Day to day life - keeping busy in Perth

After the year 2023 had kicked off and my first road trip was done and dusted, my day-to-day life started to calm down. I went to work, gym and home. Cooked, took walks. I needed some change so I tried to join as many events as possible.

At the end of January, I participated in the Lunar New Year celebrations in Northbridge. Good food (I went to try yet another place for cold noodles. I think at this point I realised that I was determined to find the best place for cold noodles around Perth), traditional Dragon and Lion dances, other performances, and greetings from the city's mayor.

While I was walking around the festival, a person handed me a flyer and pushed me to join the advertised event later in the evening. It was Cupid: The Improvised Dating Show. It seemed fun and popular and I had nothing to do, so I decided to go see what it was about. I was part of the "Australian audience" and before the show we were given some papers to fill as we could invent the characters who were participating in the show. In the end there were a retired pilot, gynaecologist, student, love doctor etc searching for love. The audience also voted once in a while, which couple should go on a date.

One evening after work we went to see The Greatest Showman at rooftop movies. It was a great experience as well, though I wish I had packed a hoodie with me since it was damn cold in the evening. The cold boba tea we had did not help the situation.

Perth has a variety of different cinemas - I also went once to Somerville cinema to see a Korean film called Broker. This cinema was built outdoors as well, on a park near the University of Western Australia.

Also, on one weekend I took a day trip to a Karrinyup shopping centre and went to see the BTS concert in the local Hoyts cinema.

One lovely weekend I got to enjoy a house party at my co workers. We had BBQ and a 'pool party' on the balcony. 'The pool' was a kids pool filled with water by the ankles, but that day was especially hot, so we enjoyed it. After the party I went out with a couple of friends to a reggaeton night at Santos & Pecadores.

At the end of January I finally got my flatmate back, and more! (I don't remember if I wrote this down earlier, but my flatmate went back to her home country for a couple of months to see her family and friends, so I was living alone). There was now three of us living in the same house and I felt relieved. Though it was an apartment in a great location, it was starting to get lonely - that is the good part of hostels, you get to meet new people and rarely feel lonely. My flatmates are amazing chefs and I am happy to have enjoyed many of their dishes.

One of my favourite things is eating. So I did try many restaurants and cafes around Perth. There are so many great restaurants, but also every day you can choose to go to a different street market to get the best food truck choices. Here's my top choices in no particular order:

• Preston Street Coffee - FINE, I might be biased in this one as my friend worked here. But it is a nice cafe with a lovely atmosphere and good coffee. Went at least four times.

• Tiara cafe - My co worker introduced me to many dessert cafes in Perth, but this one was extremely good. I think I ended up visiting at least 3 times. Their Matcha cheese cake is to die for. Also really good bingsu dessert dishes.

• Korean restaurant WooJeong. After the previously mentioned long study and research, this was the place with the best cold noodles.

• Old Shanghai - A hawker centre filled with many different restaurants. Went here a few times to try out different dishes.

• Ramen Keisuke Tonkotsu King - The best ramen bowl I have ever eaten.

• From the many Korean BBQ restaurants we tried, my top 2 were Daily's 1988 and Tong 86. Very different from each other in atmosphere. I felt like Daily's had great dishes and everything tasted good, but they didn't have meat to actually BBQ. Tong was more like what we experienced in South Korea and the pork belly was delicious!

One last post on its way from Perth - or Western Australia to be precise. I planned a road trip from Perth to Monkey Mia and back with a friend. It was such a great time.