LETTER FROM SYDNEY/Padraig Collins: Moving from one western English-speaking country to another does not involve as much of a culture shock as, say, moving from Dublin to Dubai would. Nevertheless, even allowing for the fact that I've lived here previously, everyday life still has the power to surprise and throw preconceptions on their head.
This happened as soon as we arrived at the end of August. As we left the airport at about 7 a.m. the rain was bucketing down. So much for the Sydney sun we'd been hoping for after an awful Irish summer. The one saving grace was that it wasn't that cold.
The temperature plummeted that night. The next day was so cold that we had to buy an oil heater. Sydney houses, accustomed to being pummelled by little more than endless sunny days, are rarely equipped with central heating.
It never ceases to amuse me that the weather forecasters announce each night, almost without fail, that the coldest place in the state is the unfortunate but obviously well-named mountain town of Perisher. (Was Birr so-named for similar reasons?)
Another surprise is that the hard-drinking Aussie stereotype is fast disappearing. The major factors in this are: changing government legislation; brewers reducing the alcohol content of beers to save on excise duties and an increased workload which has taken its toll on the laid-back "she'll be right" Australian culture.
Every pub now has a sign up saying that under the law it is obliged to refuse service to people who are drunk. Nearly four years ago while on holiday in Surfers Paradise and somewhat the worse for wear, a nightclub bouncer asked me if I was drunk. "It looked like you were staggering," he said. "No, I'm Irish, that was a swagger, not a stagger," I said. I got in.
The same excuse at a different joint an hour later failed to cut any ice, however.
Drivers are better here, though a bit less tolerant of mistakes in others. For drivers under the age of 25 it now takes a minimum of 3½ years, three driving tests and one written test before you can get a full, unrestricted licence. Being 25 or over only lessens the wait by a few months.
The penalty points system not only exists here, but is rigidly enforced. Being caught speeding next weekend, a holiday weekend, incurs twice the normal points, taking you halfway to losing your licence. All this care taken to keep unqualified drivers off the road means that our car insurance is about a third of what it was in Ireland.
The war on terror has led to a dramatic increase in the price of petrol in the past couple of weeks, but it is still less than a dollar (€0.56) a litre, cheap enough for a large amount of city dwellers to justify running hideous four-wheel drive vehicles. The only bush these cars see is on their owners' carefully manicured lawns.
So ubiquitous have they become that there exists a 4WD drivers association. Former Prime Minister Paul Keating has called for them to incur additional taxes if used only in the city, something that would be welcomed by those of us with non-4WD vehicles trying to see past those ostentatious monstrosities on the road.
One potential tax that is being seriously talked about here is a direct copy of Ireland's plastic bag tax. There have been numerous press articles - both pro and against - and the Sydney Morning Herald even had an editorial about it.
Fianna Fáil might be on the ropes at home, but they are being seen as an environmentally sound party in Australia. The bag tax is also pretty much the only reporting about Ireland that is making news here at the moment.
With plenty of their own political corruption to cover, the Flood tribunal rated not a single mention here. If it weren't for ireland.com, the Irish Times website, I would be lost as to home news, but this is not such a bad thing. No major news means no republican or loyalist atrocities to report.
The vast extent of the media navel-gazing business in Australia constantly amazes. Newspapers, magazines and radio and TV stations delight in exposing each other's troubles and foibles in a way only really seen in Ireland.
I'm sure Marshall MacLuhan has a theory as to what it can mean when the media devours itself to such an extent. It's all good fun when you're on the outside looking in, though.
Australia's relationship with its trans-Tasman neighbour New Zealand is similar to Britain's with Ireland. The one crucial difference though is that while we've largely gotten over it and are now the best of friends, the antipodeans are still bickering.
This sport-mad nation is currently having a crisis of confidence over the fact that the New Zealand Warriors have made it to the National Rugby League final next Sunday against the Sydney Roosters.
For Sydneysiders, it is bad enough that non-Sydney teams have dominated the competition for years now. The idea that the Kiwi upstarts - who have only been in the competition for seven years and who were officially bankrupt two years ago - might take the trophy out of the country altogether is heresy.
To ensure a good attendance for the semi-final last weekend, the Warriors gave away 15,000 match tickets to anyone with a New Zealand passport. The final is on in the magnificent Olympic Stadium. I have my $80 ticket in among the Warriors fans and I've been practising the Haka all week. Come on the Warriors!