MATT CUNNINGHAM: Why I moved back to Darwin

IT was Joni Mitchell in her hit song Big Yellow Taxi who coined the phrase “you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone”.

Mitchell was singing about Hawaii, but she could just as easily have been talking about Darwin. Those lyrics ring loud to people, like me, who didn’t realise the wonder of this tropical paradise until they had left it behind.

I left Darwin three years ago, only to return this year after realising that once you’ve lived in the best city in the world, nowhere else quite stacks up.

Here are just a few of the things that make Darwin the best place to live on the planet. THE TRAFFIC You might not appreciate how good it is to live in a city where it takes 15 minutes to get anywhere until you’ve endured the daily grind of driving in Melbourne or Sydney. Monday night’s Four Corners told how it takes residents in Mernda, in Melbourne’s north, two hours to drive to work in the city. Mernda is just 30km from the CBD. Maths is not my strong point but I reckon that’s an average speed of about 15km/h. To add insult to injury, drivers in our biggest cities are now forced to pay tolls, just so their cars can sit stationary on hopelessly congested “freeways”. It’s a problem that’s only going to get worse after their governments failed to properly plan for future growth. I’ll take the 4.21pm rush on Tiger Brennan any day. THE FOOD While other cities crap on about how wonderful their cuisine is, Darwinites know we can get a smorgasbord of the world’s best food right here, we just don’t feel the need to bang on about how cultured we are because of it. Our multicultural population means we’re spoiled for choice when it comes to dining. Whether it’s a laksa at Rendezvous, a Grill and Chill souvlaki (just don’t call it a kebab), or some Hanuman oysters, Darwin’s food scene rivals any city in the world. It’s one of our best-kept secrets. THE WEATHER Next time you’re sipping on a cool beer watching the sun go down at the Ski Club, consider this. Millions of poor southerners are huddled up inside, escaping the cold and rain that will be their reality for at least the next four months.

Sure, the humidity can get a bit much during the build-up, but it beats putting on 12 layers of clothes just so you can walk out the front door. THE FOOTY Darwin is the only place in the country where you get footy for 12 months of the year. And while AFL games have been commercialised, corporatised and bastardised, you can still have a kick on the ground at half time in the NTFL. THE POLITICS From midnight coups to Asian love affairs, the NT parliament offers more theatre than Broadway. The downside, of course, is that the same people starring in this drama are the ones making decisions that affect our lives. But, given the level of entertainment they provide, it’s a fair trade. THE PEOPLE For all its other great qualities, it’s the people who really make Darwin a great place to live. Darwin is officially a wanker-free zone. While southern cities have become a game of daily one-upmanship, no-one in Darwin cares what clothes you wear or car you drive, where you went to school or which D-grade celebrity you hung out with last weekend. We’re not defined by the food we eat or the number of syllables in our coffee.

In fact, the only time we want to see a barista is if we’re going to court. Pretentiousness is poison in Darwin and those who exhibit this ugly characteristic tend to last about as long as an ice cream in the build-up.

Thankfully, most of these southerners will never set foot in our city, having fallen for the mythical cliche that Darwin is some kind of bogan backwater inhabited by feral rednecks.

Those of us who have lived here for any length of time know nothing could be further from the truth.

Darwin offers a lifestyle unrivalled anywhere else in this country. One I won’t be taking for granted again.