#23

Yup, the price of fruit and veg in particular is mindblowingly expensive.

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#24

The wages as a bartender are great. Ive worked out that I can work 10 hours a week less and have the same disposable income compared with Wellington.

Also I know the weather in Wellington is bad but ive grown to like it. There’s something cosy about drab weather and if a place is as beautiful as NZ I think its ok.

Does Melbourne have nice scenery within an hour or twos drive? Scenery and hikes are a but draw for me

#25

Really struggling to get a straight answer about how easy it is to get sponsored to stay too. Some people say its easy, others give me aload of spiel about how it isnt

#26

Very easy, you have the Yarra Valley wine region which is amazing, Some mountains on the city limits, that you can just take the train out to and there is Skiing in Victoria in winter.

Oh, and some great diving, or so I’m told.

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#27

It can be easy and it can be hard. Depends what your work experience/contacts/financial ability is. If you speak English as a first language then you are already at a massive advantage.
I got sponsored and it was pretty easy and now I’m a permanent resident but I was also really lucky to find a company who really needed someone (me). Sometimes it’s right place, right time. Much easier if you have a sought after qualification or work experience.

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#28

Bear in mind high paid bar jobs are really a result of expensive booze amongst other things.

And yeah the scenery around Australia is excellent. Plenty of beautiful places to go in Victoria and some varied landscapes.

#29

Id be shooting for bar manager at this point. What do you do?

#30

Looks like they’ve just removed bar manager from the list of skilled work recently. Think it’s going to be Wellington after all!

#31

I was actually sponsored as a customer service manager for a recruitment company, but these days I run my own. There are a few jobs on the sponsored jobs list that can be used for a variety of more generic roles and that’s one of them but if bar manager isn’t on there you might find it is more difficult to get sponsored as something else into essentially the same role nowadays, whereas if it hadn’t just come off the list you might have been able to argue you were completing another role whilst actually doing what a bar manager does.
Also worth considering the age limits for visas as a traveller in both places, like if the age is higher in NZ you could consider trying Melbourne first to see if it’s possible then heading to Wellington if Australia doesn’t seem like it’s gonna work out for you. Could well be the same ages though, I’ve not looked in years.

#32

I live in Melbourne - ask me anything

Always pick Melbourne over Sydney - Sydney is definitely prettier (beaches etc) but much more expensive and it’s nightlife and music scene is severely hampered by licensing laws

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#33

here is one of those great hyperbolic stories about Melbourne’s music scene

#34

And it’s muggier. Ugh.

#35

Melbourne has it’s hot unpleasant moments as well - i particularly hate how in the hot times it’s hot righ through the night - like 30 odd degrees at midnight! Growing up in Brisbane we had scorching, muggy days - but mostly some respite in the evening

Also, I’m quite happy with transport options here - I live in the inner east though so my commute isn’t long

#36

Yeah I think the trams finish at Footscray whereas I guess you have those as alternatives.

It’s not that Melbourne transport is bad, it’s just that London’s is amazing. I mean it’s crowded as fuck on most commutes but that’s the nature of the beast because the main thing you need from a transport system is to get you somewhere as efficiently as possible. I’ve used Uber so much since I’ve come to Melbourne, which is partly down to being used to London of course and finding it difficult to make better choices on timings.

#37

yeah I can see that being an issue, whenever we consider moving or buying it still has to be relative distance to trams and trains

I worked for Metro trains here for a few years, and it was such a bureaucratic nightmare. Good to see there is some movement on new stations but nowhere near enough. Whilst the tram network and regional train network get no love!

Definitely miss the convenience of the tube! And why Australia just can’t get their heads around fast city link/regional trains I will never understand!

#38

It’s very hard to get trains into a good position once cars have been established unfortunately. Look at all the rail lines the UK lost over the years because the alternative is very tax-costly and there is always a large section of the population who need a vehicle for work no matter what which tends to bring its own issues.

My impression of Aussie public transport is generally good. I got a bit grumpy in Brisbane when visiting but my mates pointed out that for whatever reason Google hadn’t integrated into the Queensland transport system and that if I’d installed their own app it would have steered me better.

#39

Nah, public transport here is still pretty patchy even with the apps. Just seems like things don’t connect up in an intuitive way, and also like certain areas just aren’t good for bus or train so if you want to get to them without a car it’s a pain any way you do it.

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#40

That said, everyone’s mum loves the citycat public ferry system up and down the river…

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#41

When I have used it it is good!

This was attempting to get from Murrarrie to Indooroopily (?) and I just used Google Maps which couldn’t find a public transport route at all, but it was there on the main app when my friends showed me. Dunno. Maybe it was having a weird moment.

#42

coming to terms with the fact that it’s gonna be hard to stay in either. my plan is to get both visas, go to melbourne for 9 months and then fly to wellington for a year. who knows what could happen in that time? it sucks to be 30 without a ‘skilled job’.

thanks for the info all

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