Making the move........
I've somewhat figured out my short term plans for the future and I think this is going to come as huge shock to a lot of people that I'm planning to leave Perth in 2010. I think a lot of people are going to question how serious I am and what has happened in regards to me wanting to make a decision like this. I will heavily state that this is something that didn't pop up into my head within the last few days, it's been playing on me for the past few months now and it's a decision being made about the potential positives in regards to moving to another city, rather then anything negative incidents that have happened in Perth.
The reason I've set 2010 is because I will finish TAFE at the end of 2009 and will be making the move to switch to university and I'm realising that this will probably be the best time to make a move, since I'll be able to meet new people more easily, get a fresh start in terms of my education rather then going through the hassles of transferring in that sense, this will be very good career wise but the move is far beyond simply a matter of career.
So basically there's a significant number of places I'm thinking of going to the main ones sticking out are Melbourne, Singapore, Amsterdam/Rotterdam, Toronto or stay behind in Perth. These are the main cities I will be heavily considering, I'll analyse each of these cities from what I know. Japan was another one I was considering but learning the language and the potentially stressful lifestyle meant it's missed the cut.
The thing is these are just presumptions and my understandings, I would absolutely love to hear peoples views and knowledge in regards to this issue, I would be extremely grateful to hear about this.
Perth
Simply if I don't have the balls I'll be taking this option
Ok, the easy option is to stay in Perth, if you asked me this question 5 years ago, easy, I had nothing 5 years ago here and I'd all be up for a fresh start. Now, I've got a pretty good set up in regards to work, school and some really good friends here. Everything is going really well and I'm simply not making this move to run away. I have everything set up in terms of all my stuff, knowledge of the area, all my accounts and the like, so staying here isn't necessarily the lazy option it means there will be shitloads less hassle.
But here's the main problem, I'm getting over Perth. Every says Perth is like a huge country town and this is a hard concept for me to grasp having spent little time outside Perth but I barely left Perth Airport and I could see what everyone was talking about. This city is far too dated, the people here are heavily closed minded and backwards and hate change far too much to make any forward progression, I can not believe our city still refuses to open up shop on Sunday it pisses me off insanely. I was comfortable with this last year, just accepting my job realising that this is working out ok but I'm very different now, I live for challenge, forward progression, modern solutions, loaded with open minded people and Perth is not filled with these ideals.
I realise that leaving this place will be hard, having spent most of my life here and setting up all over again, it was hard enough just moving house with my parents, let alone moving all my stuff to another city and setting up a new life in another city. However, hard work will pay off and while I will generally be worse off in the short term, I don't want to sit around in Perth when I'm 40 and constantly think about what could have been.
Melbourne
This is currently my #1 choice.
There will be very little culture shock for me in Melbourne, it's brimming with far more interesting people, a much larger and vibrant city and as a bonus I get a Grand Prix in my city! Well maybe for not much longer possibly but back to the point. In terms of my career, I will be so much better off career wise in Melbourne, there will be more jobs plus way more companies set up their head offices there rather then Perth.
While I will be sad to lose all my friends, it's not too difficult for me to make a trip to Perth every year to come down and the internet will mean I'm not too out of touch with everyone. Starting uni in melbourne a more vibrant goth, rave, anime scene means I will be able to find people and friends quickly hopefully especially with my brighter and friendlier attitude with less social anxiety then at the start of the year. I'll easily find a girl over there that's far into my interests which is pretty rare here.
Living expenses will be far cheaper, especially when it comes to rent and I don't know why but Melbourne is the city exciting me the most as there will just be so much more to see and do over there in general, no more being so heavily isolated. The only downside I'm picturing about Melbourne is the crime, since from what I've heard Melbourne is by far one of the most dangerous cities in Australia to live in, so that's making me a bit nervous.
Josh, Wynona, Kerry Anne and Antonia have all expressed their intentions on moving to Melbourne and this is definitely getting me heavily excited about the move to this city. ^^
Singapore
A place I love to visit but to live?
I often say Singapore is my second home, being the one city I visit more then others and a city I easily know my way around. The new heavily westernised Singapore caters a lot to my tastes and while it takes a little bit of adapting it's barely a culture shock to me at all after a few days actually. The city is modern, easy to get around, it virutually has no crime, a completely clean city and an amazing array of shopping it's truly is an amazing city. Oh and apparently they hold the best F1 race in the world and my god it was an awesome one this year. ^^
Adapting will be a piece of cake, this place is where all of my mothers relatives live and they will be very helpful towards helping me make the move. Mark from Outbreed lives there and will keep me in good company and very well connected in regards to lots of events, showing me the Singapore underground and helping me make lots of friends that I can get along with.
However the only down side appears to be my ability to have a good social life over there. Very few people are going to be anything I'm into, even things like anime fans and DDR players seemed to be a rarity over there which is a huge surprise for an Asian country. This will be worse when it comes to finding people into stuff like alternative fashion and all the references I make in my socialising which I heavily doubt most Singaporeans would get. It's a bit hard being alternative over there since there is so few let alone being an alternative Australian, I realise there is a goth scene but no offence to Mark it's pretty small.
I wouldn't have a problem living there, it's just simply a matter of me being too out of place or having to change myself significantly to adapt there to make it work. I love this place to bits but living just seems far too hard for me to consider I honestly think.
Amsterdam/Rotterdam
I have a high curiousity and there is massive potential here.
I met Roos online a few years ago and I've learnt a lot about the Netherlands from her and honestly I seriously have quite a thing for this country, it's a pretty place, very unique, interesting and I think very few can claim to be way more open minded then the Dutch. I've always felt I fitted into Europe far better then Australia in terms of my interests, likes and personalities. If there's one place that in Europe I'd pick it would be this place.
The main problem is that I've never been (which I've constantly been delaying) so I can't really say too much however I'm very excited to go here and see what it's like. The cyber scene is utterly amazing over there, I'm close to visiting other countries in particular Germany and Belgium would be very high on places I'd love to visit and there is so much to do festival wise. The country is pretty and the people seem friendly and the Dutch girls I've seen, my god, they're hot. ^^
I will have to learn Dutch though which I can get by without but it's heavily reccommended, Tom informs me that he picked it up rather quickly just from spending time over there, so this isn't much of a problem, the dreadful currency conversion and moving into an international country will be a huge challenge to say the least.
However if I really like what I see when I visit the country sometime soon I hope.
Toronto
The surprise choice?
Canada is a country I've always liked and been curious in, it's basically America but far more liveable in terms of open mindedness and not being loaded with crime, guns and rednecks. Canada is something I know little about to heavily consider at this stage however I've heard a lot of good things about the place about the people and just how many people want to move there just because it's quite an amazing place to be. I think this is an unlikely choice but if I can get a contact in Canada and look into this heavily and while not a logical choice at this stage, it could be a different story next year.
Opinions?
The reason I've set 2010 is because I will finish TAFE at the end of 2009 and will be making the move to switch to university and I'm realising that this will probably be the best time to make a move, since I'll be able to meet new people more easily, get a fresh start in terms of my education rather then going through the hassles of transferring in that sense, this will be very good career wise but the move is far beyond simply a matter of career.
So basically there's a significant number of places I'm thinking of going to the main ones sticking out are Melbourne, Singapore, Amsterdam/Rotterdam, Toronto or stay behind in Perth. These are the main cities I will be heavily considering, I'll analyse each of these cities from what I know. Japan was another one I was considering but learning the language and the potentially stressful lifestyle meant it's missed the cut.
The thing is these are just presumptions and my understandings, I would absolutely love to hear peoples views and knowledge in regards to this issue, I would be extremely grateful to hear about this.
Perth
Simply if I don't have the balls I'll be taking this option
Ok, the easy option is to stay in Perth, if you asked me this question 5 years ago, easy, I had nothing 5 years ago here and I'd all be up for a fresh start. Now, I've got a pretty good set up in regards to work, school and some really good friends here. Everything is going really well and I'm simply not making this move to run away. I have everything set up in terms of all my stuff, knowledge of the area, all my accounts and the like, so staying here isn't necessarily the lazy option it means there will be shitloads less hassle.
But here's the main problem, I'm getting over Perth. Every says Perth is like a huge country town and this is a hard concept for me to grasp having spent little time outside Perth but I barely left Perth Airport and I could see what everyone was talking about. This city is far too dated, the people here are heavily closed minded and backwards and hate change far too much to make any forward progression, I can not believe our city still refuses to open up shop on Sunday it pisses me off insanely. I was comfortable with this last year, just accepting my job realising that this is working out ok but I'm very different now, I live for challenge, forward progression, modern solutions, loaded with open minded people and Perth is not filled with these ideals.
I realise that leaving this place will be hard, having spent most of my life here and setting up all over again, it was hard enough just moving house with my parents, let alone moving all my stuff to another city and setting up a new life in another city. However, hard work will pay off and while I will generally be worse off in the short term, I don't want to sit around in Perth when I'm 40 and constantly think about what could have been.
Melbourne
This is currently my #1 choice.
There will be very little culture shock for me in Melbourne, it's brimming with far more interesting people, a much larger and vibrant city and as a bonus I get a Grand Prix in my city! Well maybe for not much longer possibly but back to the point. In terms of my career, I will be so much better off career wise in Melbourne, there will be more jobs plus way more companies set up their head offices there rather then Perth.
While I will be sad to lose all my friends, it's not too difficult for me to make a trip to Perth every year to come down and the internet will mean I'm not too out of touch with everyone. Starting uni in melbourne a more vibrant goth, rave, anime scene means I will be able to find people and friends quickly hopefully especially with my brighter and friendlier attitude with less social anxiety then at the start of the year. I'll easily find a girl over there that's far into my interests which is pretty rare here.
Living expenses will be far cheaper, especially when it comes to rent and I don't know why but Melbourne is the city exciting me the most as there will just be so much more to see and do over there in general, no more being so heavily isolated. The only downside I'm picturing about Melbourne is the crime, since from what I've heard Melbourne is by far one of the most dangerous cities in Australia to live in, so that's making me a bit nervous.
Josh, Wynona, Kerry Anne and Antonia have all expressed their intentions on moving to Melbourne and this is definitely getting me heavily excited about the move to this city. ^^
Singapore
A place I love to visit but to live?
I often say Singapore is my second home, being the one city I visit more then others and a city I easily know my way around. The new heavily westernised Singapore caters a lot to my tastes and while it takes a little bit of adapting it's barely a culture shock to me at all after a few days actually. The city is modern, easy to get around, it virutually has no crime, a completely clean city and an amazing array of shopping it's truly is an amazing city. Oh and apparently they hold the best F1 race in the world and my god it was an awesome one this year. ^^
Adapting will be a piece of cake, this place is where all of my mothers relatives live and they will be very helpful towards helping me make the move. Mark from Outbreed lives there and will keep me in good company and very well connected in regards to lots of events, showing me the Singapore underground and helping me make lots of friends that I can get along with.
However the only down side appears to be my ability to have a good social life over there. Very few people are going to be anything I'm into, even things like anime fans and DDR players seemed to be a rarity over there which is a huge surprise for an Asian country. This will be worse when it comes to finding people into stuff like alternative fashion and all the references I make in my socialising which I heavily doubt most Singaporeans would get. It's a bit hard being alternative over there since there is so few let alone being an alternative Australian, I realise there is a goth scene but no offence to Mark it's pretty small.
I wouldn't have a problem living there, it's just simply a matter of me being too out of place or having to change myself significantly to adapt there to make it work. I love this place to bits but living just seems far too hard for me to consider I honestly think.
Amsterdam/Rotterdam
I have a high curiousity and there is massive potential here.
I met Roos online a few years ago and I've learnt a lot about the Netherlands from her and honestly I seriously have quite a thing for this country, it's a pretty place, very unique, interesting and I think very few can claim to be way more open minded then the Dutch. I've always felt I fitted into Europe far better then Australia in terms of my interests, likes and personalities. If there's one place that in Europe I'd pick it would be this place.
The main problem is that I've never been (which I've constantly been delaying) so I can't really say too much however I'm very excited to go here and see what it's like. The cyber scene is utterly amazing over there, I'm close to visiting other countries in particular Germany and Belgium would be very high on places I'd love to visit and there is so much to do festival wise. The country is pretty and the people seem friendly and the Dutch girls I've seen, my god, they're hot. ^^
I will have to learn Dutch though which I can get by without but it's heavily reccommended, Tom informs me that he picked it up rather quickly just from spending time over there, so this isn't much of a problem, the dreadful currency conversion and moving into an international country will be a huge challenge to say the least.
However if I really like what I see when I visit the country sometime soon I hope.
Toronto
The surprise choice?
Canada is a country I've always liked and been curious in, it's basically America but far more liveable in terms of open mindedness and not being loaded with crime, guns and rednecks. Canada is something I know little about to heavily consider at this stage however I've heard a lot of good things about the place about the people and just how many people want to move there just because it's quite an amazing place to be. I think this is an unlikely choice but if I can get a contact in Canada and look into this heavily and while not a logical choice at this stage, it could be a different story next year.
Opinions?