North and South

Despite being the title of a very campy 1985 miniseries starring Patrick Swayze and Leslie-Anne Down, the very title of this post is a dilemma for most Melbournians. I'm a north-sider. Grew up a south-sider, but as soon as I had a modicum of free will and the wherewithall to exercise it, I made haste to the oppposing side of our great and fresh river, to discover all that is outre and previously forbidden.
So, having lived north for a good 14 of the last 15 years of my charmed excistence, I am bidden to return to the south. Ostensibly, I am treating this as an anthropological exercise, "to see how the other half live" as it were, but actually I am quaking in my boots. How will my well worn cuban heels cope in the presence of all this RMWilliams business? How will my ever-expanding collection of free K-Mart polo shirts feel when surrounded by rivals from such high-falluting brands as Diesel and, I dunno, Givenchy? And what of drinking? Will I a) be able to find a pub? b) within stumbling distance? c) that actually serves the low-grade beer that is my preference? Or will I be stuck poncily waving Stella Artois or that bloody awful perfume of a beer they call Hoegaarden? The very thought fills me with trepidation.
But, the time has come. Walls will be demolished. Excavators will excavate. Labourers will drink milky mugs of Bushells with two sugars in. And some horrible excuse for an overgrown shrub that I have been trying to surrepticiously kill will be pulled out, screaming, from what it presumed was an indentured existence next to the outdoor dunny (good riddance to that too).
And all the while I will be living a life to which I am unaccustomed, furnished with such unfamiliar pleasures as central heating and a dishwashing machine. Huzzah! I will need these things as I closet myself away from the bright young things of Greville Street and Toorak Road.
Or perhaps I should simply hold my head high, stating loudly that "Mr Wolf is a pale imitation of Ladro"; or "What do you mean you have never been to Cinema Nova?" or "No, really, I don't think I need to carry on to The Vineyard."

And so, Tally-ho it is, as I sally forth, brave, into a new world...