I'm kind of locked into being here for another year (already 'paid' 4000 for this semester for uni so I might as well finish the year) but afterwards, I get the feeling if I don't leave and experience the world while sub 25, I'm going to regret it forever. I guess this isn't exactly rocket science.
I've lived in this same suburb my whole life, nothing really changes here, social dynamics are pretty much locked and where I see my friends from uni who live in other parts of Sydney have moved out, the vast majority of the people I know from high school (local high school) are still living at home. They're all of comparable ages.
What really brought this upon is that the professor who is supervising my honours work (Best supervisor I could ask for and an awesome guy) has dropped comments about sticking around afterwards to do a PhD. I only stayed to do honours because he approached me with a project he wanted worked on. And so now I am feeling a little worried about the prospects of trapped at uni. Because while I would love to do a PhD, it's not something I envision doing at this stage in my life.
Ok, let's make this interesting and less whiny.
If you did tertiary education, did you travel before completion, after completion or during?
If you've travelled, where would you recommend as a good place to live (Other than Australia )
Have you done a PhD or are you working on one? If so, why did you choose to do it (eg wanted to enter academia) and do you regret your timing?
I'm hoping that once the year is up and I spend the summer here I'll be travelling with the intention of experiencing a couple of different cultures (I've lead a pretty sheltered life in regards to location, 21 and I've left NSW a grand total of 3 times).
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
On April 18 2009 19:31 GTR wrote: 3 times? wow i thought i was bad =[
In my defense, up until about 6 months ago my grandparents owned *the best* beach house ever, we didn't need to holiday anywhere else
EDIT:
On April 18 2009 19:36 JohnColtrane wrote: oh near castle hill
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
I've done pretty much all of these things. I guess I'm largely jealous of the friends I see with amazing facebook albums of their trips through various places. You're right though, there is tonnes to do in Sydney. Maybe simply moving out will be enough (Self-imposed deadline of a year and a bit from now).
On April 18 2009 19:36 JohnColtrane wrote: oh near castle hill
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
On April 18 2009 19:36 JohnColtrane wrote: oh near castle hill
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
On April 18 2009 19:36 JohnColtrane wrote: oh near castle hill
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
I've done pretty much all of these things. I guess I'm largely jealous of the friends I see with amazing facebook albums of their trips through various places. You're right though, there is tonnes to do in Sydney. Maybe simply moving out will be enough (Self-imposed deadline of a year and a bit from now).
you can get 1bedroom units in nice areas like homebush bay for 220k. close to the train, close to the city so easier to get work, close to parramatta and relatively close to blacktown. theres some other areas around there that are relatively cheap
On April 18 2009 19:31 GTR wrote: 3 times? wow i thought i was bad =[
In my defense, up until about 6 months ago my grandparents owned *the best* beach house ever, we didn't need to holiday anywhere else
EDIT:
On April 18 2009 19:36 JohnColtrane wrote: oh near castle hill
whats wrong with that man? i live in punchbowl =/ and its not all that bad. get to epping and take a train to strathfield, its a nice area. or parramatta, theres a nice park, a westfields. australia cant be all that boring. jump in the car and take a drive to the entrance, broken hill, or picton or something
u can experience different cultures here in australia, granted they arent the same as u would experience overseas, but theres still some culture. and its less expensive to drive around here than it is to go overseas
I've done pretty much all of these things. I guess I'm largely jealous of the friends I see with amazing facebook albums of their trips through various places. You're right though, there is tonnes to do in Sydney. Maybe simply moving out will be enough (Self-imposed deadline of a year and a bit from now).
you can get 1bedroom units in nice areas like homebush bay for 220k. close to the train, close to the city so easier to get work, close to parramatta and relatively close to blacktown. theres some other areas around there that are relatively cheap
are u looking for a unit or a house or what?
If/when I move out I'd probably go for a unit and just rent to start with. Getting a loan etc is part of the being tied down at this stage of my life that I'm trying to avoid.
@spenguin I did the road trip up to the gold coast just this February, it was pretty awesome. I think if I was to travel Australia I'd try and do one of those riding (as in mountain bike) trips you see advertised around. The one that sticks in my mind is the one where you ride up the northeast coast.
Answering these two posts made me realise what it is I'm trying to say. I am worried that by staying in Australia (specifically Sydney I guess) I'm going to end up 'settling down' before I even experience 1/1000 of the world. So I want to leave before that happens.
Do it man. The minute you leave Australia you realise how much of a speck of dust we are. I spent awhile in Switzerland/France/UK/Italy/Hong Kong and it was the best thing I ever did.
When you finish your honours you should do it, there's no reason you can't come back and do your PhD then...
I've only been to japan, and man, it was great, I'm definitely going back sometime, hopefully on exchange with the university, which would be a blast. I highly recommend travelling, even just moving out of home. I'm only seventeen and I've already moved 1800 k's from my hometown near cairns to brisbane for uni, and it's great (besides the fact I'm a country boy in the city).
Lol as soon as I read punchbowl I thought of that video too.
Australia is a fairly good place but there's so much more out there too, travel a while and see where you want to settle down for yourself. Good to have friends/relatives in other countries who won't mind if you crash at their place.
I went to Europe and loved it. Can't wait to travel somewhere else next time.
Why not take a break in between undergrad and grad school? That's what many students in the US do, either abroad or in other parts of the US. Take a year to yourself to explore a bit, and when you get back (hopefully) you'll either have reinforced your interest in the PhD work, or will realize there's something else you'd rather do.
EPT
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