From here (with substantive additions by me, lol):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/He_Died_with_a_Felafel_in_His_Hand
While the book is not written in a linear fashion the order of houses (and housemates) John lives in is as follows:
1st Place – The Boulevade (Sydney??)
Tom lives in the garage Mel lives upstairs. Her boyfriend Warren moved in some time later. When they moved out, replaced by:
Andy the med student (nicknamed "Dr Death") moves in
Tom moves out and is replaced by:
Derek the bank clerk
2nd Place
Tom and John got a new place
Derek the bank clerk (lived in a tent). Replaced by:
Martin the paranoid wargames enthusiast. Lasted three weeks and was replaced by:
Taylor the taxi driver
3rd Place – King Street (Newtown - Sydney)
PJ
Milo
PJ moved out, replaced by:
The 7 ft nurse, replaced by:
Ray, replaced by:
Malcolm and his Charlie Brown-themed bowls, replaced by:
Victor the Rastafarian, replaced by: McGann the American in his mid 40s with a fondness for prostitutes, replaced by:
Taylor the taxi driver.
Taylor at the time was having personal issues. He ambushed his fellow housemates with a toy gun after hiding for an hour. He told them if it was a real gun they would all be dead. John saw this as good reason to move out.
4th Place – Duke Street (Brisbane)
"Thunderbird Ron"
Macgyver the mushroom farmer
Neal the albino moontanner
Howie (Neal's friend)
Satomi Tiger (via Tim the invisible flatmate)
"Brainthrust" Leonard
Jabba the Hutt
Mick the English backpacker
Colin and Stepan
John moves out for reasons not made clear.
5th Place – Melbourne
Stacey the Who Weekly fan
John moves out when her loud sex sessions became too much to bear.
6th Place – Fitzroy (Melbourne)
Brain the electrician
Greg the gay school teacher
AJ
Satvia who starts going out with John
Nigel moves into the house and moves in with Satvia
As a result of the fallout from this new relationship Greg moves out and John follows suit.
7th Place – Carlton (Melbourne)
Ernie
Martin the Canadian PhD student
Dave the smoker moves in with his washerwoman girlfriend
Four other Daves move in
After trying to freeze out the Daves from the house by cutting off the gas and electricity John gives in and moves to a loft in Fitzroy.
8th Place – Fitzroy (Melbourne)
Wendell the Londoner
After Wendell's threats to kill him, John moves out and sleeps around at friends' places.
9th Place – Auchenflower in Brisbane
Wayne the Satanic vet
Danny (the decoy)
Margot
10th Place – Brisbane goth house (not clear how this move came about)
Kevin the carpenter
Slovenian art printer
Bald goth who lived in the back
Luke the musician
All the goths run away after the bailiff came round to collect unpaid rent. John keeps the house on and in moves:
Dirk Em the banker (however at the start of the book it is stated that Emma moves in when Nina moves out)
"Crazy Nina"
Nina move out to live with her friend Tanya
Tanya then moves in after Nina sleeps with her boyfriend. The whole house moves:
11th Place
Dirk
Em the banker
Tanya (possibly)
New woman moves in to replace Nina but leaves because she is "diagnosed as schizo"
Taylor the taxi driver moves in
The book then segues to
12th Place – band house in Darlinghurst, Sydney
Hooper
Tammy
Jeremy moves in to escape his former psychotic housemate
Keith the drummer moves in downstairs
13th Place – Kippax street (Surry Hills, Sydney)
Gina
Harry the doctor, replaced by:
Kim the vet, replaced by:
"Melissa the junkie" (aka Rowan Corcoran), replaced by:
Duffy the computer programmer, replaced by:
The Dutch guy who lasted 2 weeks, replaced by:
Giovanna who lasted less than a week, replaced by:
Mosman who no one ever saw, replaced by:
Jimbo who moved in with one of the girls leaving his room free for Veronica the proto hippy who was replaced by:
Jonathan, replaced by:
"Downstairs Ivan"
"Uptight Martin" moved in at the same time
Downstairs Ivan and Uptight Martin move out within 3 days of each other and are replaced by
Paul the quiet journalist and Homer the air traffic controller
Yoko San moved in and last three weeks, replaced by:
Jeffrey the "junkie" (drug addict) - of the title, I assume
Birmingham's narrative is interspersed with humorous testimonials from other veterans of the Australian share house lifestyle, and descriptions of common share house paraphernalia, such as the bucket bong (yep), the ubiquitous "brown couch" (mine was blue), and milk crates serving as makeshift furniture (can confirm).
ok ... I fail to understand what this is about ...
Living in shared houses, over a period of time...
As you can see at the link, the above content is taken from a book called "He Died With a Felafel in His Hand", which is supposedly non-fiction.
It's one man's experiences of shared housing, and the people he lived with, over time...
Some of the experiences are very funny. Some are just sad. I find it... Amusing, because I can identify with some of this stuff, having lived similar experiences...
As I wrote in another comment which bizarrely seems to have been hit by a spam filter or something, I'm interested to hear other people's takes on this, and whether... "Share housing" has produced similar experiences, in other places/time periods. And I just thought it would be funny, because this shit is real life, rather than, say, pop culture.
That's all, really. shrug
The Americans won't really experience this for another 5-20 years, depending on how quickly BlackRock buys up all the houses. For now, we're more able to be solitary creatures than Canadians or Australians, because our government didn't sell out to the Chinese so quickly, so hard, or so soon.
Maybe…
I think it might actually be cultural, though. Because flat-sharing has been a thing over here since at least the 60s. Same in major UK cities.
We literally didn’t have “normalised relations” with the CCP until the early 70s, so… I’m not sure that’s quite it, tbh.
At least not as a “full explanation” of the situation, anyway. 💁🏻♂️
Attention u/DomitiusofMassillia, one of my comments on this, and on another post today (possibly) is there for me, but doesn't seem to actually appear on the post (and isn't in the comment count above, for whatever reason)...
If it's stuck in a spam filter or something, would be grand if you could approve it. Or tell me what is wrong with it (I can't see anything, anywhere), and I'll edit it...
Maybe the system is blocking Reddit and/or wiki links, now..? Dunno.
Just let me know, if indeed that is the comments in question, and I can archive it or something. shrug
Cheers in advance.
I edited the formatting, because apparently bullet point lists do not translate well on this site...
Not sure if it makes any more sense to you now, but I'm really not sure how I could make it any more clear, tbh, lol...
Just follow the damn hyperlink, if you need more context.
I'm interested in hearing how this compares to the experience of others, particularly in other countries, if others feel inclined to share...
I know "room sharing" is much more common in the US, at least in college. That's markedly uncommon here, even at university, apart from between couples, siblings, or with international students (and the occasional close friends, or American exchange students, but even then it is exceedingly rare)...
I've personally literally never done it, apart from very short-term, or with a girlfriend. So that's a significant difference, for one.
People tend to live with their parents longer here, I believe, than other... "Anglo" countries, but obviously much less commonly than in other, non-Anglo (e.g. Middle Eastern or Asian) cultures.
But yeah, I don't even know if you guys would call it... "House sharing", but I'm sure you get the general idea/can understand at least some of these experiences and (in) jokes!
That much is true. The overwhelming majority of full time undergrads in the US wind up in some sort of room sharing or apartment sharing arrangement during college.
True that!
Yeah, apartment sharing (i.e. common areas, and things like appliances) is very common over here, especially in areas with high student/transient/international populations (any city over half a mill), but room sharing (like you mention) is equally uncommon…
In fact, it is vanishingly rare, at least in my experience, lol.
But I haven’t studied in Melbourne or Sydney, specifically. Perhaps it is more common there, idk…
In America...
Most full universities offer traditional dorms (with communal shower rooms) as well as hybrids and full apartments.
Most conventional dorm rooms are doubles, putting two occupants in roughly 16-20 m^2. The occupants usually loft the beds to increase the usable floor space. Rooms smaller than 14 m^2 tend to be for a single occupant, and are rarer (often filling out irregular voids in the building's design). At most colleges, upperclassmen have priority in picking their room assignments, and single rooms are picked off long before freshmen get a chance at them.
Hybrid dorms started appearing in the 90's, to increase flexibility by eliminating communal washrooms. In this configuration, a single bathroom is shared between two double rooms, making it much easier for a building to be co-ed.
University managed apartments take the hybrid concept one step further by essentially being a full 2 bed , 1 bath with an open plan kitchenette / living room open to 2-4 residents depending on whether someone wants to pay for a full room or share a room. These are popular with upperclassmen who've made a few friends, because they're usually comparatively cheap (often far from campus and built low budget like commercial apartments) and typically assign full room groups before dealing with unassigned singles. These also often include an in-unit washer and dryer.
Here you will find some of the people apparently tangentially involved in some of the above, which is... Amusing:
https://www.reddit.com/r/brisbane/comments/4x17ym/its_been_20_years_since_he_died_with_a_felafel_in/
Also sadly vaguely relevant (from a week ago): https://www.reddit.com/r/AusEcon/comments/uy0yc1/the_sharehouse_just_died_with_a_felafel_in_its/