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Brit lists biggest shocks after being in Australia for two months: 'Confused'

The young mum has struck a chord with fellow poms regarding her observations.

A British mum travelling Australia with her family has struck a chord with fellow poms after she shared the things that "shocked" her the most after being in the country for two months.

After having so far explored eastern Australia with her partner and six-month old daughter, Maise Crompton dished out the key differences she noticed compared to the UK.

"First of all, traffic lights," she said in her TikTok. They go from red to green. There is no amber to get you started to go...I was not prepared."

While the UK and other places in Europe have this system in place, Australia does not, which the woman found frustrating.

A photo of a British mum who is travelling in Australia with her family and has listed the top culture shocks she experienced after being in the country for two months. A photo of the woman with her baby along the Great Ocean Road in Victoria.
A British mum travelling in Australia with her family has listed the top culture shocks she experienced after being in the country for two months. Source: TikTok/Instagram

"It makes so much sense (especially as most of us drive manual in the UK) you can get car into gear and make sure you’re ready to go," she said in the comments.

No toilets in venues are 'the worst'

However the thing that "confused" her the most was a lack of toilets at cafes.

"This one is the worst. I feel like in the UK wherever you go, if there's a cafe, they're more than likely to have a toilet that you can use," she said in the video. "In Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, they have cafes and they just don't have toilets in there. Or you ask about a toilet and they give you this weird set of keys and give you the instructions to go down a weird alleyway and go to the toilet."

She thought the move wasn't very family friendly, meaning her daughter Elsie is changed in her pram "a lot".

"In the UK it's a legal requirement to have a toilet if you serve food to eat in," one person offered in the comments, to which the woman replied with "makes sense". However she said Australia has "more public toilets" than in the UK.

In Australia, hotels, clubs and other venues with an alcohol licence must provide toilets on the premise, however other venues like cafes may just direct a customer to a toilet within 80 metres of the premises. The path there must be lit enough for safety reasons.

Another "big shock" is the "lack of bins" compared to the UK, she said. "I don't know what people do, they must just take their rubbish home with them because theres not actually a lot of litter in Australia, its a very clean place, but I just can never find a bin," she said.

Social media users react

The video from Sunday has garnered almost 78,000 views, with people mostly agreeing with the mum's sentiment.

"Sydney has zero bins," one person commented.

"The toilet thing drives me mad," another said.

However not everyone agreed with the toilet comments. "I’ve lived in Melbourne my whole life and I’ve never been to a cafe that didn’t have a toilet," one person said.

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