Living in the "World's Most Livable City"

Although not necessarily printed in an unbiased journal (The Sydney Morning Herald), Melbourne has ranked as the 'Best City in the World to Live' according to the Economist Intelligence Unit's Global Liveability survey.  It recently supplanted Canada's Vancouver in the rankings, which the article attributes to a low rating in "Infrastructure-" although I'd be more inclined to speculate that it is because in Vancouver, your car may be set alight depending upon the outcome of a hockey game...

Read the full article here.

Unfortunately while ranking number 1 in most livable city, it has also ranked as the 7th most expensive city to live in- 40% higher than New York City.

Moving On In

It's been nearly three weeks since my last post, which I realize is nearly criminal given how much I've been promoting this blog among friends and family, so let me start by offering a sincere apology; as Lydia alluded, these past few weeks have been spent voraciously searching and applying for housing, setting up bank accounts, mobile phones, and utilities, and figuring out how to get around and where to get the necessities.
At a time when I should have been posting regularly given the pace at which events were transpiring, I neglected my duties to our loyal blog readers and the blog itself. In an attempt to play catch up, my next series of posts will be recapping the details of those first two weeks.

As Lydia noted, we successfully found a suitable apartment within our budget in two and a half days, in East Melbourne (about a 20 mintue walk from the CBD) and were actually able to get the keys same day. We quickly switched from apartment hunting mode to apartment furnishing mode (not something for which I'm particularly adept), where our first stop was Ikea.

* Courtesy of http://blogs.ubc.ca

Complete disclosure: I have a rather strong distaste for Ikea: I find their perfectly industrial engineered layout of the store maddening; I hate the grotesque pungent smell of glue and sawdust from all of their laminated particle board furniture; I hate the implied "clever" engineering of how their furniture is assembled; I even hate the little amorphous blob character prevalent on all of the instruction packets included with the furniture. BUT, I have to admit, you can't beat the prices; oh the glory of globalisation and economies of scale. After spending nearly three hours of our Saturday rifling through the store, navigating the narrow cart ways, and long after the repeated joke of, "what chair speaks 'Matt and Lydia'," lost its humor, we walked away with a living room, dining area (picking the right chairs was a chore), and about a quarter of a kitchen, all for less than two-weeks’ pay. Not bad, and they deliver to boot!

With Ikea lying in ruins behind us, our next inclination was to go to Target in CBD to search for the essentials that Ikea couldn't adequately meet. To our collective chagrin, Target here is not at all like what we had back in the States; to shop at Target here really is reserved to those in the top tax bracket- while we did chance upon a 10% off home furnishing sale, the prices were still generally much higher than what we'd come to expect of Target, and not just because we're in Australia. No need to fear, though, as KMart has proudly filled that niche here. KMart is not as it is in the States- that is, it’s not dirty, disorganized, or soul-sucking (although Walmart wins in that last category). If it wasn't for the big "K" everywhere, I'd have almost mistaken it for Target. Sparing you the boring details, we were able to further supplement our new accommodation with the essentials.

Using what little Internet we could find, we located the nearest mattress store reachable via public transportation. After a rather comedic episode of catching and transferring to various trams (more on that later…), we made it to the store before it closed, were able to test out several bedding options, and buy the mattresses and box springs on the spot for next day delivery. To Lydia’s dismay, we spent more time discussing Aussie Rules Football with the salesman than actually shopping for mattresses (more on footy later).

Having rented an unfurnished apartment, by all literal sense of the word, we had the “opportunity” to either rent or purchase our own washing machine and refrigerator (for some unknown reason, the apartment included a dryer). After employing rudimentary financial and economic analysis (I nearly pulled out Excel to do an NPV analysis), we opted to purchase both appliances. We researched online, found the refrigerator and washer we wanted (and that would fit), and as per the advice of our adopted Australian parents, stopped by Retravision to see what they had on hand.

An important caveat about Retravision- although it’s an Australian-wide appliance, electronics, and home theater store, each store is owned and operated independently. This means each store has its own pricing margins and inventory as determined by the owner, and thus more latitude when it comes to price negotiation. Lydia and I were able to walk in with our specified refrigerator and washer models and associated prices in hand from an online competitor, and negotiate down the respective prices of each to an even lower net price. We ended up walking out saving a good few Aussie dollars and with next-day delivery. Perhaps the coolest part of it all was that the store owner whom we purchased the appliances from was actually the same person who delivered it to our apartment. After talking with the store owner briefly about installation steps (the transaction included delivery, but not installation, which I was much obliged to perform myself), we had our new refrigerator, stocked with the essentials, up and running in no time:

The washing machine, which required a few more steps than just “plug appliance in,” proved a bit more challenging, although nothing out of our collective capabilities. After thoroughly and diligently reading the manual multiple times, we ran an empty cycle on the hottest temperature with half a scoop of front-loading washing detergent. Despite our by-the-book approach, the washing machine started to ooze a slow-motion, but continuous slide of suds. After a period of alarm, some double checking of the manual’s steps, and a couple, “what in the hell?” moments, we conceded and let the machine run its course. The torrent of suds soon subsided, the machine finished its cycle with no issue, and our bathroom floor exuded a near polished shine we had not before seen. To this day, we don’t know what went wrong or why the machine overflowed- the standing theory is that the washing detergent had some sort of accelerated reaction with whatever lingering chemicals persisted in the wash drum after its manufacture (the elimination of which was why we were supposed to run an empty cycle in the first place…).

Although lacking some of the finer luxuries of modern living (a TV, night stands, lamps, and outdoor furniture) we were able to successfully furnish our new apartment and take a much needed respite to explore and enjoy our new home in Melbourne- with the reassuring comfort that we can return to our bed-skirt donned beds.

SeppoTV Cribs

We shot this video shortly after moving in to the new apartment, but didn't have the technology at the time to render it for the blog, so its about two weeks late... Nonetheless, here's a tour of our new set up in East Melbourne!

Ultimate conclusion from the video: I'm a huge dork.

Shelter Found, 7-Eleven Assists

We knew we needed a phone once we got here to help contact agents during our apartment hunting. As Matt explained, our Droid smart phones from the states don't work in Australia. However, until we knew phone plan discounts provided by our company, we didn't want to buy a smart phone just yet. So, we bought this magenta pink phone-that-just-makes-calls to share during our first 2 weeks here. 

It certainly makes calls, but no GPS. We needed a map!

This is the map we used to navigate the city while inspecting potential apartments.

Why yes, it is from 7 eleven.... 

And it does have all of their locations marked....
But it did the trick!

The biggest thing we learned while apartment hunting, has to do with inspection times. We primarily used Domain, with the addition of a few other sites, to help find available apartments. When ready, agents would list inspection 15 minute windows that anybody could attend to view their apartment. This has its drawbacks. First of all, it becomes highly publicized, so by that time you are fighting with a bunch of other contenders for your application to be picked. Secondly, most places with inspections were not the nice places.

Before we got to Australia, we tried e-mailing agents through Domain to set up times to view once we got there. This more often than not ended up with emails going to the wrong place, or replied to with a template response included inspection times occurring before we even arrived.

One option is to ask the agent at an inspection if they have any other places you could see. That worked for us twice. However, the best way to apartment hunt here, is to go directly call a real estate office. They will know have all their current properties available that all their agents are responsible for. Many front desks of these offices were willing to let us come on down, pick up keys, and see available apartments in our price range that very day. We found two places we loved doing this! One we found the number for by seeing their available apartments on Domain. The other we found through random business cards we obtained, but more on that later. 

The first apartment we loved was right in the CBD (Central Business District)....but were told that we would have to wait for our references to be reviewed. Once the agent got back to us, she told us that she would review our references... and the owner was replacing the carpets of the place so it wouldn't be available for a week at the earliest. 

As a backup, we wanted to find another place we liked enough to put in an application. The rest of the places we had seen had only been so so, and we had toured many apartments. At our wits end, we remembered some business cards we had picked up.

The first day we were in Melbourne (as in just off the plane), we inspected two places. While chugging Monster energy drinks to combat our exhaustion, we attempted to figure out the tram system, and headed to the first apartment inspection. We ended up there pretty early, and it was locked. During our walk from the tram stop to the apartment, we had noticed a different (much nicer looking) apartment complex. We decided to wandered over and check it out to kill time. Hey, worst comes to worst it could be unlocked and a warm place to wait in! This complex was also locked. To our luck, a nice older man was walking in, and showed us the front desk that had a phone on it to call management. Nobody was at the desk, so we picked up the phone, and explained that we were curious if any places were available in that apartment. A fellow with a thick Australian accent replied that he didn't lease it out himself, but he had some business cards of agents he could give us. As we waited for him to come downstairs, we realized we were almost late for our inspection. We allllmost left, but just then, the fellow I spoke with on the phone walked into the lobby and gave us the business cards. Cards in hand, we hurried back to the inspection. I'm glad we waited for the cards at the nice complex, because the inspection we were supposed to go to was horrible, damp, dimly lit, prime Huntsman territory. 

Anyways, we decided to try giving the 'calling the leasing agency' thing another whirl, and called the agents on those random business cards. Two of them had places available we could see that day, within our price range, and where we wanted to live!

The first place was pretty close to what we wanted, but between the baby blue carpeting and older fixtures, we wanted to see the next place. Still, a pretty decent backup.

The minute we walked into the second leasing agency, we A) laughed ourselves because they were literally next door to our hotel the Westin B) were very impressed by how swanky, hip, and well lit the place was. We hoped their apartments were just as nice! We picked up the keys to two apartments in a complex of theirs that had availability. To get there, we walked through the beautiful Fitzroy Gardens, and arrived at what is now our apartment complex. Downstairs was a wine bar, a grocery store, and a bunch of restaurants. The apartment lobby was gorgeous. However, we knew from past apartments that many complexes had done face lifts to the downstairs and not updated the upstairs, so didn't get our hopes entirely up. When we got to the floor of the first apartment and were still impressed. When we walked in, we looked at each other grinning. We checked out the apartment on the other floor, and loved it too, but preferred the layout of first one we saw. Incredibly excited, we hurried back to the leasing agency. We now had a backup of that place in the CBD, plus both of these apartments with this new agency. Finally, after our week long quest for apartments where none seemed quite right, we could take a breath, and stop freaking out about how much longer we would have to live in a hotel.

Through a combination of us willing to take the apartment that day, and offering to pay an extra month up front, we got the apartment that we loved! We had already pulled together all the information an apartment application needed when we applied to the other place, so we were ready to apply. She reviewed our bank statements/offer letters/passport and accepted the bond (agencies use bonds, individuals leasing their apartments directly use deposits, but they mean the same thing), and gave us the keys that day.

We now live in East Melbourne, right near Fitzroy Gardens. Thank you, 7 Eleven map and pink phone to call that random agent. On top of everything, we later found out that the complex is the renovated historical Victoria Bitter Ale Brewery. Though perhaps not the most delicious beer currently, as beer lovers, we still find it pretty cool. Pictures/video of the place to come!

http://www.student.nbend.k12.or.us/2012/nbalvarez/Images/MonsterEnergyDrinks.jpg

Lingo

In preparation for our trip, I read about certain words and sayings Australians used. However, it was hard to discriminate between bush/outback speak vs city speak vs really cool words that are actually outdated. For example, see http://www.koalanet.com.au/australian-slang.html.

Here are the more useful things we have learned while actually living in Melbourne so far:

Barrack - Root, cheer: "Who do you root barrack for?"
As our friend here put it "Well, root means, to shag, essentially." Matt already knew this and warned me not to say root, and I think partially because I was so conscious not to say it, I used it in a sentence when talking to locals at the wine bar below our apartment. Nice.

Bogans - Rednecks, 'unclassy', crude, or members of an opposing team that you dislike. "Only rednecks bogans root barrack for Collingwood."
 In America, if you went to UVA you would call Hookies bogans. Matt can specify an Atlanta version, but from what I hear, if you go to UGA, Gators would be bogans. Again per our local friend, saying rednecks here conjures up images of of America as seen on TV.... There are bogans in the city and bogans in outback and bogans in Collingwood, Melbourne (says all the people we've met here who don't like their Aussie rules (Australian Football) team.

Rubbish - trash, refuse. "Only rednecks bogans root barrack for Collingwood, they're absolute trash rubbish."
Also, I've seen trash cans that actually say "rubbish bins" on them. I still haven't figured out if trash is used as well or has some other connotation.

On an unrelated note...

Capsicum - What Americans refer to as Red/Green bell peppers. Chili peppers are referred to as chilies. Apparently they don't have jalapenos here or else they are out of season. Pepper only refers to the black pepper companion of salt.

To be continued....

Voyage

*In an attempt to make up for not having decent internet/free time for our first weeks here, we will be posting some catch up posts on our trip to Oz, time at the Zoo, apartment hunting, and generally exploring Melbourne!*

They kept sneaking in somehow!

After an intense week.... of fighting with my families' smug cats intent on foiling my plan of washing my clothes without adding cat dander (Matt is allergic), convincing Verizon to cancel my plan without penalty, exchanging old and getting new contacts from 1-800-Contacts...Not to mention weeding through my closet due to limited packing space via advice from my aunt (plus I may have girlishly read Tim Gunn's A Guide to Quality, Taste and Style) and with help from my sister while cramming things into space saver bags...all while finishing up remotely training my work replacement....I had finished packing and was ready to go to Australia.

Since I was flying out of Richmond International Airport, my brother oh so kindly drove me to Richmond, VA the night before my flight. I didn't want to risk any car break downs, massive traffic, or freak weather impeding a trip from Charlottesville to Richmond on the day of lift off!

My wonderful friend Brittny let me crash at her place. My last evening entailed Pad Thai, extreme home makeover, and us calling Brittny's boyfriend Ricky on speaker like we were teenagers at a sleepover party. On our drive to the airport the next morning we stopped at a Walgreens for me to pick up some very necessary ear plugs for the 4058 hours of flight time ahead of me. The kind lady who checked me out encouraged me to get a Walgreens card. "I'm sorry," I replied, "but I'm moving."
"Where?" she asked.
"Australia!"
"When?"
 "Right now!" It was one of the more fun moments of informing people I was moving to the other side of the globe.

My first flight leg, Richmond to Atlanta, I took alone. The plan was to meet up with Matt in Atlanta. This caused a problem seeing as I was one person with one giant suitcase, one medium sized suitcase, one carry on, and a backpack to carry. Thankfully a concierge of sorts helped me to the delta counter.  I counted the Delta attendant letting me check in two bags at 52 lbs each (after maneuvering of shoes) for free when there is a 50 lb limit (before costing additionally $$) a win, and a great omen for the rest of the trip.

Dear Space Bags, thanks for letting me fit in so much  stuff into my my suitcases,
without putting me over weight....

Once Matt and I found each other in Atlanta airport (being cellphoneless felt like we had undergone time travel) we found our way to Delta Lounge. I must say, I've been missing out. The free alcohol and snacks, chairs, available sockets, and quiet filled venue was quite nice. As Jezebel puts it, lounges are an "Island of Happy in a Sea of Sad". Matt played on his laptop with the server he had set up, and I promptly spilled beer on myself. When I asked for a napkin, the bartender not only helped but remembered what drinks we had ordered, I began our flights feeling very pampered.

We left the lounge with adequate time to make our flight. But, our flight was delayed. Bemoaning the additional drinks we could have squeezed out of the Delta Lounge if we were still there, we sat and waited as the flight was pushed back and back. Any stress this caused was alleviated when Matt got on the plane and saw what his business elite upgrade earned him. Business elite on a plane (Boeing 777) where elite meant being able to lie all the way down in your own futuristic lounge area. I watched, grinning, from Economy plus (just two rows behind Matt) while he was served Scotch straightaway, and played with the million buttons that adjusted his seat position. For all the ridiculous traveling he had to do for work, I was happy to see his Platinum status make up for it. At one point during the flight I got an attendant to pass Matt a note (apparently the middle school mindset from my sleepover hadn't left me). She found the whole thing rather cute and returned with a Reese's peanut butter cup, one of my favorite candies as a response from Matt. I enjoyed switching between my Kindle and the free TV available. Traveling isn't so bad, right?

After making it LA, we went straight away to another Delta Lounge.  There I realized I couldn't port my phone to Google because I didn't know my mom's Social Security number, and there would be no way to do so once we arrived in Australia. It was around three in the morning back home, so I couldn't ask her. Alas, my coolest palindrome filled number ever, 434-989-4224, is gone.

How could I be glum, however, when our next stop was Sydney! For this flight, Matt joined me in economy plus. The Delta agent who booked our flights over the phone put me in the exact same seat, in the exact same type of aircraft, for this flight as I had been on the last one. At first I thought, "What fun is this! My seat will feel like home." False. As you can imagine, flying for that many hours makes one a bit stir crazy. Flying for that many hours in the same row makes one well, like they are going insane. Matt and I traded the window back and forth, but either way we were trapped by the Canadian fellow Matt mentioned on the last seat in our row. I'm sure his recounting of the flight involves making fun of Americans and their bladder size.

During this portion of the trip our minds started to melt a little. From this moment on we started to speak  Australian Australian-British English-sounding like a tool. Matt didn't want his breakfast so he told the lady "Excuse me ma'am, I don't need this, can it be used for another patron? Else, it is rubbish". I started using the word lovely a lot. And, love. As in, instead of calling Matt his name, I called him "Hey, Luv?" When we got to Sydney I asked an airline desk about our tickets and felt the need to reply wide eyed to her answer with "Magical!" Seriously, we were going insane.

Landing over Sydney was both beautiful and overwhelming. The cliff drops to the water were picturesque. The city itself was huge. I was glad to be moving onto Melbourne for the time being, but intrigued and excited to eventually visit Sydney.

Australian Customs Form

For customs, I had to check a rather daunting box informing the Australian government that I was bringing drugs into the country. When they asked, I told them it was medicine stuff for my occasional migraines, and an inhaler for occasional asthma. Doctor signed prescriptions ready, they waved me through without taking a look. The microchip in Matt's passport wasn't working but they let him through after suggesting he replace it eventually, at some point, if he wanted. To go through the metal detector on our way back into the airport for our flight to Melbourne we didn't have to take our shoes off. This was clearly not America. The one thing I had to take part in was their adorable troop of customs sniffing beagles. Since Matt and I had gone hiking and swimming in freshwater areas lately, we checked that box as well. Illicit dirt free, the beagles let me through.

We had to take a bus from the international flights terminal to the local flights terminal. During the ride, an Australian girl in college Uni just back from partying it up in Europe gave us some helpful tips on the area and served as a friendly welcome to the country. The bus rider had the radio on and we heard the opening line "Dumb American tries to..." Matt and I both looked at each other and laughed. "Oh no, I guess we can see how we are painted here already!" Matt continued talking to the girl while I tried not to  freak out about what seemed like constant near car crashes as we drove on the "wrong" side of the road.

Not anticipating an incredibly efficient customs process, or the ease with which we got back into the airport for our local flight, we had hours to kill at the Sydney airport before our final flight. Ours jaws dropped at food prices. In a daze we split Chinese sesame chicken and a doughnut, not really knowing what mealtime to consider it being. Our time zones were a jumble. Our minds were in EST our phones were stuck in PDT from Los Angeles but we our bodies were now living in Australian EST.....

Additionally, my right foot was swollen up like a pregnant woman about to pop out a baby. The stitching on my shoe seam, running up my ankle, had actually busted. So, I was delirious on time zone discombobulation, my right foot looked like a puffer fish, and I was speaking Australian Australian-British English-sounding like a tool.

We took Virgin to get from Sydney to Melbourne. Though not the cheapest of the airline options, we were able to pay a premium that let us bring all our luggage without paying by weight. We sat in their version of first class and right next to each other (the revelation of which was way I said "Magical!" to their agent). Food and drink was included. We then discovered that Australian Pepsi tastes waaaaayyy better than American Pepsi. And, we both hate Pepsi (Matt is from Atlanta after all). We could only imagine what their Coke tastes like.

En route, I began to see breathtaking views of snow capped mountains with little towns nestled between valleys. Snow turned turned to a dusty brown environment ending in lush and green at the mountains' bases. Rivers ran through and lakes were often. As we ventured closer to the city we saw the outline of the CBD. Beyond the city we could see Port Phillip Bay. While suburbs did stretch out from the city, they didn't have the overwhelming expanse of Sydney or New York. When we landed, after controlling our excitemnt, we both looked at each other with a "Wait just a minute now, expression." This is their airport? It was beautiful. We landed in a lush green field. Gum trees, which I had never seen before, dotted the landscape. The sky was a vibrant blue. We could see mountains in the distance. The airport seemed so local and small town, it was so lovely inside and out. We began to get excited about how stress free traveling around Australia would be. As we realized we were getting ahead of ourselves, we headed to baggage claim, and got ready to explore Melbourne.

All of our bags arrived safe and sound. We caught a huge van taxi, called a Maxi Taxi, to fit all of our stuff. It was time to take on Melbourne! Today's events not only entailed completing traveling half way across the world, but also inspecting not one, but two potential apartments. As we headed into the city, our excitement bubbling for what was to come, I could almost ignore the throbbing of my swollen foot-like appendage on the end of my leg.

Signal Lost

Hello friends and family!  Just wanted to post quickly that Lydia and I have not fallen off the face of the earth, we are in fact doing quite well and are loving Australia!  We haven't had much time to post to the blog since we've been racing around inspecting apartments, setting up bank accounts, buying mobile phone plans, and furnishing our new apartment!  Unfortunately we're finding accessing an internet connection rather difficult at the moment, as we don't have broadband set up yet in our new apartment and every internet cafe charges an arm and a leg for an hour of Wifi.  Right now we're paying the internet cafe downstairs for their Wifi, which we can only reliably access via the balcony of our apartment.

We do plan on updating the blog shortly with photos of our new apartment and accounts of our experiences thus far once we get our broadband connection hooked up.  Until then, thank you for staying tuned!