The Unhappiest Place In Australia

It's official, Sydney is the unhappiest place in Australia, according to a recent survey. They wrote the cannon, now they have to sing the tune; but it comes as no surprise that Sydney is the most distressed, stressed miserable and unhappy place in the country. Everyone comments how much worse it has got; a snakepit of snarling yuppies who all think they deserve to have made so much money on property; legions mortgaged to the hilt; rotten jobs, rotten traffic. It's barely worth going anywhere anymore; we get home and lock the door and just tell the whole world to get lost. In the muffled entrance to the Packer compound pictured above, the staff come and go; but for the rest of Sydney, just surviving has become a struggle.

Here's from the ABC: "Western Australians are fairly grumpy; those in inner Sydney are the most disgruntled of all, but the residents of one of the poorest areas of Queensland are the happiest Australians.These are some of the results of a survey by a Deakin University Professor which compares the well-being of people in Australia's 150 federal electorates.The Queensland seat of Wide Bay, one of the nation's poorest electorates, has come out on top, and at the bottom is the inner Sydney seat of Grayndler."

The news that Sydney is the unhappiest place in Australia comes as no surprise to to many of us who have lived here and are older than about 25, as no one seems to be anymore. The glittering city is no more, except for the very rich. For some of us the city was a bohemian paradise, Amsterdam by the sea, beacon of excitement, promising fantastic career opportunities and a great social life: a non-stop party against a backdrop of beautiful beaches and friendlylocals. Now most of us spend our days dreaming how to escape.

Sydney is a very difficult town to live in. Ourpoliticians just don't understand how deep the anger is out there. In their chauffer-driven limousines and on their outlandishly highsalaries they have no idea how impossible life has become for ordinaryworking people. If you've got a couple of kids, you're on an average wage and you've got the typical hefty Sydney mortgage, then your life has become hopelessly dispiriting. You can't afford to go out. You can't possiblyafford to stop working, to take time for yourself. When I see all those tollways, where people are basically paying to sit in traffic jams every morning, I'm amazed there aren't more incidents of road rage. The anger out there is very deep."

Like every other Sydneysider I resent paying taxes to prop up hapless bureaucracies and smug politicians. I'm in my fifties and I still work every day. But allaround me I see people who are getting paid to sit on their backsides, who get public housing and transport subsidies, free medical care. Round here they even get free lunches at the local church. But becauseI work and stand on my own two feet I get absolutely nothing. It is no surprise that two 14-year-oldgirls allegedly killed a disabled taxi driver earlier this month. No one cares about anyone else anymore. I know it's atouchy subject, but the government has deliberately promoted the transformation of the city I used to love into ethnic ghettoes. Cronulla was a good example of what we can expect in the future as aresult of these policies.

Nothing works anymore, testament to decades of bureaucratic and political incompetence. Local councils are invariably a farce. ,Just getting around Sydney is so unpleasant; the trains are appalling, the traffic unbearable.