Today marks my first week at Bowen Backpackers and my second week in Queensland looking for fruit picking work. Despite my arrival in Bowen being more difficult than expected, I’ve made the best of my time here and have come to enjoy the environment… and I’ve been working for 2 days! Hoorah!
Yesterday I was called in for my very first farm work job – picking chillies on a family farm for 5 hours. Myself, 4 Germans and a Frenchman boarded our bus at 6:05 am and were out working in the fields as of 6:30. We had to pick the fully grown yellow chillies, which grow very low to the ground and require lots of crouching. The majority of the chillies were still quite small and not ready for picking, so the challenge was to dig low and find fully grown ones. Instead of bending over repeatedly, I opted to lie on the ground and drag myself around which was much more comfortable and even more fun :)
For every (large) bucket that we filled, we were paid 15$. I didn’t mind the work at all, mainly because my iPod kept me entertained with Cat Stevens (Tea for the Tillerman), Simon & Garfunkel (Old Friends, Bridge Over Troubled Water) and most appropriately the Red Hot Chilli Peppers (Stadium Arcadium). Towards 11 o’clock there were very few chillies left to be picked and the work became tiring and frustrating in the heat of the sun, but I kept at it while the others gave up and chatted for a bit and by 12 o’clock I had harvested 4 buckets worth of chillies worth 60$ (which amounts to 10$ an hour of work, not so great in the scheme of things, but very much worth getting away from the hostel and applying myself!).
Today I was called into Tom Co. where they make sundried tomatoes and ship them overseas. This time I was working in a factory for 18.60$/hour, clad in a hair net, overalls and gum boots. I had to take all of my piercings out (which made me realize I have more piercings than I was aware of) and even had to wear a Band-Aid over my nose piercing because I was afraid to take it out and not be able to get it back in. You can imagine how cool I looked!
At first I was setup in front of an upward tilted conveyor belt where we were to place tomatoes with their stems facing sideways so that they were pushed onto a blade and cut in half. Although this may seem like a simple task, tomatoes are round and therefore when placed on a tilted surface, they roll down and fall into whatever position they desire. There were two of us on the belt, the first one scurried to set them into place and the second made up for what was missed and tried to make sure they stayed in place before hitting the blade… a very difficult task! Whenever the workers down the line got overloaded, they had to shut down the machine and as soon as it stopped I got ridiculously dizzy and had trouble grounding myself again. After 20 minutes of working I became really nauseous and broke into cold sweats, stared seeing white light and feared losing consciousness. I had to press the emergency stop button and tell everyone I wasn’t feeling well, then stepped outside, which was pretty embarrassing but absolutely necessary. When I was able to stand up I came back and they stationed me on the next part of the machine where you sort the badly cut tomatoes from the properly cut tomatoes. The job was tedious but I was surprised to find that I didn’t mind doing it. As it turns out, 1 in 10 people can’t work the conveyor belt due to ‘sea sickness’!
Both work days were really short and only temporary work, but I was glad to apply myself and take on work that I never expected to see myself doing. I’ll be working at Tom Co. again tomorrow and am now 4th in line waiting for a permanent position doing shed work. I’m really happy to finally be working and am glad I don’t find the work completely unbearable. There are women working in the factory who are in their late 60s and who have worked there for over 30 years, which leaves me feeling very lucky for all the working opportunities I’ve had in my life!
The hostel itself isn’t too exciting but the people within it are great! Everyone is traveling and has a thirst for life, discovery and adventure, which I love being surrounded by! The energy is great and there is much to do away from the hostel to keep from going stir crazy. I’ve spent the last week tanning on the beach, swimming in the ocean and snorkelling for my first time. I even saw three sharks! They were Wobolong sharks, the not-so-dangerous kind that lurk around the bottom of the ocean near rock formations.
Although last week’s update was a bit on the depressing side, I’m now really excited to be amongst happy travellers who are motivated, eager and fun to be surrounded by. The best news this week was planning for Sean to come join me for the month of October! It sounds as though the shed work season will be over at the end of October and everyone seems to be planning to leave around that time too, which leads me to think that I may be leaving with Sean to go to The Fest at the end of October and then coming back to Australia to find 1 more month or so of agricultural work in Victoria! I’m back on track!
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