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Victor says:

Driving to work this morning, I spend some time in traffic reflecting on the years I have been here calling Perth my home now. Thank you road works and lollipop man for holding up traffic during peak hours!!!

This is truly a city that I have grown to appreciate and constantly remind myself how lucky it is for me to here. As warren buffet would have said, I have basically won the lottery just by being born in a first world country. Lucky for me, I was born in Singapore and migrated to Australia.

What is it about Perth that makes it so great,

Traffic

We have grown so accustom to having next to no traffic except during peak hours on the freeway into the city. So when we hit a jam when we least expect it, WE GRUMBLE AND BLOG ABOUT IT!! Thanks you road works and lollipop man again.


Any tourist or locals who have driven here should be able to related to this, driving into the city on a weekend, not having to pay any tolls, driving around outside of peak hours without having to plan routes or drive through fancy shortcuts in some suburban areas. On top of all that, parking is normally free outside of city areas(even in city there are free parking). Yes Malaysia and Singapore, I am looking at you!!!!

Cars are also affordable and relatively cheap to maintain. However do note that without a car, the public transport here is horrendous. We are talking 2 hour for a bus to arrive at times. Without a timetable and logistic team for planning, it can be a challenge to get to places on time(you are either really early or really late).

Working culture

This obviously depends on the company you work for and your job role however, having worked in 5 companies and contracted for 2, this is my general impression of the local working culture.

Lax. I cannot emphasize this enough so here goes, lax, lax, lax. Family over career. During school holiday, my office goes on holiday too. If you need time off, company will give it to you and 9 out of 10 times, this is what they will say.

"I hope everything goes well and take more time off if you need."

Meanwhile back in Singapore,

"SIMI DAI ZI, WAH LAO, ALWAYS TAKING TIME OFF. THEN YOUR PROJECT HOW, I DON"T CARE YOU WORK OVERTIME AND FINISH IT"

which translate to basically "WTF!!!"



We also have a mandatory 20 days annual leave a year(4 weeks if you include weekends). Something that even countries like USA is lacking behind. USA has no regulation but on average 0 for the first year and 7 days annual leave after working for 1 year which is mostly used over Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Lastly, what no OT? yes.. really.... very rarely we get overtime, and if we do work overtime, we normally get compensated for it.

Housing

This is a really tough one because it really depends which generation you are born in. With today's economy market, it sucks to be young and late into the property market. Let me explain why.

Medium house price according to REIWA: 530000
Typical down payment: 20% - 106000
Commonwealth bank variable interest rate: 4.90 p.a
Repayment each month is : 2251

Now, Western Australia medium HOUSEHOLD income: A$72,800 before tax. after tax we are looking at 5000 assuming that is dual income. single income will be 4600 roughly.


Now firstly the 20% downpayment is a bitch to save up especially if you are renting. Secondly 50% of your income is used in repayment. Not feasible considering Australia is not exactly bali cheap. Council rate, insurance, utilities and food will kill you if the mortgage didn't. Note all calculating is done in MEDIUM instead of AVERAGE so that the ultra rich or poor won't skew the results.

However, people that have got into property early are winning because firstly, income has doubled in the last 10 years and if they have bought their property early, it would have been at less than half the current price combo that with a double in income means a double win.

What do I like about Perth? The short/quick answer is NOTHING.

Reason? I am here all by myself, my entire family lives in Kuching, Malaysia and this has been going on since 2002. 14 years and counting!

--note\\: it doesn't take 8hrs to fly from Kuching to Perth. Back in 2002-2004 there were directly flights from Kuching to Perth served by Malaysian Airlines. It took 5 hours and unfortunately that route got cancelled and we all have to pass through Kuala Lumpur now.

So since I don't like anything about Perth, you might wonder wtf am I doing here?

To summarize Perth in my experience, there is nothing here! No mouth watering food, the shopping industry in Perth sucks!, the landmark is okay-ish, job prospect is considerable poor in comparison to East Coast and although there are 4 seasons here it doesn't snow in Winter and people do die from heatstroke during the months of Summer.

Again! What do I like about Perth? The answer is Nothing! In your terms, you would read it as I don't like ANYTHING about Perth but the truth is I've grown to like Perth because it has NOTHING. I go back home once a year and never in my life apart from my own family members have I invited anyone to Perth. People would whinge how boring and lifeless Perth is (and that puts a smile on my face in my heart!). But what people whinge about aren't fiction. 5 years ago, shops will operate from 9am to 5pm, 1/2 day on Saturday and Sunday is a total write off. There weren't as much local eateries or pubs to go to at night as well and one might claim Perth to be a ghost town. Why is this the case you might ask, cultural difference and high employment wages (if I am not mistaken business were not allowed to operate out of local government defined hours.)


Now you would wonder why would I want to stay here? First of all when I arrive in Perth my aim wasn't to have fun. It was to graduate uni, I guess it would be easier to sell the idea that Perth is the ideal place to study because it has little to no entertainment options for a young adult to my parents, to be honest that wasn't the entire reason why I came to Perth. Just the fact that it is the closest city to Malaysia and at that time the cheapest city to study in.

This is the 4th day now for me to finish this post and what I realize is that everything I like about Perth actually translate to the entire country. I have flown around Australia for events, work trips and holidays the one thing that I have like about Perth compared to Sydney is traffic and parking. When I was working in Sydney, if I request for some vendor to come onsite to do any work, before they understand the job scope they ask if there were onsite parking. Yes parking in Sydney is expensive and difficult but public transportation is a lot better compared to Perth. It is probably a lot easier to taxi than drive for work purposes.

In Perth we don't have to pay for tolls to get on an expressway but that is also the same back home where I came from so I don't see this as a perk although you need to pay for tolls over east.

I managed to build a house 15kms from the CBD for less than $450,000. I think you can also do that in Tasmania and Adelaide but then flying from KL to Adelaide or Tasmania takes more time and money.

GST refund, this is the easier process ever. Just keep your receipt when you make a purpose. As long as it is more than $300 (doesn't even have to be a single receipt, as long as its from the same business) you can claim over the counter. I have been to Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Bangkok and Japan, and I don't even bother.

We don't have big brands here until recently. The likes of TOPMAN and ZARA just open shop early 2015. Prior to that we only have the few mega luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci in Perth. We don't even have an official Rolex shop. More money in the bank I guess. No temptation.

Australia has the cheapest Lego sets that I have seen so far, however we only have limited range of whatever there is to offer, if you are not happy you will have to make your purchases from Lego.com online shop and get it shipped.


Travelling from Perth to anywhere sucks EXCEPT BALI! Anywhere you go, you need to transit via Singapore/Malaysia/Hong Kong or Dubai. I have literary never been anywhere prior to 2007/2008, always flew home for Chinese New Year for holidays. (this is one of the biggest regret of my life, but this also enabled me to save a big chunk of change for owning my own home).

I believe I have finally finish this post but I don't think I have clearly post why I like Perth. I think it more a mix review like mix veg rice which is the way I like it.