Days 40 to 45: Hard work, a lot of pain, new friends and some farewells

Location: Caboolture
Country: 'Oz
Day number: 46
Mood: In a lot of pain

So, I'm aware it's been a while since I last blogged, the simple reason is that internet access is rather limited. When I was in Brisbane I could use my phone, but I can only use the computer every now and again. So I'll try to remember nice and far back and put down all I can remember!

On Day 41, Jerome, Paula, Jason and I ventured into Caboolture for the day. Jerome wanted KFC, and we all needed to do some food shopping. While I was there I bought myself a cheap little digital camera, because my phone just sucks at pictures. It was a good deal, 14 megapixels (It was on sale!). Kind of scary actually, I remember my first digital camera just a few years ago which had 3.4 megapixels, and was regarded as amazing for having so many. Isn't it amazing how quickly technology changes?

The next day we quietly groaned as we tried to recover from work on Sunday. Backs ached, and we thought it couldn't get any more painful... we were wrong. Work started again on Thursday, and we started off well, with Aya, Soonim and I planting 2710. Almost the most, we were beaten by 90. Yesterday was our next day of work, and we planted 3350! We were very pleased with ourselves, beating everyone else, but then we had to go to a second farm in the afternoon (I'm returning there this afternoon, not looking forward to it) and boy oh boy did that hurt. The new farm had planting beds that were lower down, and having to lean over that little bit further just killed me. Hopefully I can get through today, though we'll likely have work again tomorrow. Think of the money Andy... think of the money.

A few days ago, Jerome and I had an excursion into Brisbane so he could buy his car (Now cancelled due to girl issues). Good fun, we took the bikes and rode the ten kilometres to the station, then jumped on the train, and some more riding. Gave me a good workout because the bike only had one gear! It was broken... I'm going to see if I can buy some new gear wire and restring them, as the old wire is rusted so badly I can't changed gears on it...

Hmm, what else is new... Paula and Jason were fired from planting. The woman in charge of the planting (Sue) didn't like Paula, so was a bit unfair with her on the second day. They left yesterday, I hope they're doing ok... they're off to find work in Brisbane.

Jerome and I are going to go travelling around together. We'll stay here either until Wednesday or for an extra week, depends on how much money we earn. Then we're going to go up the east coast, see all the beaches. At the moment I think we're going to rent a camper van and use that, it works out to something like 40 dollars a day for transportation plus accommodation, so it's not a bad deal. Gas prices are soaring though, so once we get it, our money reserves are going to start vanishing.

I'm not sure if Jerome will come with me into Asia... we'll see. He's planning on returning to Belgium to get some work experience so he can apply for permanent residency here in Australia. He wants to live here. Well, I just want to keep travelling, and I definitely want to use this Indian Tourist Visa after all the pain and expense I went through to get the damned thing.

Well, that's about it from me. The sunsets and sunrises are stunningly beautiful, and the sky is so open and wide here... you can see for miles. I've seen so much and met so many amazing people, I've met more people in these couple of weeks planting than I have done the rest of the time combined. I'm still the youngest person out here, but most people think I'm 23/24, so that's ok.

Finally for now, my confidence has exploded it's so high. Living by myself, looking after myself, all this way away from home? It's really made me stronger... any of you who think you wish you were out here... really, come out here, see the world, because words and pictures are cheap imitations of the real thing.

Hope everyone is well, have a super fantastic day (to quote our old friend Patty),

Andy