Sorry I Fail at Blogging - Melbourne

I know, I know, I haven't written in months. It's easy to get side-tracked with life when you haven't been doing anything as exciting as travelling around every two seconds. I'll try and catch you up on everything in a nutshell that's happened in the last six months.

Before the Saints and Sinners Party

According to my last post, I was on my way to Magnetic Island. To be honest, this place was pretty fun, but there really wasn't much to do there besides party. So I spent a night there then headed to Cairns the next morning. Cairns was where it was at! I spent a week skydiving, white-water rafting and partying! At the hostel I was staying at there was a Sinners and Saints party, which apparently is the biggest party of the year in Cairns. They had live tattooing, a dominatrix person doing a show, porn-esque photo shoots, face painting, glow sticks, famous dj's, pub crawls... EVERYTHING you could think of. So me and my friends dressed up and partook in the activities! Two days later I did a skydive which was one of the most amazing experiences. I really thought I would freak out but I surprisingly stayed calm all the way up until they opened the airplane door and I watched the first person being sucked out like a vacuum. There wasn't any turning back since they whipped everyone out of that plane so quick. But once you are soaring in the air there is a moment of realization of how awesome your life is. To my left I was falling 14,000 feet above the great barrier reef, to my right was a rainforest and you land on a strip of the beach. Utterly amazing, I would suggest it to anyone!

The next day we went white-water rafting which I was a bit nervous about since I'm not the strongest of swimmers, but this ended up being one of the funniest trips of them all. Everyone was falling out left and right, it was so much fun.



The A-Team!

After rafting, me and some friends decided to stay in Cairns for a few more days then head down to Melbourne. This was more of a task than it appeared! We went to Flight Centre but everything was $400+. Ridiculous. For a one-way! So the lady at the desk said we could get a flight for $170 through this airline called Tiger Airways, but they weren't reliable and known for cancelling flights all the time. Since we are cheap backpackers we decided to chance it. Bad call.
We woke up at about 4:30am to head to the airport and upon arrival they broke the news that (of course) the flight had been cancelled. I'm usually a calm person in situations like this, but everyone around me was FREAKING OUT because it was ruining all their travelling plans if they didn't get to Melbourne on time. So that was beginning to rub off on me and stress me out. Luckily one of the lads I was travelling with lived in Canberra, which isn't too far from Melbourne. It's kind of in between Sydney and Melbs so he suggested we fly to Sydney, then take a bus to Canberra and then I could stay at his for a few days then fly to Melbourne. So that's what we did! It was actually pretty fun unexpectedly hanging out in Canberra for 4 days rent-free.

A few friends from the hostel I lived
in for 2 months!

Now that I was low on money and needed to get to Melbourne and find a job, it was time to get a move on! I flew into Melbourne and was so excited to finally be there. I had heard nothing but great things from everyone all throughout my travels. I had a friend staying at a hostel in St. Kilda so I decided to go check in there and hope that all the rest would come together.

I got there and spent about 2 solid weeks making friends and partying then decided to go find a job. I spent a day handing out resumes to restaurants in hopes of getting something quick. In Australia they make you do a trial before they decide if they are going to hire you or not. So I ended up getting a trial at this little Irish restaurant/pub. I really enjoyed it and was offered the job but the next day when I called to ask how much the pay was, it wasn't much. They were only offering $13.50 an hour, which might seem like a lot, but that's not even minimum wage here.  And it was cash in hand so I wouldn't get any tax money back. And they couldn't promise me a lot of shifts, so I reluctantly had to say never-mind because that just wasn't livable, let alone savable.

When I first got to Melbourne it was the middle of winter, which was actually really cold and really rainy. So I stayed in the hostel for a few days and ended up meeting a guy while I was eating breakfast who offered me a job! He asked what I was going to be doing for the rest of the day and I mentioned I needed to go out and look for a job and he told me he was a manager at a restaurant not too far away if I wanted to come in for a trial. "Ummm Okay!!" The place was called Mini Bites, and I didn't know it at the time but this would end up being one of the best decisions.

I showed up at 4 o'clock for the trial and met another English girl there who was doing a trial that day as well. The place was brand new, had only been open for a week, and as I looked around I noticed something I definitely didn't expect. This place was a full-on Jewish restaurant. I'm talking seriously Jews, with the curls on the sides, the little hats, big beards, the works. And the night I was working there happened to be a party of all men celebrating something and they were chanting and singing throughout the whole night. I have nothing against Jews, but at the time I just didn't understand the whole thing because I grew up in Bible Belt, America. I hadn't really met many in my life and if I had they weren't really that religious. So needless to say me and the other girl doing the trial were a little freaked out. We kind of looked at each other and told each other that we would stick through this job together for only 2 weeks or so just to get some cash then peace out and find another job. And that decision wasn't just because it was a Jewish restaurant, it was mainly because during our first shift, it was so busy and noone really took the time to explain the till or what anything was and the whole night was just really stressful and confusing.

Mini Bites family on my Birthday.
Having drinks by the beach!

The staff was somehow impressed with us that night so they decided to put us on the roster and gave us some more shifts. The money here was much better so I figured I would keep going in. Day two ran much more smoothly and by the end of the day I had a pretty good grasp of how everything worked and what all the food was. Our secret plot of two weeks turned into a month then two months and so on and so fourth. I ended up working there for about 5 months and I'm so glad I gave it a chance. I made the best of friends through that job, it was so laid back, I had tons of hours, and best of all I had a blast working there.

During my stint at Mini Bites I also ended up landing a bar job without even really looking for it. So for about three months I was working two jobs, which was actually pretty exhausting. I ended up meeting one of the managers of Hotel Barkly and while we were chatting he asked if I had any bar experience. Since I had bartended in the Outback I said yea and he asked if I would come in for a trial on that Friday. I went in and did a shift, but let me tell you, this bar was nothing like the pub I worked at in the Outback. This place was fancy. Everyone was beautiful, rich and ordered vodka lime and sodas. Much different than a Bundy and Coke from clientelle who had half their teeth missing.



Pub Golf Night!



This bar was also much more fast-paced. But I pulled through and adapted quickly so at the end of the shift the manager offered me more shifts and put me on the roster. Best of all, this place paid even more than Mini Bites so I decided to take it on as a weekend job. I loved Mini Bites and still hang out with my friends from there, but about 3 weeks ago we had a staff meeting at the bar and the owner told us that pretty much everyday throughout the month of December there were going to be Christmas parties so they could give us full time work if we wanted it. I decided that it would be wise to just work one job there full-time rather than splitting two jobs, so that's what I've been doing! It's been pretty exciting at Barkly as well! The other night David Beckham came in, got to talk to him for a few minutes and snapped a group photo (seen below), and Snoop Dogg is coming in on New Year! Sadly I'm going to miss Snoop because my last shift at Barkly is going to be Christmas night.



Who is that to the left of me? Oh it's just David Beckham! (He's got his arm around me, Watch out Posh!)



Some friends and I decided it would be fun to go to Sydney for New Year so we are leaving on the 27th and my flight home is on the 6th of Jan. I can't believe my Australian adventure is almost over. It's quite bitter-sweet. Although it's the end of this chapter, it's going to be the beginning of another one. As a traveller you'll notice that you never really end up sticking to your plan exactly as you planned it. You meet others and they tell you their stories and give you more ideas and you find yourself wanting to do it all. So I've decided that I'm going home for a month or two then I'm going to meet some friends who I met in Australia in Thailand and we are going to travel all of South East Asia. So starting in Thailand then doing Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Bali. Then after that I want to go to New Zealand. Since I've been in Melbourne I've managed to save up a small fortune, so that money will go towards those trips and hopefully last me so I won't have to work for a few months. Well that's been my life in a nutshell the past 6 or so months! I'll be sure to update soon with Christmas and New Year blogs!

And now for a few memories that can't go without being mentioned...