Fruit Picking Work

The Truth About Fruit Picking Work

Written by Steven Hermans for Startbackpacking.com

Fruit picking is a common source of work for travelers in Australia as a way of making money outside of the regular backpacker jobs in the city such as bar tending, waiting tables and construction.

As it is also one of the easiest jobs to get, most working holidaymakers in Australia will end up doing fruit picking work sooner or later. I have picked fruit in different parts of Australia, from the hot south to the even hotter north. I landed my first job in the little town of Berri in South Australia, a three hour bus ride from Adelaide. It is located in a farming region well known for grapes, citrus fruits and stone fruits. I headed down there without a job or a lead. I was hoping there would be plenty of fruit pickers needed since it was the beginning of December and oranges, apricots and nectarines were coming into season.

A good source of information was the Harvest Trail website (http://jobsearch.gov.au/harvesttrail)  run by the Australian government. It lists job openings and tells you which fruits are in season, when and where. Upon arrival, I checked into the only youth hostel in the small town.  It was geared completely towards working travelers: everyone staying there was working in the fields surrounding the town.

Simply put, the farmers knew who to call if they needed someone. Since people were coming and going all the time, I got a job the day I arrived.

Good Experience

The next day I started my fruit picking work together with six other people of different nationalities: French, Danish, English, Korean and German. Place of business was a medium-sized farm growing nectarines and apricots, a half hour drive out of town. We got up at 5 am, picking started at 6. As far as the eye could see nectarine trees spread out before us. We went straight to work picking nectarines in the dewy orchard.

It was important to make an early start because things started to heat up quickly. By the time it was 9 o’clock the temperature had already gone over 30 degrees Celsius and sweat was pouring down our necks. Protecting ourselves from hazardous UV-rays became a prime concern: a hat, sunglasses, a long-sleeved shirt, a jumbo-sized bottle of water and small rivers of factor 30 sunscreen all proved indispensable. Since the farmer only wanted us to pick the best fruits we were paid hourly instead of per bin, which is more usual.

Fruit Picking Money:

We earned 15 dollars per hour, not bad for a fruit picking job. Usually around 2 pm it became too hot to work and we went back to the hostel, where we would hang around the pool, drink beer and play the didgeridoo, have a game of football or play volleyball. The hostel was a great place to relax and forget about work and Saturday nights became legendary.

After three months of hard work, cheap living, late nights and early rises, I had saved up enough money to continue traveling and with a sense of regret I left Berri. I had worked a strenuous, boring job for months but at the same time had made many friends from all over the world and had a lot of fun.

Later that year I did fruit picking work in Queensland, further north, in an equally small town a few hours east of Brisbane. This time the mission was apples, on a huge farm with about 35 of us working there. It was a lot harder to earn money since the pay was per bin.

We got 25 dollars per bin and at first, it took me more than two and a half hours to fill up one. My neck and back were hurting from the heavy picking bag and it was difficult to be fast, because the trees were big and no apples could be left hanging. At this rate, I figured it would be extremely hard to make any money.

After two weeks, the initial fatigue wore off and I started to fill more bins. Still, after paying the hostel each week I felt I should have earned more for that amount of work. I didn’t like the accommodation either. There was no community amongst the backpackers and the owner was a tyrant. Disappointed after my previous experience I decided to move on as soon as I could afford to. Since then I had other picking jobs in different places in Australia.

In Conclusion:

Sometimes fruit picking was easy and you could earn lots of money quickly, at other times it was the exact opposite. The friendship of fellow workers always proved to be very important, as you are living in a rural town where nothing ever happens except for the occasional rodeo. Picking fruit is not a cushy job, but it is a good way of saving up money (as there is nothing to spend it on except food and drinks) and seeing a side of the country you would never see as a tourist.

You do get to eat a lot of fresh fruit!

Meet the Author:

As a therapy for shyness, Steven left his native Belgium and traveled in Europe, Asia and the Pacific. As a therapy for his travel addiction, he is now trying to work and study in Brussels.

Teaching English Abroad

Why think about teaching English?

Teaching English Abroad

A true account writter for Startbackpacking.com by Tyrel Nelson

“Teacher, what does cliff mean,” Marcelo asked from his desk.

Shaking my head in disbelief, I slowly approached the lanky, boyish-looking Ecuadorian.

“Marcelo”, I said, “It’s the VOCABULARY section of the test. I can’t tell you that.”

Disappointed, the dark-featured teenager frowned, took his eyes off me and refocused them on the unmarked page in front of him.

Given that Marcelo’s question was about the twentieth time in twenty minutes that one of my eight Intermediate English students asked me for an answer on their midterm exam, I was about to lose it. Flustered, I swiftly returned to my seat at the front of the classroom and resumed checking my pupils’ homework.

Suddenly, I could feel something calling my attention from the other side of the room. I quickly glanced up to make eye contact with Ana Elisa, the brunette girl who I had just yelled at for leaning out of the window as I was distributing the midterms. The tiny Ecuadorian, however, didn’t have an annoying question nor was she causing trouble. Rather inexplicably, she was simply waving at me while sporting one of the biggest grins I had ever seen. Apparently, Ana Elisa just wanted to say “hi”…during the middle of an exam.

Unable to contain myself, I burst out in laughter. Although she had angered me earlier, Ana Elisa’s silliness put a much needed smile on my face.

In fact, the aforementioned story is a microcosm of how teaching ESL has been for me during the last eight months. My patience often gets tested, but at the same time, my students also bring me a lot of joy.

Several months ago, I was searching for my next step in life. My second year of AmeriCorps was nearing its end and I sill hadn’t figured out what I wanted to do after my days with Twins Cities Habitat for Humanity. Nevertheless, I did know a few important things about myself that helped point me in somewhat of a direction: I loved to travel, really enjoyed speaking Spanish, and wanted to remain in a leadership role. And so, after several late nights of Internet research, I decided to apply to LanguageCorps, a program that sends its members abroad to not only get TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) / TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) certified, but to live and work abroad as well.

Soon after I submitted my thorough, on-line application (http://www.languagecorps.com/apply.php), I was interviewed over the phone, and subsequently accepted into LanguageCorps’ Flagship Program in Ecuador. Therefore, I spent my last month in Minnesota finishing AmeriCorps, working and saving money, as well as packing for my mid-September departure for Quito.

On the night of Saturday, September 15, 2007, my American Airlines plane touched down in Ecuador’s capital city. After grabbing my two massive suitcases, I was greeted by Andy Gavilanes, my Corps Advocate (LanguageCorps’ on-site assistant who helps program members with housing, job searches, and any other issues that may arise during their time overseas), as well as Marcio and Rita Hernández, my Quiteño host parents (strongly in favor of intercultural exchange, LanguageCorps also arranges home stays for the duration of its teachers’ TESOL course).

The following Monday, my eleven classmates and I found ourselves standing at the Ecuadorian Experiment in International Living, nervously awaiting the start of our SIT or School for International Training (http://www.worldlearning.org) TESOL Certificate course. With a week of Spanish lessons (SIT purposely includes a week of language classes prior to the certification course so that its prospective teachers gain the experience of a student learning a foreign tongue) under our belts, Andrew, Gillian, Jannan, Liz, Matt, Margo, Nick, Nicole, Rachel, Rozana, Seth, and I were then consumed by a 130-hour, sleep-depriving course that constantly challenged us throughout four extremely intense weeks. In spite of the fact that the TESOL course was very hard, it was worth every difficult second nonetheless.

Our facilitators, were not only very accommodating, but also superb instructors. Through their wide variety of role-play activities, classroom exercises, and written assignments, Justin and Elías taught the dozen of us many different aspects of effective English teaching. More importantly, they observed each one of us practice teach in front of Ecuadorian students for a total of six hours. They also provided my peers and me with crucial feedback after each lesson.

Looking back at the beginning of my TESOL certification course, I was scared and had absolutely no clue about teaching English abroad. When the course ended, however, I felt confident and prepared to demonstrate the new skills I had acquired. There’s no doubt that I was grateful for my SIT TESOL experience, especially since it helped me land a job almost immediately.

Even though nine out of us twelve opted to stay and work in Quito, I was one of the three people from my TESOL group that chose to teach in another town. In truth, I had heard great things about Cuenca (a tranquil, historical city in the southern part of Ecuador) and, furthermore, asked my Corps Advocate, Andy Gavilanes, to put me in touch with the Centros de Estudios Interamericanos (CEDEI); a school at which I once pondered studying abroad during my undergraduate days.

Hearing from Andy that I had my TESOL certification, CEDEI’s English Department Director promptly asked for a phone interview with me. At the first opportunity I, therefore, called her and subsequently completed an online application as well as a Language Awareness Test, which she later e-mailed to me.

Within a week of receiving my certificate to teach English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), I was offered a job with the Centros de Estudios Interamericanos (Centers for Interamerican Studies). As a result, I sadly said goodbye to my TESOL course friends as well as my host family, and instantly flew to colonial Cuenca, the capital of the Azuay province, which is nestled in Ecuador’s Southern Sierra Andes.

Ever since my early arrival on that late-October morn, I have worked for CEDEI in a number of different capacities. First, I started out administering placement exams, which are oral and written evaluations needed to place prospective students in appropriate courses based on their language levels. Next, I taught a pair of intensive (Monday though Friday, two hours per class for five weeks) English courses and led a handful of Advanced Conversation Clubs (two hours every Saturday morning during a regular, ten-week cycle). Now, I am in the heart of my third cycle with CEDEI, teaching one intermediate and two advanced English courses successively (Monday through Thursday, an hour and fifteen minutes per class for ten weeks).

I’ll admit it; I often find my job frustrating. It’s really hard putting up with lazy, misbehaving students at times. In addition, teaching is exhausting. I probably spend just as much time working OUTSIDE of the classroom, either lesson planning or correcting papers, quizzes, and tests-which I don’t get paid for. And the money I do earn isn’t anything to brag about.

On the other hand, the incomparable enthusiasm and drive of several of my students make teaching very rewarding and fun. By the same token, my pupils not only learn from me, but I also pick up things from them. Their different personalities and learning styles have certainly taught me how to be a more versatile educator. It’s been an incredibly valuable exchange.

As far as compensation goes, my monthly paychecks are enough to cover the rent and keep my belly full. I also get remunerated in other ways, such as visa support and I have the option to attend free Spanish as well as dance courses. Lastly, I have made some good friends (gringo & Latino) and live in one of the most beautiful places that I’ve ever seen; which also allows me to speak Spanish whenever I want. For all of these reasons, I can’t complain too much. The pros definitely outweigh the cons.

With that said, however, there’s yet another explanation as to why I am still working for the Centros de Estudios Interamericanos.

My father once told me that “you can build all the buildings and donate all the money you want, but the only way to truly change the world is through people.”

And so, whenever I get down and begin questioning my desire to continue with my current occupation, I just think about what my dad said. His words always remind me to give my learners everything I have.

You can greatly increase your chances of teaching English abroad by getting your TEFL certification in advance.

Meet the author:

Tyrel Nelson graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2003 with a B.A. in Journalism and Spanish Studies. He spent 2 years working with Habitat for Humanity and is now currently teaching English abroad in Ecuador.

Hostel Working

Hostel Working

Written for Startbackpacking.com by James Esbester

Anyone who’s ever taken a long trip, especially an open ended one, will tell you that there comes a point when you just can’t face the thought of packing up your backpack and dragging it off to the train station, when the sight of one more pagoda or temple will make you scream, when you really don’t want to say goodbye to the friends you’ve just made. You’re not yet ready to go home, but you want to stay in one place for a little while.

There’s one major problem – the cost. You don’t want to feel like you’re just wasting time and money when you’ve worked so hard to come here. There’s always the possibility of English teaching, but that often requires a commitment of several months.

Hostel working is the solution

My solution is hostel working. This isn’t well paid, or even paid at all beyond room and board, but is rarely too demanding of your time. it gives your bank balance some room to breath and you the opportunity to relax a little and get to know a place in a lot more depth than you would simply by passing through; a chance to cultivate some real friendships instead of isolated encounters.

Hostel working usually isn’t too hard to come by, even if, like me, you only speak English. It’s often just a question of seeing something that needs doing about the place, some way in which you can help, and approaching whoever is in charge.

Recently, I have been working at Sim’s Cozy Guesthouse in Chengdu, China proofreading signs and tour documents. Though most of the staff spoke reasonable English, they had no native speakers working there and often the signs were confusing and needed some time to decipher. I suggested to Sim that I do this and he was happy to let me. Previously, I have also worked offering poi and juggling lessons, and as bar and reception staff.

Choosing the right place for hostel working is (obviously) quite important. I have always tried to go for smaller, more personal places. They are much more pleasant places to stay, for one thing, and usually the owners, taking an active interest in creating a good environment for travelers, are in a position where they have no time off.

Having someone help out, even for just a couple of weeks, gives them a little time to themselves, something they’re usually more than grateful for. A few years back, I was working at the Juggler’s Rest in Picton, New Zealand, and all I really ever did was show people around the place in the evening, then sit and talk with them – something I would probably be doing anyway. This gave the owner a chance to go to the pub and see his friends, something he hadn’t been able to do in months. Having stayed a few days and got to know him before I asked about the job helped enormously.

It may not be the best paid work, and you may end up dreading he question ‘So, how long have you been here for?’, but hostel working is a great way to take a short break from traveling and still be in contact with other travelers, and to have the time to get to know a place in detail, or to learn much more about a foreign culture, without having to worry too much about the money.

Get some ideas and information about hostel jobs here.

Meet the author:

James has been living and hostel working in Chengdu, China for longer than he cares to admit, but it has allowed him time to travel the area extensively and even trek in Nepal.

Organic Farm Work

WWOOF: Organic Farm Work

Written for Startbackpacking.com by Steven Hermans

WWOOF stands for Willing Workers On Organic Farms. It is an international organization with branches all over the world set up to bring together farmers and people who wand to live and work on an organic farm.

I had heard of organic farm work through a friend of mine who had worked on an organic farm in Australia and I decided to try it out for myself on a recent trip to Bulgaria.

The idea is that you work for food and board (usually half a day, it depends on the arrangements you make with your host) and live with the family. There are different ways of getting in touch with farmers depending on the country you want to work in.

Many national organizations publish a book with all contacts for organic farm work that you receive when you become a member for a small fee.

I had already made arrangements with my organic farm hosts prior to coming to Bulgaria. It proved to be quite easy and quick to get in touch with them and agree on a date.

Linda and James were a British couple who decided to get out of the rat race and leave the fast-paced, consumerist society of England behind them, instead opting to start a small organic farm in a rural village in the heart of Bulgaria.

I was a bit nervous coming from the train at the run-down train station of Gorno Bote, seemingly abandoned by all but a limping dog and a cloud of mosquitoes.

Anxiety filled my body and brain. I didn’t know these people at all and suddenly I was going to live and do organic farm work with them 24/7. Was this going to work? It didn’t sound like a good idea, but my fears quickly withdrew when we met. Linda and James were very warm and welcoming from the start.

Their house was a beautiful old lime and earth building on the outskirts of town. We had a traditional Bulgarian meal that evening before we went to bed. There was a separate bedroom next to theirs that I had completely to myself. The next day we set to work.

An organic farm, even if it is a small one, always provides work. The beans and the tomatoes needed sticks to keep them upright, a new plant bed for sowing herbs had to be dug, the blueberries needed to be picked, and there was always weeding to be done… Even though we agreed I could take time off whenever I wanted, I ended up doing a lot more work than planned.

Not because they forced me to or because I felt morally obliged, but because I enjoyed it so much. Work and life intertwined here, it never felt to me like I was doing a job. We were always working together, so it was a good thing we got along so well. I realized it could have been completely different, but this was perfect.

The weekends I spent going to the nearby city or exploring the surrounding valleys. I was learning a great deal about living a sustainable life and organic farming. A couple of times I even went with some of our neighbors to help them out in the fields, turning the hay or milking their goats. I learned some Bulgarian and I made friends in the village.

I got to see what it was really like living in the countryside. I was not a tourist only there to admire the landscape and to witness the folklore. I was an actual part of the community.

People knew my name and asked me to come to the bar in the evening, or come to church with them on Sundays. I found my way into the local gossip circuit, which proved surprisingly exciting. More than anything else, it was this feeling of healthy, honest, simple living that made me stay in Gorno Bote two weeks longer than I had planned.

I found organic farm work to be a great alternative to ‘normal’ backpacking because it gives you the chance to really experience living in a rural setting, which is more difficult as an itinerant traveler. For a city person like myself it was ideal: I could live a green and healthy lifestyle and I could actually do something useful that didn’t involve a keyboard.

I sowed peppers, watched them sprout and eventually ate them; it felt like such an achievement to me. At the same time, I have to recognize that I was very lucky meeting two people who I got along with so well. It is a drawback that you are never sure if you will like your host. But it’s worth the risk.

For more information on supplementing your trip with organic farm work, visit http://www.wwoof.org

Discuss WWOOF experiences in the backpacking forums.