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Cost Much? Everyone keeps asking about the cost of
living here. I have highlighted a few examples so you can get
an idea. In the U.S. you have the $1 stores, here you have the $2.50
stores. Housing in the urban areas of Sydney is virtually
unattainable. It would cost north of $600k just for a 2 bdr.
apartment. An old bungalow type house with 2bdr, 1 ba and
maybe a 3,000 s.f. lot is over a million. If it is actually
livable or remodeled it will be over $1.3M at a minimum.
Strawberries are about $3 for a green basket on a good day. If
the berries are big you might get 6-8 a basket so you are paying
$0.50 per berry! I miss Costco and the 4 lb boxes of strawberries
for $8.
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A
drunk Santa? In America we leave milk & cookies for Santa
and carrots for the reindeer, in Oz many leave beer for Santa and a
cucumber for the reindeer if they are lucky.
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On
the fringe. When I went to get my haircut I asked if I could
have shorter "bangs" and the hair dresser looked at me with a
horrified expression. Luckily he had traveled to the U.S. and
realized that what we call bangs they call fringe and what they call
bangs, well... it takes place in the bedroom. So word to the
wise, if you travel here, don't talk about how long or short you
like your bangs, where you like your bangs on your face or how long
you have gone with or without bangs because, well, you might just
get a different reaction than you expect.
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Cab
Rides. Interestingly enough, when you ride in a cab here,
the default is to sit in the front seat. In general, people
love to talk to the cab drivers and have more respect for the
profession over here.
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Accent? Recently we went to the supermarket and I asked
about an item and the employee said he didn't understand what I was
asking for. Sydney quickly repeated the question to the
employee with her Aussie accent and then said to me, "Mom, they
don't understand American, you need to speak Australian like I do."
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The
Sultana. What is this famous sultana and why is it
everywhere? On our first shopping trip I wanted to get some
oatmeal and cereal but I noticed that all the packages had
"sultanas". At first I thought, "Is there a Sultan of Australia and
has his wife found a favorite food?". What are my picky child eaters
going to eat if they don't like her majesty's food? then I
went to coffee and again I was offered bread with sultanas?
Why were they following me everywhere? I decided to get to the
bottom of things and look up the infamous sultanas in my "Americans
guide to living in Australia" book and found out that sultanas are
not some exotic royal concoction, they are just raisins. Yes,
plain old raisins. I struggled to understand this because
typically Australians use very practical words for most everything,
Breakfast is "brekkie", if you need to get dressed up to go outside
you put on your "warmies" so why are raisins not dried grapes or
something that made sense? This was going to be one of my many
food follies to come. Now I just "buy and pray" and hope that
I will like whatever we have purchased.
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Drive
Much? Driving is very similar to driving in the U.S. except
everything is on the opposite side of the road. My major issue is that
the controls are also reversed which means I turn on the windshield
wipers every time I want to use my signals. The people behind me
probably think I am nuts as I switch lanes with my windshield wipers
going at full speed on a sunny day. I actually think that the real issue
is getting used to City/urban driving. There are one way streets,
turn lanes, toll lanes etc.. and because we are unfamiliar with it all
we tend to go in circles. Even with our GPS we managed to stay
within a mile radius of our destination for over 20 minutes as we kept
on looping around and getting caught on oneway streets or other traffic
impediments.
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Food
escapades. I think the photo to the right says it all.
Get your Kangaroo and Crocodile here!
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