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Some of the detail might be quite sketchy as i'm writing this at the end of february 2007 and these events took place in Aug-Oct 2006.
After Mikey left the pub in the centre of Perth to catch his flight we continued to drink into the night (for some unknown reason we had taken it upon ourselves to try out the local drinking establishments so we could inform the others when they arrived - a good excuse for drinking to the excess i do believe!). We found our way back to Northbridge and found an Irish Pub called Rosie O'Grady's. As soon as we walked upto the bar Pete and Katherine had recognised someone they knew from N.Ireland. And from that moment on continued to meet old faces. Most of the time Gary and I stood there in amazement at what we were seeing - they had come across the other side of the world to one particular pub out of god knows how many and met people they knew. Pete had a story for each of the people they met and we just looked on in silent amazement - i know its a cliche but it is a small
world (if your from Ireland that is)!! That first night we all had rather alot to drink before heading back to our new home for a month - The Billabong.
The girls had reccomended the Billabong to us as we caught them up coming down the West Coast. As was always the case we needed someone to tell us where to go as we couldn't be bothered to think for ourselves for the most part. The Billabong was quite a friendly place and we met a few people there. I immediately got on quite well with two ladies in particular on the reception desk as they were cheerful and always chatty. Another receptionist on the other hand was not so welcoming - Big Gay Al (as he was termed - he was fat and sounded camp i.e. Gay). For some reason he took a particular dislike to me and I to him. Luckily for us we got into a 4-bed dorm - ideal for myself, Gary, Peter and Katherine (i'm not sure Katherine quite saw sharing her room with 3 blokes particulary pleasing at times but she put a brave face on it). Soon we made the place ours
- clothes strewn across the place, strange smells started to linger (wasn't helped by Petes fish esky - you have never smelt anything like it!!). Therefore it didn't take long for us to get our first eviction warning - a letter from the cleaner that said: 'If this room is not clean by tommorow we would be asked to leave'. The letter ended up being thrown on the floor with all the other junk that had accumulated. It was joined by a couple of other letters until finally we had a verbal warning and had to do that most dreaded of things - CLEAN UP!! Like in Darwin my pile of clothes seemed to have merged somewhat with Garys and everynow and again we would find something that neither of us could put claim to. The Billabong had Fox Sports so every weekend i wouldn't miss any of the football, it also had a games room which contained the table tennis table. Table tennis was quite popular to escape much of the boredom of our impoversihed lives. Although we talked with some of the Billabong it felt i had my travel buddies and therefore became more anti-social than i would
have been normally. Throughout my travelling I had always put the effort to make friends with other people but now in Perth i really couldn't be bothered!
A week or so after we had arrived the girls and Rhys joined us at the Billabong after their significantly longer trip. It was nice to see them as although the four of us had a great time together it was nice to have a bit of variety. After hearing all their stories "did you goto Pinnacles, you must have seen the self governing bit of land, horse trekking blah blah blah" we informed them that we were in a bit of a rush and happened to drive past those particular landmarks. So as it was we headed out into Northbridge (sleazy drinking area of Perth) and caught up.
It turned out that everyone was pretty much financially crippled by the excursions down the West Coast and Perth was supposed to be a place where we all got jobs and got rich. By this point in my travels i was quite sceptical about the availability of work so i kept some money safe - just in case (by this point my
credit card was close to max). Emma, Katie, and Emily would have no problems getting work as they were all nurses, Pete is a plasterer and met alot of the people he knew from back home "who gave him a contact or 2" but myself, Gary, Katherine and Rhyso's prospects weren't as encouraging. As it happended the Billabong had a jobs board/book (most adverts were as good as useless) and we got the jobs section in the Western to find something suitable. It looked like I had once again settled for a job as a labourer - nice to see my degree went to good use for that whole year!! We both phoned a few places and a company called Fusion Recruitment said come in we'll have work for you. He seemed a nice enough bloke and explained that it required an early start and one of us would work the following day (friday) and we would both start the following week. We walked back to Billabong well pleased with the relative ease of our success and therefore decided a celebration was in order (yes we celebrated getting jobs that involved moving office furniture). Myself and Gary joined the others
in their room and the boxes of Goon were 'cracked open'. I had decided to go in and do the job in the morning after a 'you can do it' type argument with Gary. At midnight the prospect of getting up at 5am seemed a little daunting (even if it was only a few weeks since i had performed this feet without worry in Darwin), but as drunken bravado goes - i was still up for it. That night was quite comical for another thing - a certain lipstick thing. Emily had asked me to close my eyes and as the mug that i was i did so even with protestations that i was being an idiot from someone else in the room. As i felt something on my face and heard giggles around the room i started getting slightly concerned and opened my eyes to find that my face (and teeth) had been painted a lovely pinky/purply colour. After a few more drinks i thought it was wise to head to bed and get some kip before a hard 1st day at work. The alarm went off twice the following morning - the first from the phone and secondly
from the ringing in my head! I felt awful and decided sod it - roll over and go back to sleep. Next thing i know im being woken up by Katherine, "Essex your late for work" - i said i wasn't going and then Gary heard and we debated the issue for a good 2hrs before finally deciding at 10am it was too late anyway. All the while our agency had continually tried to contact us and in the end I was forced to phone back with possibly the lamest excuse anyone will hear...EVER!! "Hi its Paul Jones, I was supposed to work today but i couldn't make it in because I was involved in a car crash, do you have anymore work going in the near future?". Sadly he never got back to us and so that was it - we had missed our chance of employment by celebrating the fact we had a job!!
The following week Gary and I got back on the jobhunt again. We went to a job internet site and found a job requiring people to package and lift tissue/toilet paper (yes pretty amazing i know). We phoned up the number and the
City Centre
Pete, Me, Gary + Giant Kangarooslady informed us that we couldn't get public transport out there but put us onto another lady who may be able to help us, Ingrid. She invited us down to her office and we had to sit through 2 of the most boring but quite comical H&S DVDs. Throughout her chat to us she kept on saying "please dont let me down because we wont hesitate to get rid of you" or "you must turn up on time because this employer is very anul about promptness". I couldn't help but think back to the week before when she kept on stating such things and even thought at one stage 'does she know something!'. Ingrid came across as very patronising and talked to us like it was our first ever job coming from school! So it was sorted we had another job working for Interite Commercial Interiors based in Willeton.
Gary needed some steel toe caps to work for ICI so we went and had a look in one of the second hand clothes shops and he picked out what had to be the worst looking pair of shoes I have ever seen in my entire life - but they had
The Girls @ Rosie's
Katie, Emma, Katherine & Emily steel toe caps and they we cheap - dirt cheap! On arriving back at the Billabong we all had a good laugh over the new shoes and even tried them on. As well as being the ugliest they were also the most uncomfortable shoes ive ever had the misfortune of trying. Ingrid asked me to sort out a black collared shirt and some beige trousers as I was doing deliveries to clients (there cant be many backpackers who carry black polos and a pair of beige trousers - who wears beige trousers anyway!!). Ingrid insisted that I had to look smart as i was representing the company - my black steel toe cap boots were covered in white paint where i had primed the timber back in Melbourne so i thought it was best i got some meths to try and clean them up a bit - but to no avail.
After a relatively good nights sleep (we didn't drink to much) the alarm went off, we got changed, had breakfast and set off to catch our bus at 6:30am!
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