Another day in Cairns

Not much happened the past month, since my main focus was finding a job in Cairns and I can tell you, it was NOT easy. I completely underestimated it, because in my mind the Australians were counting on backpackers trying to work and it would be easy to find a job here. But I lost all hope when I started to look for a job. I started searching online for farmwork when I was in Townsville, but literally every farm that I called was not hiring. So I started to look for jobs in hospitality, sent out a lot of resumes through websites and also printed out around 50 resumes to go door by door, or more like restaurant by restaurant. That took a lot of time and effort, with no results whatsoever. I was nearly broke and had about 100 dollars in my account and was about to ask my parents to buy me a ticket back home to the Netherlands.

That week I had so much stress, because I was kind of denying the fact that I was so broke. Also, I didn’t want to admit that it was maybe time to go home since a job was not really in sight. I still had friends coming to visit me and I only ‘used’ 3 out of 12 months of my working holiday visa, without even working. So I was not really ready to come back home again, with no plan on how to go from there.

All I ate that week were apples, spaghetti with just pesto and müsli bars, because I needed the money more for accommodation. I also tried couchsurfing to save money on accommodation, but this did not really went as I expected. I had friends that used couchsurfing a few times and their stories sounded really positive and I wanted to try

couchsurfing anyways, as part of the ultimate backpacker experience. So I went online and searched for hosts and sent out a few requests. One guy replied back to me that I was welcome to stay at his place for 2 nights. He offered to pick me up after his work shift, because his place was a little out of town. Once I reviewed his profile again, I stumbled on a few minor things. He was a bit older than me, around 40 and he had set his preference for gender to female, which worried me slightly. But, this was my first couch surf experience, so maybe I just blew everything up in my mind.

However, as soon as I saw him and we arrived at his house I knew my gut feeling was right and I did not feel comfortable at all. In my request I did tell him that I would spend 2 nights at his place, but I quickly changed my mind as soon as I arrived there. He was a kind person, but looked like a stereotype single guy with his massive TV, gaming consoles all over the place and bathrobe on. I tried so hard to make conversation with him, but he did not ask me anything back so there were a loooot of awkward silences. I’m not proud of it, but I had to make up an excuse that would let me leave a day earlier than planned, because I just felt super uncomfortable and had to get out of that house.

Luckily about 3 weeks ago I got a call from a restaurant, if I was interested in doing a trial shift and of course, I was over the moon. It went really well and I’m currently working as a waitress in an Italian & Seafood restaurant, hooray! It’s not many hours but enough to survive. Last week I also found a work for accommodation position, which basically lets me stay in the hostel for free, in exchange of 12 hours of cleaning per week. I just finished my first shifts of cleaning and from now on I’ll be staying in this hostel called Dreamtime Travellers. It’s a pretty relaxed hostel, has a pool and a minivan full of pillows. Very comfy and the perfect place to write this next update.

But, to be fair, I’ve spent about a month in my previous hostel and got kind of used to living there, the people and having everything close to me, since it was in Cairns City.

However, also a few things I won’t miss about my previous hostel. I am not going to miss the Chinese girl in my dorm room who was always talking on the phone, even when I came back from a party at 2.00am or later. Also the fact that I am not sleeping opposite of the kitchen and next to the reception anymore, because that was a guaranteed wake up at 8am every morning, no exceptions. I will also still keep an eye open for a second job, because with my current job I can save just a little money every week and I am not planning on staying in Cairns forever.

Since I found a job, I could also afford small trips and activities again, because all I had been doing was handing out resumes and going to the lagoon. In one of the dorm rooms I met a German girl with a car and we went on a trip to Lake Eacham and Millaa Millaa Falls. I also met a lot of people on my Fraser Island trip and since we all went in the same direction I saw a lot of them again in Cairns. Now, over a month later, nearly everyone has left, EXCEPT for Matt the English bloke. We were kind of forced to become friends since we were the only ones left and staying in the same hostel. So after a month of going to the lagoon (because I had no money and he didn’t have a job) we decided to do some actual stuff. So we rented bikes and cycled to the Botanic Gardens and to Holloways beach the next day. (10km oneway and then 10km back!!) We also went to play minigolf and randomly decided to take the bus to Palm Cove, but it was rainy and Palm Cove on a rainy day is not really worth it.

Besides that I’m slowly turning into an English gal, because the world cup is obviously going on everywhere and since The Netherlands

didn’t qualify this year, and Australia lost their game against Peru, my only option is to support Matt and his English team. I have been taught some English slang, and also -very important- the -unofficial- England football anthem. Although I am not waking up for the 4am games, sorry Matt.

AND THEN LAST BUT NOT LEAST. My dear friend and ex-housemate Rose has showed up in Cairns and stays here for the next week. It’s so nice to see a familiar face again and catch up after 5 months, because thats how long I’ve been traveling for now. Also my aunt was here a few weeks ago, which was also a really nice catch up and I even got a little bit emotional. She lives in Alaska, so I normally don’t see her a lot, and it was such a weird but special moment to meet again on the other side of the world. And then also Zaïda, who I started traveling with in Thailand arrived here, so a lot of cool stuff happening at the moment!! Keep you posted, cheers! X