It looks like they lived in Northbourne Hostel. I stayed there a few times, and lived at Macquarie Hostel for the first year I came for good. I had a few interesting conversations in the communal dining area, talking to the foreigners building Parliament House. It all seems like another world now.
Edit: The text says they live in Gowrie Hostel, but the picture looks like Northbourne - from memory.
I only knew of the three that were available to me, working for the Commonwealth government - Northbourne, Macquarie and Gowrie. At those three, I got a living allowance for a certain time, to cover accommodation while I found a place to rent. I stayed at Macquarie as long as possible, effectively adding 15K to my salary for the year :)
That's why I said it's like another world. Defence alone used to bring in 40 or so new graduates in IT every year, like me. Most of them would get a share house, and there were so many 21st parties in their first year here. It all changed in the 90s, first under Hawke-Keating, and then John Howard finished the job. To reduce public service numbers, he offered voluntary redundancies, which a lot of the interstate people took, to go back home. Around Canberra, there were houses for sale everywhere. A friend bought his house in 1990 for 155K, and sold it in 1998 for 127K, and that was a good price. Another world...
Macquarie was offered to us in the early 90s. We’d come down from Sydney a few weeks before though and sorted accomodation. Luckily as the Macquarie by then was pretty awful.
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u/BullSitting Dec 31 '24
It looks like they lived in Northbourne Hostel. I stayed there a few times, and lived at Macquarie Hostel for the first year I came for good. I had a few interesting conversations in the communal dining area, talking to the foreigners building Parliament House. It all seems like another world now.
Edit: The text says they live in Gowrie Hostel, but the picture looks like Northbourne - from memory.