Shipping off from Montreal to Wollongong Australia!

Well, I got confirmation this morning. I got the engineering job in Wollongong. The company is about 1km from the beach. I was curious how the lifestyle compares from Wollongong to Sydney as well as cost of living etc.I heard its a University town and my girlfriend and I are 27 and 26 respectively so we're still a couple of social animals.
I also saw some climate charts and it seems like it doesn't really get cold there and the hottest it gets is about 24 or 25 degrees C which is fiiine with me!

Anyone have any input? It would really help me from stressing out!
AAAHHHHH!

Congrats on the job!

You'll probably love the temperature year round. Although you will likely find it really cold in your house in the winter here. The houses aren't really insulated and don't have heaters really so you'll find it pretty cold at night.

We arrived in May after a long winter in Canada and come June-August there were a few cold spells where we were bundled up under blankets and had space heaters going at night. But it certainly wasn't all winter long. Even during the winter the weather outside was usually very nice.

What kind of engineering do you do? I know they have underground mines there because my husband's a mining engineer, but other than that I don't know much about the place.

Thanks on the congrats! Now I gotta break the news to my family.oooohhhh boyy.

So what kind of engineer am I? Well, generally mechanical however I got an awesome job in montreal as an aerospace technical liason engineer.but when I got the call from Australia, I had to try for my dream and it worked out.much better salary anyway.really looking forward to vacations in thailand, fiji and cairns.hiking in the blue mountains on weekends and of course picnic suppers on the beach.I just need to know the voltage in australia so I can get adaptors for my cpu, stereo and SPACE HEATERS lol.Wollongong is a little south for my taste but I won't push my luck.
if your husbands a mining engineer, he must work for Hatch.maybe I'll meet him sometime.

take care and write back!

Jarrett

No, my husband doesn't work for Hatch. Although they do deal with them quite a bit. He works for Queensland Energy Resources, so not quite a company you're likely to come across.

Are you coming over on a temporary or a permanent visa? Have you looked into taxes and housing costs in Wollongong? I have no idea if it's an expensive city or not.

I'm sure your parents won't be thrilled, but they'll get used to the idea. Our parents were not happy, but then we were bringing their only grandchildren with us.

I wouldn't brother bringing too many electrical things unless they are dual voltage. They operate on 240V and 50Hz. So the voltage and frequency are different. We didn't ship any of our things but we did bring over our laptop, digital camera and mp3 player because they are dual voltage. We left behind our desktop computer and printer but they would have worked fine here. Even if we had shipped all of things over we were going to leave the TV and stereo equipment behind (except for maybe the speakers).

I did a bit of research and you can get adapters so that you can plug your stuff in, that's what we're using now. But adapters won't change the electricity. So you would need transformers to change the voltage. The problem is that even with a transformer there is no way to change the frequency. So you can get your item to run, but it would be running faster or slower than usually because the frequency would be different on the machine than the electrity it gets. So, for example, a clock would be a bad idea. Because you could power the clock but it would cycle faster or slower so it wouldn't keep time properly. Or other items might run faster and heat up, etc. So our personal decision was to leave anything that wasn't dual voltage. I checked everything in the house and the only things that were dual voltage were things that were pretty mobile or universal, like computers and digital cameras.

I hope you got all that! But if you do a little research you'll get a better idea of what I'm talking about. If you search on the message boards, particularly that one I sent you, you'll see it being discussed quite a bit.

I'm on a permanent visa as far as I'm aware.the director is flying to montreal in two weeks to discuss salary and after everything is done, I imagine it'll take another 4 months to get the visas. He said my girlfriend can be considered my "de-facto" wife and can work under my visa.this is new information as I thought she would get one of her own. I'll have to check that one out as well.
By adapter I did mean voltage adapter. I can pick one up for $40 anywhere so it's not that big a deal but the frequency I'll have to check out. I have a desktop computer I want to bring so hopefully that will be dual voltage as well. Everything you mentioned that was dual voltage was pretty much what I wanted to bring down.
Since I'll be in Wollongong for perhaps a couple of years, I won't be investing in a house. Either renting apartment or renting a house. the average is about $200/week right on the beach from my research so thats pretty decent. Also don't have to worry about property taxes so thats a plus!
From what my uncle tells me(lives in Sydney), Wollongong is MUCH cheaper than sydney. He said it probably has something to do with the fact that its a university town with many students and younger crowds. The trains are everywhere, buses are everywhere, everything is so accessible. Technically, since the train from sydney takes about an hour to get to Wollongong, I'm not even restricted to living here. Just have to wake up earlier to catch the train which brings me right to work.
Anyways, thats the story. Have you done any special touring since you got to australia? Any touring outside of australia?

I'd really double check on the type of visa you're getting. If you're only on a temp visa then you'll have some unexpected costs. For example, you would need private health care and if your company isn't footing the bill for that it could set you back a couple grand. If it's temporary you'd also be tied to that employer as well.

They were right about your girlfriend though. She would be on your application as your defacto as long as you are in a genuine long lasting relationship. Typically this means living together for a year or more. You would need to supply evidence of this on your passport. If you haven't been together for that long then I'm nore sure how she could be included. Hopefully this part will be no problem for you though. Should she be included on your application then she will have the same visa as you. If it's permanent, she's also permanent. If it's temporary she is too, only she can work for anyone and wouldn't be tied to a particular employer.

How do you know the visa should take about 4 months? That's pretty quick for a visa so it makes me suspect temporary, unless the sponsored ones are significantly faster (which I don't think they are). Our permanent visa took 7 months, and right now I think they're taking a little longer than that.

Also find out specifics on your salary. Make sure you know if your salary is before or after your super funds. The employer has to put away at least 9% into your Super fund (like an RRSP). Sometimes jobs will include that super amount to make your take home salary look higher. So make sure you have them write is as your salary + XXX amount of super so you know exactly what you're getting. Also if you're coming as a temp you would be able to take the super money with you when you leave. But if you're permanent that super money is locked away until you actually retire. So we will not be able to touch ours until retirement, which is fine for us anyway.

I'd also make sure they clarify any benefits you might get like private health insurance, relocation assistance (like shipping, flights, hotels, rentals, etc). Everything you can get helps!

If your desktop computer is relatively new then you should be fine. You'll find a switch on the back, or a little bar that slides back and forth to choose between voltages.

Had a quick look at rentals there. Looked to be lots of places for $200 a week there, not sure what areas or proximity to the beach though. But at least you know they'll be cheap rentals there. One thing you also have to factor in is that you will either need to buy appliances or rent then. It is very rare to find a rental with the big appliances in it, odd I know. For our rental we had to rent a fridge, washing machine, dryer and microwave. It only had a stove, oven and dishwasher. The dishwasher was a bonus too since most rentals I saw didn't even have that. So that could add up to another $50 a week if you're going to rent them.

We haven't done anything too special since we arrived. We flew into Sydney on May 5th and spent the first 3 weeks travelling around while my husband had job interviews. So not a whole lot of fun with 2 little kids. But we did do a little exploring in Sydney, Newcastle and Hunter Valley. Mostly just driving around though. We drove from Newcastle to Brisbane twice so we got to see lots of scenery there. We officially move to Brisbane in June and then spent the first month getting settled and buying furniture, etc. Then we had to find a house and move in. Now that we've finally moved into our own house we're getting more settled. We have managed to do some looking around the Gold Coast at Surfers Paradise. We've taken the kids to Dreamworld and Seaworld, got a 2 years pass to Dreamworld so we'll be back quite a bit. Haven't seen that much in Brisbane other than our portion of the city, Southbank and the two hockey arenas. We'll be checking out the Sunshine Coast soon though.

My mother in law is coming for a month in December so we'll do more exploring then. Then my mother is coming in February for a month, so lots more tourist things then too. So I'm sure we'll see lots more soon. We're also going to go see the Great Barrier Reef for a weekend away while we have some babysitters. So that'll be good.

Anyway, that's it for now. It's very late here so time for bed.

How is the surfing in those parts?

From what I've seen on the net, surfing looks pretty decent except much less advertised and sensationalized than other places along the east coast. This usually means that it's probably not the greatest quality of surf but I've no concrete evidence of this.just my speculation.

I've been looking around the net for airfares around australia for example, Sydney to Cairns or Alice Springs. It seems to me that on the net these airfares are quite expensive. Is this just because its the net or do they actually have normal specials floating around the airports, especially if you show up last minute. These can't be the everyday realistic prices!

Jarrett

Sydney to Cairns is actually a really long distance. It would be like flying from Edmonton to Ottawa. So I actually find the airfare to be a lot cheaper. I found Sydney to Cairns for $$99 at Jetstar:

Try the following websites:
http://www.jetstar.com/sale-fares.html
http://www.virginblue.com.au/Personal/S ... /index.htm

And then of course there's Qantas. But they're not the ones I'd go with for cheap internal flights around the country.

Hope that helps.