WTF?

So we decided in March 2007 to permanently move to Australia from South Africa. It's December 2007 and we're here now, so I decided to share some info around our experiences.

WTF is for 'Where to Find...?', 'What the F...', Why the F...', etc... ;-)

I'll let you know What To Find, What they tell you, and especially, what they don't tell you!

I know there's loads of info out there about Aus, but I thought I'd compile it into one place about the stuff that worked for me. I hope it's useful to someone...

Disclaimer: This is based on my individual experiences. I'll mention companies by name and recommend what I found worked - or didn't. Do your own research and use common sense when considering my view...

WTF - who to trust with everything you own on the planet!

What you want:
All your earthly possessions to arrive safe and sound halfway across the world - undamaged...

What you think:
It's very expensive, everything is going to break, and it probably won't arrive in Australia.

What they DON'T tell you:
We relocated with Crown International Relocations instead of Biddulphs for the simple reason that Crown offered an end-to-end Crown owned service, whereas Biddulphs used other service providers.

Crown was excellent.

The packing staff were great and thorough, and when we received our goods that were shipped on 20 October on 27 December, NOTHING was damaged or broken. Incredible, considering our whole house had gone via truck to Durban, South Africa, into storage, onto a container ship to Singapore, into storage, onto another ship to Melbourne, into storage, through customs, transferred to a new container, and eventually unpacked at our new home. Even our 40 plus bottles of wine and 80 or so glasses made it. Well done to them!

The packing process took 2 days and they pack it all. Loading is on the third day and takes most of the day.

Make sure you remove all animal, plant, untreated wood and grasses from your stuff. Don't try to sneak anything through. Customs and immigration unpacks the container into a new one on arrival in Australia, and they'll find most things. We had a honeymoon photo album with a banana leaf stuck on the front cover and they destroyed this - we didn't sneak it in, just overlooked it in the chaos.

Another thing to get used to - it took 8 guys to load the truck in SA, plus a driver to watch, and 2 guys to unload, one of which was the driver - bit more efficient and cost effective, methinks...

WTF'kin start?

What you want:
Work & money

What they tell you:
get your PR (Permanent Residency), then relocate/migrate, then find a job - no worries...

What they don't tell you:
Get a job first! We looked at permanent residency, but the process takes ages - about 12 to 24 months - really. My brother started in March '07 and he's lucky if he's in by April '08. We were lucky enough to find employment first, which included a transfer (everything paid), and it was still very hard - emotionally, physically, and paperwork! It still took 6 months before we landed in Australia.

WTF:
Australia Immigration Site - use it! There's step-by-step instructions and if you make the effort you can DIY

WTF - go looksee for yourself

What you want:
Move to Australia ASAP!

What you think:
You've been told 'it's very similar to South Africa - same weather, also love rugby, sunshine and braai/barbeque'

What they DON'T tell you:
Go and see for yourself. It's beyond me how anyone can rip up their whole lives, hop on a plane and go and live somewhere on the opposite side of the planet without taking the trouble to have a look firsthand?

Yes, it's expensive. Yes, it takes planning and time. Yes, everyone at work and all your friends and family get a heads-up on your intentions. Just do it!

We decided to visit Perth (everyone in South Africa tends to end up there), Sydney (everyone wants to be there), and Melbourne (heard good things from some Aussie friends). We skipped Brisbane, Canberra and Adelaide.

We took nearly three weeks so we could spend a decent amount of time experiencing local life and try to lose the tourist feeling to feel the 'real life' in the various places. Not much time in retrospect, but enough to see the differences in the various places.

So here's what we thought:

• Perth - too far from everything, particularly given that my wife and I are in IT. If you're in the mining or resources industry it's probably good to consider, as it's booming at the moment. Also a solid 6 hour flight to Sydney and Melbourne where a lot of Australia's business happens.
• Sydney - nice if you're a tourist, but our (very limited) experience was that it's just another busy city. It seems very congested, loads of tourists, traffic is hell, very expensive to live and work there. Very beautiful.
• Melbourne - this stole our hearts. It's a spacious, well-planned, vibey and interesting place and has a bit more laid-back feeling. It sits on a 50km by 50km bay which is perfect for any watersports, has winelands all around it, snow skiing in winter only a 3 hour drive away and there's lots of sports, concerts, shows, restaurants, etc in very close proximity. Public transport is also excellent. The trams, trains and buses are clean and well maintained and generally on time. Also very well organised as is everything else here, so they have extra transport during major events as an example.The weather seems ok - it's known as four seasons in a day, but so far it's been great. Gets VERY hot sometimes with desert winds blowing the temps up to 40 degrees for a few days, then a 'cool change' comes in and the temp drops by 10 to 20 degrees in 30 minutes. Everyone always has a spare coat with them!
• Brisbane, Adelaide and Canberra - we skipped these because Sydney and Melbourne are the biggest cities - around 3.5 million people in each, and these 3 cities where either too remote or too small to hedge our bets in the job market.

One thing you need to experience too believe is the sheer size of Australia! It's massive.
Take a look at the map and see how close Sydney and Melbourne appear. That's 900km's you're looking at! roughly from Joburg to East London. Also remember that you have to drive at 100km/h - not 101 or 102, but 100 - and that's a loooooong trip by car...

So our impressions were that the weather is good, lifestyle is very different, very British history, mannerisms and ways about the Aussies, very clean, neat, well-organised country, very proud nation, very welcoming, very accepting of different cultures (only 30% of Melbournians are Aussies), VERY EXPENSIVE housing and a low, low crime rate.
The country is also booming so there's lots of work around and we felt we could build a future here filled with hope, security and a great lifestyle...