A Little Bit of Fun..Resume of a Young Vagabond

NAME Ashley Elizabeth Cultra (Ash to most of you)

CURRENT OCCUPATION Displaced marketing student currently avoiding the wrath of the corporate world. Have chosen to spend the priceless years of my mid- twenties hopping around foreign cities and off the beaten path destinations.

CAREER OBJECTIVE Eager to utilize 2 years of time tested experience on the international backpacker trail where I've picked up such talents as personal chef, island laborer, ABC teacher and singer of nursery rhymes, and other semi-useless, but highly laughable job skills .

RELEVENT WORK HISTORY

EKKA Marketing and Sales Associate

Increased sales of Nestle drumsticks and chocolate heaven bars by 76.5% at the annual EKKA event held in downtown Brisbane. Distracted whining children, indulged in the sweet tooth of hand-in-hand couples and provided spontaneous conversation for various international patrons while contributing to the obesity of the world's population. Self handedly implemented a new marketing scheme involving iambic pentameter and ice cream rhyming- a feat that provided enjoyment and laughter to many of the fair's visitors.

Golf Course Employee of the Month/Clean up Crew

Ensured that quality standards were met and exceeded on the 48 acre golf ball course where I coordinated the transfer of golf balls from the top of the hill to the bottom of the hill. Coordinated team system that increased ball rakage output, giving team opportunities to perform spontaneous races and stunts down the sacred grass of the golfing hills.

Laundry Mistress

Built a dominant relationship with the industrial dryer during long, overtime hours in BUNK's laundry room. Mastered the art of folding hundreds of doonas, flat sheets and mountains of green pillow cases and developed new systems for taming the dreaded fitted corner sheets (I'm still actually working on this inventive concept). Identified tasks to facilitate ontime and sleep efficient completion of nightly loads of laundry (i.e. lugging the laundry into the television room/bar area and encouraging team sessions of folding).

Qualified Curry Specialist and Conesour - Indus Indian Restaurant

Coordinated team efforts for sales of butter chicken and beef jalfrezie (and tip donations to Ashley's Travel Incorporated). Mastered the foreign art of smelling like curry for eternity (especially my hair!). Became highly efficient at balancing oversized plates of rice while cheerfully answering patrons dim-witted questions and directing young children to the bathroom. Proficient at polishing heaps of cutlery, red wine stained glasses, speedy table re-setting and providing detailed explanations of lamb samosas, tandoori chicken and panir naans.

House Cleaning, Ect Gal

Created a new work opportunity when hired to clean the luxury apartment of a highly regarded town official. Utilized my past twenty years of advanced apartment cleaning, window washing, bathroom scrubbing, oven polishing, and general household repairs. Overcame severe predicament when kitchen was flooded while using multi gadget dishwasher (the soap bubbles were actually up to my knees!!). Applied my very expensive college degree and cunning maintenance skills to secretively clean the bubbles, water, and general disaster area while still gracefully chatting with The Boss (who spent the entire time sitting on the coach watching me and playing with his high tech phone). Dilemma solved!!

SKILLS AND QUALIFICATIONS

**Fluent in English, both with an American accent and an attempted Australian accent.
**Cheerful personality and team player (you have to be when you sleep in 10 bed dorms)!
**Artistic and Creative (especially when trying to craft original recipes using the remains of tuna, tomato sauce and leftover cereal before I let myself go for another grocery trip).
**Very detailed and money orientated; able to create useful and exciting entertainment prospects using exceptionally small amounts of money.


Ahhhhhhh - - I'm up late tonight having just returned from my 3rd job of the day and am trying to be creative with my writings. However, the inventive juices just aren't flowing at their normal speed. BUNK Hostel is my home for the moment, or rather has been for the past six weeks. I'm finding that I tend to settle in places while in Oz instead of travelling at my normal pace. On one hand, this is rather relaxing since I have all my clothes unpacked into crates under my bunkbed, third from the right in room 204. On the other hand, it means that I've run out of money and am juggling several jobs to build up my account at First National.

BUNK is located in the heart of Fortitude Valley, a somewhat artsy side of Brisbane complete with the drunks and homeless on the south side of Brunswick Street and the rambling, ear shattering, music pumping bars and eclectic coffee cafes just two blocks down. I'm a well known face among both sides of the spectrum. Early mornings can find me dropping off steaming cups of coffee to the various street bums who are in all stages of dress and cleanliness. Sammy, the friendly aboriginal who sleeps outside my favorite fruit store, hasn't said more than three words to me since we first crossed paths two months ago. However, he always manages to smile and wave when I happen past with arm loads of fruit and discounted vegetables - he definitely deserves a coffee and a few free apples for his jolly persona.

Room 204 is complete with great friends and a stuffed animal on my bed. I tried to buy a shower mat and some hand towels for the bathroom but the boys in the room said no. They thought I was trying to feminize the room too much. Other long termers in the hostel gather around at night to play cards, minus the drinks from earlier months in Oz. Instead, we make several coffee/tea runs up into the dark, musty smelling kitchen in the attic area and chat about where to travel next, where to work next, and how many hours of sleep we might possibly get in the next week. The most recent topic among our circle was Bush's morning breakfast with the fire brigade in downtown New York in remembrance of 9/11. I was the brunt of a lot of jokes that night.

I have a wisp of a memory of sending out a semi-tailored message a few months ago about my work adventures. A few arne't worth mentioning at all since they cause me to shake my head in dibelief....the things we do for money!! ust to highlight a few though - - EKKA was quite similar to our Iroquois County Fair. It had all the usual cow judging, grandma's secret recipe for pie contest, and acres and acres of hotdogs on a stick, elephant ears, and lemonade shake ups. I got way overexcited trying to explain the concept of 4-H and FFA clubs to my fellow Aussies and crew of international helpers. They got confused right way…” you mean that your friends led cows around on a rope for fun?”

EKKA ended and I've been doing odd jobs eversince. The apartment cleaning job went just as described. The guy never knew what was happening as I was kneeling behind the kitchen counter for an hour trying to hold a conversation with him and slyly rinsing bucketloads of soap bubbles down the sink. However, I left three hours later, clutching $100 and leaving an absolutaly sparkling apartment behind me. Who says midwestern girls don't have brains?

Many mornings still find me waking up early to work alongside of alongside of Tanya, Deb, and Linda, scrubbing toilets, mopping the ickiness out of rooms, and folding 15 loads of laundry. I'll never feel the same way about a washing machine again.....

Although it does seem that all I've done is work, we do find time to escape Brisbane and have some fun on the weekends. My plan of finding someone with a car to cater to my whims worked out wonderfully when Grant moved into our room and drove us to Molooloba and on a fishing trip to Noosa. The fish were in a bad mood that particular day but the sunshine and company were wonderful. Another afternoon had us cheering on Brisbane's very own Bronco's rugby team in the SunCorp stadium. Our tickets were smack in the middle of the XXXX section, making for a highly enjoyable sporting event. They dresssed us in XXXX t-shirts, silly hats, and gave us fun plastic things to hit one another with - - go Broncos - I'm not actually sure who even won that game but we enjoyed ourselves to the fullest.

I'm off this weekend to my new job with a catering company. We are camping for a week out in the bush near Ipswitch, about 70 minutes outside of Brisbane. Supposably there is a famous guru that is coming to speak to over 5000 of his international followers. We haven't been told too much about this character but it should make for an interesting eight days of camping and serving food to his "listeners"! My 25th birthday is coming up soon as well as my much looked forward trip to Fraser Island. End result being that I'll have plenty of exciting things to talk about instead of my silly, no money jobs that I'm sacrificing my sleep and health over. Travel is still fabulous!!! China is next on the itenerary on October 27th!! Too much to do to prepare bu the countdown has begun!

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