Having my nose blocked, all the time – Melbourne has a class of pollen that go above and beyond the call of duty, making my life bloody miserable. Being able to breathe freely is a vastly underestimated privilege
The bloody weather – I think there’s only been one day here in the last 3 weeks (gods, has it been that long already?) that I’d say was sub-par weather, and we’ve had a range of weather here. Don’t have to carry a jacket with me at all times on the risk of a cold snap.
Warmth, or rather lack thereof – Sydney is a Proper Summer as far as I’m concerned. Shorts and t-shirt are almost mandatory when you’re not being forced to wear monkey suits and outmoded “fashion”. To work of course. Here I can go out at 9:30 at night and not feel bloody cold. Quite pleasant actually.
Being miles from anything by way of regular public transport – Bus to station is definitely not cool. Walking there takes maybe 15 min, 20 if you’re feeling relaxed, and that’s far better than at least 20 min by car. Plus, where I live the services are nearly all expresses during the daytime – major roxors.
Not being able to pay the toll by coinage – why Melbourne (and now Sydney’s newest freeway, the M7) must have cashless tollways is beyond me. It’d make life a lot easier for the tourists, that’s for sure.
Seeing the same people day in, day out – =P As cool as it is having a tight knit group of people around, it’s far more fun to have a variety of people to hang with should you choose it. It’s like going from an iPod shuffle to a iPod Video 60gb. More options! (ok, terrible analogy, but the boss’ VideoPod is being flashed around the office right now. Muchos sweetness). No (real) offence intended for the regulars, but I just need more variety in my interaction, and I’d got bogged in to a pattern in Melbourne.
Curfew – I can set my own curfew! I mean, for the weekdays, it’s completely irrelevant… and the weekends, well, there’s not been many so far, but it’s good to know I do control it. Of course, given that in the last hour I’ve yawned at least 7 times, it’s not been doing me much good.
Misnomers – Calling pencils “greyleads”, pacers “mechanical pencils” and handball “2- (or 4-) square” and other such multiarious examples. Life doesn’t exactly revolve around these kind of things, but they make that 1% difference that you notice. Eventually.
The oh-you’re-from-Melbourne-High-so-you-must-be-an-intellectual-snob attitude – schools still come up at this stage, and it’s only the other Melbourne grads who adopt that “oh right MHS.” kind of attitude. It’s refreshingly different, and being the only one from Monash also makes for more differentiation. And that is a Good Thing.