in pubs on the Swan River. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hannahnjonty Posted March 21, 2015 Author Share Posted March 21, 2015 Wow. Thanks for all the replies, great snippets of advice. We do want to go for longer than a week but dilemma number 1 is that we either Go for longer than a week and take our 4, 3 year old and 8 month old which I think would make the recce difficult because that's what this is, not a holiday. Or as planned we leave the kids with grandma for a week which is the max she can manage without blowing up. Besides we wouldn't want to put them through the flight trauma just yet. This is our first big step to making it happen. If we like it the next thing is finding employment, as said where we end up depends where I can find work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VERYSTORMY Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 Do you have a visa yet? Have you checked if you can qualify for a visa? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hannahnjonty Posted March 21, 2015 Author Share Posted March 21, 2015 I don't have a visa but we have added the points up and we believe we do qualify. I work in aerospace engineering, my wife is currently a housewife but is a pharmacy technician. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozmaniac Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 I don't have a visa but we have added the points up and we believe we do qualify. I work in aerospace engineering, my wife is currently a housewife but is a pharmacy technician. There's a lot more to getting a visa than simply passing the points test. Have you looked into skills assessment? You must have a positive assessment as well as the required points before you can submit an Expression of Interest (EOI) in applying for a points tested visa. If you intend nominating 233911 Aeronautical Engineer as your occupation, the skills assessment authority for that occupation is Engineers Australia so if you haven't already done so, you should check their requirements. http://www.engineersaustralia.org.au/about-us/migration-skills-assessment EA skills assessment Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hannahnjonty Posted March 21, 2015 Author Share Posted March 21, 2015 Thanks, I will look at that and see how it stacks up. My wife may have already done this for me, I will check with her when she gets in. Thanks for the heads up. Info like this is much appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix16 Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 You really aren't going to get the slightest sense of 'living in WA' on a 1 week visit!! I had never been to OZ when i set foot in my new home, the first few weeks really were a whirlwind and exciting, it gave us no realistic idea of real life here. I think the critical thinking needs to be done at home, thinking about your reasons for emigrating and working through the pros and cons and particularly looking deep within yourselves about your rationale and expectations, i don't think even a 2 week or 2 month reccie would give you a real sense of life here, Migration is a massive upheaval for the whole family, physically and emotionally, for me hubby came home one day with the dream offer and 8 weeks later we arrived, very naive and without really thinking it through. For us its turned out really well, hubby career has thrived and we have a lovely life, for me on a personal level, i gave up my career, i couldn't recreate it here, i went through the honeymoon here and loved the new, different lifestyle then crashed somewhat, for me personally it wasn't missing family or Uk it was trying to find out what my career would be for the next 20 years, Australia is different and careers are difficult to break into if you're not university educated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeegieDave Posted March 21, 2015 Share Posted March 21, 2015 1 week? You'll barely be shaking off the jet lag before you'll be back on the plane. 1 week ain't enough to do anything Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hannahnjonty Posted March 21, 2015 Author Share Posted March 21, 2015 This has been on my wife's mind for the last five years, she has played thru endless pros and cons and possibilities. One reason for going is to experience the actual journey and actual feeling of distance between us and family and although 1 week isn't ideal i do think it's better than not going at all and making such a big decision without even have visited even if it's only for a week Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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