Illustration by Mice Hell
Shona McGarry
Staff Writer
For the last two months I’ve been living in the sun-buttered and wholly magnificent city of Perth, Western Australia. I’ve been staying with family and working in a slightly-less-than-magnificent supermarket where I spend my time staring absently at herbs, and explaining that no, Ireland is not part of the UK. Time off is spent buying new jumpers, possibly with bobbles on, because although famed for its sweltering summers and laid-back, chill-out, what’s-the-problem-mate attitude, Perth is currently sneezing away and wrapped in winter. It’s even ski season in Melbourne, down south. So, after flying 18 hours across the world in the company of not one, two, but three Ryan Gosling movies (thank you, Emirates), I find myself in a bit of an off-season place. A place where everyone eats with a fork and spoon (I’ve had many a that’s not a knife, this is a knife moment. The Simpsons Down Under, anyone?), and asks How Are You Going? by means of a greeting, even though you’ve explained to them TOO MANY TIMES that this does not make any sense and you have absolutely no idea how to handle frankly ridiculous queries such as this.
Welcome to Oz. You’re not in Kansas anymore.
That’s right, Perth city is as far away from home as possible, surrounded as it is with Americana suburbs, freeways, and miniature cities. It’s a bit hipster and a bit cool – the tourism ad has some dude rapping ‘Perth is my city/it’s my city/and I love it/I love it’ over images of the clear-mint river, pelicans, some cactus-sculpture-thing, and people having a Genuinely Awesome Time. How cool is that? And it’s got actual skyscrapers, a Chanel, and streets that are clean, wide, and have people playing didgeridoos on them. It’s also the city of Fly-In Fly-Out – something to do with miners working one week on, one week off, during which they come home and spend all their money on beer, food, cafes, and clubs, while laughing jovially about football and some maybe sporting a questionable amount of AFL merchandise. They’re also pretty easy to spot, seeing as they keep their flouro vests on even when they’re not currently mining. If that’s not something to write home about, I don’t know what is.
Outside Dublin we have grass and the odd petrol station. Outside Perth, however, lie a whole clutch of trendy other cities. The City of Subiaco (‘Subi’ to us in the know), has a football Oval and is popular with young working adults, such as myself. Then there’s Fremantle (‘Freo’ – Aussies like their abbreviations), the dockside home of markets where you can buy weird art and mint-flavoured fudge, as well as a rubber flour-filled ‘friend’ for $10. I have three. Cottesloe – Cott – the seaside town, is where all the cool hostelling crowd hangs out, and Rottnest Island – Rotto – is where everyone goes after their finals to get stung by massive jellyfish. Mt Lawley has a great burger joint, and is probably abbreviated to Mount Law or something.
As if all the abbreviating isn’t weird enough, the entire language of Australia is a bit of an off-shoot. Veggies are spelt ‘vegies’ and pronounced ‘veegies’, like they’re some sort of Australian version of the BeeGees. And they’ve all been renamed for unfathomable reasons. An aubergine is actually an eggplant, even though it has nothing to do with eggs, or indeed plants. A courgette becomes something called a zucchini, while the capsicum takes the place of the humble pepper. It’s not college, it’s ‘uni’, you don’t say bye, you say ‘see ya’, and when you’re describing that time you won a gold medal in the sack race, you say that you ‘took it out’. Sweets are ‘lollies’, and friendly folks in shops will say ‘G’day mate’ when you walk in to buy yet another magazine (must stop wasting hard-earned cash on magazines). That’s right, they actually say that. G’day, mate is not just something that Rolf Harris made up. It’s real life.
And that’s what’s here, too. While their national slogan could be Well, I’m Just Looking Forward To Having An Awesome Time – because that’s what they’re about: awesome times, road trips, having a beer, travelling the world – the Home and Away lifestyle isn’t all you’ll find here (except at The Shire, Australia’s answer to Geordie/Jersey Shore. I don’t know why they felt they had to have an answer to whatever incomprehensible question either of these Shores was asking). They even take some things seriously, contrary to popular opinion. Every single one of their Olympic hopes is an actual hope, and they’re also pretty serious about cooking something delish. What’s more, Perth is full of regular people who work 9-5, people who wear suits, people who don’t wear suits, people who drive, people who don’t drive, people who work on farms, people who don’t work on farms… They’re just regular life-living people like us, who go to the supermarket and get really angry when things they like aren’t on special, scream at you for giving them a $100 note when they wanted two $50s, and who demand that you pack their bags before repacking them RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU. And yes, I am aware that there was possibly one too many supermarket references in that sentence, but that’s what working at a checkout to the constant companionship of Phil Collins’ In The Air Tonight on Mix 94.5 every day does to you.
Speaking of work, there’s a killer minimum wage here – almost double what we get at home when you’re over 18 – if the word ‘killer’ can actually be applied to standing at a till for 6 hours with just one ten-minute break during which you spend $5 on a coffee and 5 minutes reading The Book of Heroic Failures, about such luminaries as The Worst Poet Ever and the woman who failed her driving test within three seconds. There’s also lots of work – from casual shop shifts in the cities to seasonal farming up north and the high-paying mines further inland. It’s the land of opportunity – even if I did take that opportunity to listen to people tell me that they ‘need a bag, dear, because I have to walk up the hill’. Something tells me that forklifting my way through Australia or digging for silver (is that what they do in the mines? Probably not) may have lent my escapades a slightly more interesting complexion than entire days filled with Would You Like The Meat Separately?
Anyway, aside from my complaints about inconveniently named ‘vegies’ and my highly entertaining supermarket escapades, being in Perth really is perfection, from the freezing nights to the footie. Even if it just means I’m away from people who drive me mad, from weather that just doesn’t do what it says on the tin, from nights at Academy that just blend into one big boring haze, and from the same bus route every day. Being somewhere new means catching a bus called the 103, shopping in ‘op shops’ instead of Topshop, hearing people discuss the ‘new’ season of Downton Abbey (otherwise known as what we watched last November. Amateurs), and looking up at a sky that isn’t going to rain unless it’s got something scheduled.
Now that’s a summer (winter) time worth having. As for the new language, I’m taking it out, on my break from uni, eating a lolly in the shape of an eggplant.
If you can’t beat them, join them mate.
