Three weeks ago I posted a piece about what it’s like to be a Sydneysider in Melbourne; a collection of observations from living 12 years in Australia’s second city.

It’s now time to turn the tables, and although I’m not a born and bred Melburnian I have definitely experienced the culture shock of returning to my city of birth, and all that comes along with it.

For the record, I’m not especially biased towards either city; both have their strong and weak points. And as for the Melbourne-Sydney rivalry that gets talked about so much (especially in the southern capital), it’s worth remembering that Sydney and Melbourne are still much more alike than they are different – the week before I moved to Melbourne in 2007, I had been in Tehran. That was different.

However there are subtle differences between Australia’s two largest cities, and when I return to Sydney I find myself coming up against the following;

1. OMG the hills…

“But Melbourne has the Dandenongs, right?” Yep. But the Dandenongs aren’t in the middle of the city.

There are parts of Sydney’s CBD which feature serious hills, and out in the suburbs some of the inclines are impossibly steep. It makes Sydney both gorgeous and difficult to plan, build and walk in. A short walk along the harbour could see you climbing giant staircases that in Melbourne really only exist in high-rise buildings.

2. Views everywhere!

The upside to all those hills is the beautiful views that appear down any street near or far from the harbour.

One thing that always strikes me when I get back to Sydney is how I can be driving along, look to the right and there’s some stunning vista across to the harbour bridge, the opera house, or some beach. No-one seems to notice, life just goes on – it’s nothing special, it’s just another day in Sydney…

3. Landing in the city

Kingsford Smith Airport is a nightmare for many reasons, but one thing that most Sydney-bound Melburnians seem to appreciate is just how convenient the airport is.

You fly over either Sydney Harbour or Botany Bay when you land (beautiful), there’s a train station at the airport and it’s only 10 kilometres and three stations to the city centre. Meanwhile in Melbourne, the SkyBus and local taxis seem to run a racket rescuing people from the paddocks at distant Tullamarine.

Just don’t talk about Sydney’s airport traffic, or what it’s like to transfer between Sydney’s separate domestic and international terminals. Most Melburnians have at least one horror story to tell about transferring flights at Kingsford Smith, and thank God for direct international connections nowadays.

4. The humidity, the storms and the rain…

Living in Sydney, a lot of people don’t realise just how subtropical their city can be at times. Coming from Melbourne, it’s astounding just how much moisture there is in the air.

Sydney might only qualify as a “warm temperate” city in climatic terms, but in summer it feels almost equatorial – the humidity is oppressive, a gigantic storm builds up in the afternoon, and the rain comes down in sheets.

Melbourne gets cold and damp and its seasons are upside down, but no-one does a storm quite like Sydney’s sky throws a tantrum on a January afternoon. If Melbourne’s weather has constant mood swings, Sydney’s is a drama queen.

5. What’s with the city centre at the weekend?

These were the exact words a Melburnian asked me when he returned from a week in Sydney. Initially I was taken aback – I didn’t realise Melbourne’s city centre was any more or less busy at the weekend.

But then I remembered all those shifts at a cafe in Martin Place back in the mid-2000s where we were literally sitting around waiting for a customer to stumble across our shop. There, in what should have been the buzzing heart of Australia’s busiest city, was five blocks of empty grey granite tiles.

Melbourne has its quiet places at the weekend too, but nowhere is quite as starkly deserted as some of Sydney’s most important public spaces on a Sunday afternoon. I haven’t been out partying lately, but I’ve heard that things are even quieter at night since the implementation of “lockout laws”.

6. What’s the hurry?

Melburnians often accuse Sydney of being an unfriendly city, and although it’s a bit of a hackneyed stereotype, I believe there is something to it. Sydney is a city of businesspeople, and for them, time is money. Most people in Sydney don’t seem to have the time, or the money, or the care, or all three, to stop and chat.

It’s not that they’re unfriendly, but they’re just always on their way somewhere – the actual importance of said rendezvous is another matter. They’re also not particularly interested in where you’re from – in Sydney, everyone is from somewhere, and is probably going somewhere. No-one bats an eyelid if you say you’re from Melbourne; the same would apply if you said you were from Burkina Faso. Call it uninterested, call it busy, it’s a certain brashness that Melbourne lacks.

This was most visibly brought into focus for me when transport card stopped working at the barriers at Sydney’s Town Hall station in peak hour. The same thing had happened to me at Flinders Street Station in Melbourne a few weeks earlier, and the guy behind me leaned over to see what the hold up was. In Sydney, the guy behind me gave me kept walking as if I wasn’t there, and when I tried to step back out of the barrier, he seemed pissed off that I existed.

Have you been to Sydney? What did you notice about the city’s character? Comment below!