SwampMum

The weather here is awful. In winter it is windy and freezing cold. In summer, it is either cold and raining, or really hot. Its rarely a nice temperature. Lets not forget the fog, which is very thick. Oh and it always rains at 3pm school days. We went from 10 years of drought so bad we considered recycled water (the natives were far to uncomfortable with that idea so it got tossed), to so much rain that... well I think everyone knows about that. My plants died from too much water.

The schools here are great. There is a uni, which I personally do not feel is all that great. I've lived in several houses in Toowoomba, and only got to know 1 neighbour well. Meeting new people is hard. There are plenty of dodgy neighbourhoods and schools with bad reps. Most streets contain at least one drug dealer, one house that throws regular parties, and one dog that wont shut up, EVER.

There is only one public pool, so if you enjoy squeezing in the pool with a whole bunch of other unwashed bodies on the weekend, is a great place to go. That's if you can find a carpark.

Downtown areas suffer from a major cockroach problem, the western half of Toowoomba has a bad fly problem in summer, the eastern half has a bad spider problem. Never walk between trees and bushes at night as you will probably end up with a massive spider on your face.

The community is mostly religious. There are lots of great parks around, but without toilets handy. Carnival of flowers is only exciting if your a child or like gardening. There is Easterfest, which is only exciting if your religious and like rock music. The Christmas lights in queens park is always nice and worth seeing.

In my opinion, jobs are difficult to get. Rental properties are in high demand so it is difficult to get a decent property with a landlord who actually maintains the property properly as well as a decent property management team. Also the mould is bad on the east side of Toowoomba. East is the better side however, with better neighbourhoods, better schools, and nicer parks and plenty of trees.

Also a lot of people don't know how to drive. A local lollypop lady told me she almost gets run over on average 3 times per day. On wet days, its not unusual to see people sliding around corners, or driving without lights on. So buckle up!

On the issue of Toowoomba coming together after the floods, they may have done this for a few days after the flood, but in general the community is no closer. A year after the event it seems to be mostly forgotten with no real attention paid to it. I did hear many complaints about the memorial that was held, evidently it was very badly done.