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6 July 2009
Michel's A Fishy Affair Restaurant Chef Interview
"The Northbridge curfew? Ha ha (laughs for 10 seconds) Is this a joke? I don’t know, I’ve never seen it."
Our restaurant has been here for about 20 years. I’ve been working here for five years.
I can be honest with you. Northbridge is not a place that I would go to. If I didn’t have to work here, I would never come here. I’m not going to tell you that there’s no fights, drug dealers, gangs, brawls or riots and so on. All I can tell you is that for it to be advertised as a tourist attraction for Western Australia... I’m a well travelled man myself and everywhere in the world, I have never seen it like Northbridge where you see police, horses, unmarked cars and bicycles.
There’s almost as many police as there are people on the street. Me as a tourist, if I come here and as human nature, you see police, you think, “Woah! what is going on here?”
Northbridge is not dangerous. People come here and there’s all the teenagers and youngsters who fill up the bars and nightclubs on the weekend, it doesn’t stop them but I mean, it’s not a place I would go and many people think the same as me.
Ten years ago, it was much more busier than it is now. It was more pleasant. More disturbances but it would have been more unnoticed because there were so many more people. Now all the tourists that you see compared to ten years ago, are students and backpackers.
To be honest with you, I’ve been here in Perth and I’ve known Northbridge for about 39 years now. 35 and 30 years ago...
"Northbridge was a nice place with nice little streets but now it needs to be completely demolished."
They’re trying to do nice things like what’s happening with the Plaza and opening new places. New patches on old soil. It doesn’t go. For me, the whole thing bulldozed and do it all over again like a new little city.
Now they’re talking about the Northbridge link and linking it to the city, which is already linked. You can walk from here to the Esplanade. They want to spend a bit more money. I don’t think they’re going to do anything for Northbridge because the main structure of Northbridge is the blocks, the streets. They’re still the same. It’s like putting patches on an old coat. It just doesn’t work.
The Northbridge curfew? Ha ha (laughs for 10 seconds!) Is this a joke? I don’t know, I’ve never seen it. The kids are everywhere, any time of the day, any time of the night.
Curfew? Ha ha ha ha.