Graduation season is coming again! I decided to share something pretty different from my other blog posts today - everything about my Temporary Graduate Visa. It was almost 1 year that I decided to apply for this visa after my graduation. I still remember this time last year I was very panic about the application, the process, the timeline etc. So I wanna share my experience and something that I wish I knew before applying, something not basic and the Internet didn't tell me.

1. The Timeline
Know Your Completion Date
485 visa only allow applicants to apply after the official completion date of your degree. Neither the day you finish your exam, nor your graduation day. Each semester has the official date for completion. Check your uni calendar or ask student service. Once you know the date, get your completion letter from your uni student service, which usually takes within 30 minutes to be ready and free of charge.

Know Your Student Visa Expiry Date
485 visa only let applicants apply within 6 months after completing your program. With the requirement of a valid visa, you should submit your application before your student visa expired. I would recommend submitting about 1 week prior to your student visa expired, to elongate your stay in Australia. For example, my visa expired on 15th March. I submitted on the 9th March.

Book Your IELTS Test
If you want to save time or you have time between exam finished to your graduation, do your IELTS test. IELTS Tests are quite high demand and it only happens on Saturdays. It is often full within a short period of time. Check the available IELTS Test centre and book in advance.

2. The Process
After knowing all the important dates, it's still pretty confusing how the application actually works. For me, I got really confused about the visa application because I never do it by myself before and I also don't want to spend extra money on agents.

Create ImmiAccount & Health Declaration
Personally, I think the Home Affair website is so complicated to read but their online application guided me through the application step by step. Once you create your account (make sure you write down the log-in details), the first thing you should do is make a health declaration. Answer all the questions and the system will determine what kind of health examination you are required. Then an e-Medical referral letter will be sent to you, with your HAP ID and exam you needed to take.

Book Your Health Check
After you received the referral letter, you now can make an appointment with any registered health check clinic that recognised by Australia Government. It's totally fine to do the exam before submitting the application, because the clinic will automatically submit your report to Immigration and they will record the result with your HAP ID. For me, I found out doing the exams are cheaper in Hong Kong (Bupa Aus is over AUD350, while Quality Health Care is HKD1350), so I decided to book mine in Hong Kong when I was back for visiting.

Do A Health Insurance Research
There are so many insurance companies that provide OVHC. Compare a few policies: the price, health cover, reputation etc. There's website that compares different insurance companies, so do have a look before choosing. The one I chose is CBHS (link), their application is quite user-friendly and they are the cheapest (AUD63.35 per month). Once your policy begins, the insurance company will send you a letter to attach in the application.

Apply Your Police Check
To get your character check, log in to the online system (link). You are required to provide at least 2 identity-prove documents (i.e. passport, student card, credit card). After filling the forms, print out and sign the consent form. Upload it back and make your payment. I do mine in the post office since I can't do it online, so prepare for a post office run.

Scan, Attach & Submit
Now, you should have all the required documents and you can finally fill up all the details and questions provided by the system. Make sure you're in Australia when you do the application because the system does not allow submission outside Australia (can't continue the next step after certain pages). Scan or take photos of all the documents. There's an attachment session at the end, thus double check the attachments' numbers you enter along the application are correct.

Pay, Wait & Got it!
Once everything submitted and payment made, the Bridging Visa A will automatically be given to you and active when your student visa is expired. If you want to leave Australia during bridging, you will need to apply a Bridging Visa B, which allow you to travel out Australia while waiting the actual visa approved. The approving time really depends on the demand. If you apply earlier, it only takes 1 month or less. However, submission during the peak period might extend the waiting time. For me, I didn't get my visa until May (applied in March), because of an incorrect document. But once I got my document right, the approval only takes 1 week.

3. The Hacks
Agent is not neccessary.
Personally, I think using an agent is just a lazy option. The whole process is easy and smooth if you're willing to spend time doing research and ask around. Some agents offer a free consultation, so if you really have questions, just give them a call or visit. Save that money.

Look for IELTS discount.
I believe most uni offer 50% off or other discounts for graduates to take IELTS Test. I got 50% off from taking the IELTS in my uni exam centre. Save that money.

Make sure you apply the correct police check.
As mentioned, I got an incorrect document which is my police check. I applied for "overseas employment purpose" instead of "immigration purpose". It leads me applied the Queensland Police Check, instead of National Police Check.

Download a scanning app.
Using a phone scanning app will make your life so much easier. CamScanner helps me to "scan" all my documents just by taking photos from my phone and add a scanning filter. It also allows multiple pages, naming the documents and easy sharing to a computer. Save your time figuring how to use a scanner.

This visa only allowed to apply once in a person's lifetime. 2 years is long, yet not very long. Is it worth to apply? Depends. Same as all other decisions in your life, take a deep consideration and ask for advice! *DISCLAIMER: I'm not an education or migration agent, all option stated is base on my personal experience.

Some useful link:
ImmiAccount https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/Trav/Visa/Immi
Online AFP Application https://afpnationalpolicechecks.converga.com.au/
485 Visa https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/trav/visa-1/485-
SEE YOU,
cherry xoxo

Long-waited hello to the Internet! A lot had happened in my life in the past 8 months and finally decide to update here. The other day my boyfriend and I decided to visit Toowoomba for the first time for the annual Toowoomba Carnival of Flowers. The annual event took place in multiple gardens and parks, with free entry while some events cost around $5-30 (adult). This year, the carnival started from 21st - 30th September, the beautiful sunny springtime in Queensland. One of the highlights of the carnival was Grand Central Floral Parade on 22nd September (Saturday).

It took 1hr 45min to drive from Brisbane to Toowoomba, a bit of journey so make sure you pack your water and snacks! The first stop was Queens Park, the main botanic garden of the carnival. The whole park was planted with colourful flowers and plants where you can take a bunch of photos. There're lots of grass area and an off-leash area for picnic, kids and doggies.
If you have time, you may also visit Laurel Bank Garden, which is 5 mins drive from Queens Park. It's similar to Queens Park but smaller. During the first week, there was a Twilight Tour in the park which cost $5. The one-hour tour showed the darker side of plant life from the experts and found out exotic plants.

The second stop we went to was Japanese Gardens located in the University of Southern Queensland. The sakura tree planted along the lake and the red bridges gives a Japan-vibe to the whole garden.
We ended our day in Picnic Point lookout where you can clearly see the Table Top Mountain and take a break in the Picnic Point Cafe.

Toowoomba is a really small town but definitely worth to check out the annual carnival, which is the perfect way and reason to visit Toowoomba and celebrate Spring! I vlog a little bit in Toowoomba, check out my latest vlog:
SEE YOU,
cherry xoxo

Back to mid-January, me and my friends went to Bangkok for 4 days to spend time together, relax and of course, FOOD! It's really nice to escape the cold in Hong Kong for a while and get some sunshine in Thailand.

DAY ONE
We arrive Bangkok around 1pm and we Uber to our hotel. We stayed in Urbana Sathorn Bangkok, right in the centre of Bangkok, about 45 minutes away from DMK airport. After checking-in and putting our stuff down, we headed to Siam, the most busy area in Bangkok, to walk around and look for food. We tried Mango Tango and ordered mango sticky rice and other mango dessert. We also bumped into a random market, called Street Art Market. They got music, food and different products. We tried coconut ice cream, which surprisingly good!

At night, we had a 2-hours Thai massage at Healthland and then dinner in Asiatique night market.

DAY TWO
We had a solid 9 hours sleep after a long day yesterday, so we started our first full day pretty late with some last minutes planning (as always). We bought a one-day boat pass (THB180) that can bring as along Chao Phraya River at Sathorn Pier. The first stop we headed was The Maharaj Pier to check out the Grand Palace and The Temple of the Emerald Buddha. Make sure you don't wear short or skirt when visit the Grand Palace, my friends got kicked out because of wearing shorts, but don't worry there're Thai fisherman pants to buy right outside the entrance lol!

We then take the boat to Wat Arun, a beautiful white temple, but we didn't pay to enter lol.

DAY THREE
Another full day in Bangkok, we decided to book a taxi for one day to bring us to Damnoen Saduak floating market and Mae Klong Railway Market. It took around 1.5 hours from Bangkok CBD to our first destination. Floating market is really fun and a must-do in Thailand, but we didn't buy anything in the market. After that, we visited Mae Klong Railway Market and had lunch there. Railway market is known as one of the world class attraction. Marketers along the railway will close their shop within few minutes before the train pass by, and then open again right after the train left.
The driver dropped us at a subway station as we wanted to visit JJ Green Market. We just spent around an hour to get dinner and walk around. We ended up enjoy the last night at Siam Design Hotel with night view and a drink.

DAY FOUR
Last few hours in Bangkok, we took a quick Uber ride to Pratunam to try the famous chicken rice!
Then, we did a last minute Big-C run and bought a lot of snacks and noodle. After packing everything, we hopped on to a taxi and rushed to the airport to catch our flight back to Hong Kong.

4 days is definitely not enough for Bangkok and I am sure I'll be back for the cheap food and market! I spent around HKD1000 on food and transport, HKD2300 for flight and hotel. If you wanna know more what I did in Bangkok, check out my vlog:
SEE YOU,
cherry xoxo

1+2// Forever Living Aloe Vera Gelly & Aloe Propolis Creme

Hey 2018, another year is passed, another life achievement unlocked.

I was looking back to all the previous yearly review post I did. It amazing how much I grow and how different I am compare to 3 years ago. Last year, I wrote "If 2014 is the year of changing, 2015 is the year of realising, 2016 is definitely a year of growing." For 2017, is a year of trusting.

Being the final year student, I was constantly asked about future and post-study plan since day one. I didn't really think about it seriously until recently...I kinda know I wanna stay longer in Australia, but at the same time I am afraid of making decisions, facing changes and planning about the future. I panic about graduating, being unemployed and leaving the city. I panic, but that's not everything. I still find joy in spending with friends, fellowship and serving in church. I tried my best to build better relationship with individual friend and treasure every friendship I've got. The panic is still here at the moment, but I didn't let it takes away my happiness and controls of my mind.

2016, I spent so much time on learning and focus on the word. 2017 I decided to focus on relying and trusting God. In the midst of assignments, committee meeting and training, even though it's tiring sometime, I know I'm glorifying Him, I know He's providing and strengthening me. This transiting period is killing, it's scary and feels helpless. But it forces me to rely God furthermore, to pray harder, to trust Him entirely.

2017 brought me to lots of places: Taipei, Seoul, Jeju Island, Tasmania, New Castle, Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne. 2017 also brought me so many first time. I finish my first full-time internship, first time serve as keyboardist in church, first time rock climb, first time visit Tassie, first time seeing aurora and milky way, first time hike in snow mountains, first time road trip and drive in Australia, first bachelor degree gained...

Thanks for being with me in this 3 years journey. Hey future me, I hope 2018 will be a worry-free year. Continue to trust the Lord, trust that He will provide everything and plan the best for you. Don't panic, everything is gonna alright. It's ok to get lost after uni, it's really ok.

Bye 2017,
Hello 2018.

Watch my latest video:
SEE YOU,
cherry xoxo