Working!!

2/13- I was waiting outside at dawn with 8, yes, 8 boys to go grape picking. All the girls on the list have since been given potato jobs, so it's me and lots of testosterone today. We paced outside until around 7:20, when Matt, a guy from another hostel who helps the lady named Jacky that we are picking for, arrived. I crammed into the van with the French and a couple Italians, and Andy and Tom, some of my UK friends, rode with Matt. It only took about 10 minutes to get there. Jacky asked each of our names and where we were from, then handed out clippers and explained what we would be doing. We were partnered up, or given "work husbands" and then each of us went to one side of the row and clipped grapes into buckets. My work husband for most of the day was a guy named Ming from another hostel, but we shuffled around a lot during the day. It is hard and hot work, but I was allowed to listen to the Red Hot Chili Peppers on my iPod, and I don't think it would have been quite as bad if I could have had water with me the whole time. She had given us breaks about every 2 hours in the morning, but in the heat of the day, she was anxious to get the work done and didn't excuse us to our water bottles again. She did occasionally pass around some of her own water bottles she brought, which were frozen and therefore much more desirable than my now slightly beyond room temp water in my bag by the van. But you only got a few sips and it was HOT day. But I lived, and picked a lot better than a lot of the boys (and I call them boys, as they are all younger than me, some like five or six years younger). Jacky seemed to think so, as she kept sending me back behind some of them to re-pick what they had left behind. I am not sure when I will be working again, but I am glad to know I can hang with a bunch of boys and hold my own picking grapes in the Barossa Valley!

I am potato sorting tomorrow. I am only doing this temporarily. The hostel requires you to accept a job offered to you, or you go to the bottom of the list for jobs. So I accepted it, on the condition that Sam, the receptionist, has said it will be only a couple days a week and I can still do grapes. If I had said no, I would go to the bottom of the list anyway, and not be able to pick grapes for a while, hence no money. All the girls hate this job, so I can't say I am looking forward to it. And even though it's not contract, Jess seems to think it is going to be 4 days a week. I will talk with the people tomorrow and find out. Worse comes to worse, I work the job for a week or two and make some money, then quit and hopefully do grapes or go back to Adelaide and do the last bit of traveling I want to do. It's pretty frustrating though, I get a taste of picking grapes, then it's gone. I will let you know how tomorrow goes...