So you're moving to Canberra, the city that gets an eye roll every time someone says they love it; the home of fireworks, porn and federal government. Frozen over in winter, empty in the summer, but where you're (kind of) legally allowed to grow two marijuana plants.
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It's surrounded by parks, has beautiful free museums, the people are friendly and relaxed, and rent is relatively cheap compared to Sydney.
January in Canberra sees a mass migration of people starting new jobs, courses and lives. This might include you, so here are some pointers on moving to the "bush capital" (soon to be the "cool capital").
Find yourself top-notch housemates
Canberra can be a hard city to make friends in outside of work, school or Tinder so you want to live with people travelling in different circles (people in the public service especially just tend to have mates in different departments. You'll see more of Canberra if you're not just hanging out with the boys from Treasury).
Everyone in Canberra knows everyone
A bit of an exaggeration but there's a lot less than six degrees separating people in "Australia's Meeting Place". Consider that before making a spanner of yourself at a party or on a date.
Get a car for the car city
Public transport consists only of buses until a limited tram network arrives in 2018, so getting around Canberra for errands, work or to see the sights is simpler and quicker in a car. Traffic "jams" are laughable next to Sydney or Melbourne and the roads can offer beautiful views of the city.
Canberrans love to whinge about parking, seeing as everyone's in the car and finding a spot in the city can be painful. (Although Parliament House has free parking.)
Be careful on the roads as you're getting your bearings, Google Maps can be frustratingly inaccurate as it hasn't mapped some of Canberra's new highway extensions or roads.
If you're on the bus, get yourself a MyWay card, which is cheaper than buying a ticket. There are also late night buses for party animals, as well as Uber and taxi services.
And before you ask, yes, the roundabout capital actually has the most roundabouts per capita than any other major Australian city.
On yer bike
Whether you're a MAMIL (middle-aged man in lycra) or fixie-pedaling Melbourne-hipster scum like me, Canberra is a great city to cycle around. It's flat, so short trips are made easier, there's lots of infrastructure in place to explore the town and there are amazing bike trails in and around the ACT.
Overall, staying active is made more tempting by the insane views you get in Canberra's parks, mountains and even suburbs. Plus a plethora of gyms and pools. All this and luckily only a few paleo joints, so far.
Where do I buy stuff for my house?
A lot of big brands like IKEA or CostCo are in Canberra, unusual considering the relatively small size of the town. Perhaps you can thank the pollies for that.
But, for first-hand or second-hand white goods, hardware and furnishing your new place in general, you want to head out to industrial Fyshwick.
Speaking of Fyshwick, isn't that where I get my porn and fireworks?
Well, kinda. The adult shops aren't quite what they used to be, and fireworks have actually been banned in the ACT for almost a decade.
Where am I?
People use blanket districts for describing where things are in Canberra, relative to Lake Burley Griffin at the heart of the city. You have Gungahlin in the far north, Belconnen to the north west, Braddon the "inner north", Civic aka "the city", while south Canberra tends to be the area around Parliament House, Woden is to the south west and Tuggeranong the far south.
Kingston Foreshore is Canberra's more successful answer to Melbourne's Docklands.
Fyshwick and the immediate surrounds makes Canberra's main industrial zone, the other two are in Mitchell and Hume.
Parliament House is sometimes referred to as "the hill" in Canberra and by other, more colourful, names in the O'Mallon household.
And Queanbeyan to the south-east is technically NSW but for all intents and purposes may as well be in the ACT.
Where do I get my wheelie bin, register my car, pay my fines?
Canberra is small, which means the ACT government, through Access Canberra, takes on the roles you're perhaps more used to your local council taking care of.
Also, ActewAGL supplies Canberra's energy and natural gas (but the other big players Origin and Energy Australia are also here), while Icon Water manages the territory's water. Make sure you register your details.
What do you do for fun around here?
Mates visiting me in Canberra are pretty stunned by how much there is to do here, this isn't some desert backwater, it's the nation's capital.
There's the free museums and galleries stuffed into the Parliamentary Zone (including the old and new Parliament House), the bars and coffee shops lining Lonsdale Street, cheap cinemas in Manuka and the more small-town pubs at your local shops.
Local gem, the Polish Club aka The Polo is in the O'Connor shops; burger-joint Brodburger is a Canberra institution next to the Canberra Glassworks in Kingston; Ona is the pinnacle of Canberra's coffee snobbery and there's a lot more out there you're bound to discover (and have fun doing so).
What do you guys speak here?
Because most people work in public service, a field with a penchant for acronyms, you'll hear a lot of DFAT, APS6, APVMA, SES Band 2, CSIRO, MSTRKRFT etc. So it's probably inevitable you'll end up with a joke like "APS4 in the streets; EL2 in the sheets."
One thing another Melbournian and I noticed was no-one says "cooked" around here, slabs are "cases" and "fedpol" means federal politics not the Australian Federal Police.
Also, Canberra is a very white city which gets very meta if you suddenly remember that at a house party and start looking around the room.
Where is the ocean?
You're spoilt for choice in terms of rivers and fresh water swimming holes in the ACT, but if it's saltwater you're craving (note: do not drink the saltwater), Canberrans flock to the NSW south coast in summer, particularly Batemans Bay.
That's the Skywhale, it's a bit of a regular sight here in Canberra. Or at least it used to be. There's also the owl statue in Belconnen that most Canberrans consider slightly phallic, and a bunch of statues in Civic including one of a sheep belly up, which is apparently a play on the saying Canberra is "a good sheep paddock spoiled".
And what are the big stories in Canberra?
Most importantly, the ACT government is buying back and demolishing over 1000 houses contaminated by asbestos insulation material, Mr Fluffy.
The planned Civic to Gungahlin light rail was made a huge issue during last year's territory election and it's planned to be completed by 2018.
The local government is a minority government made up of the Labor and the Greens. The Liberal party in the ACT has failed to win government for the better part of two decades, since 2001.
Do you even Canberra, bro?
Have you recently moved to Canberra and have some (better) advice? Or can you remember some things you wish you were told when you first moved here all those years ago? Let us know in the comments, or Tweet at @finbaromallon.
