G’day All,
It has been a while, but I thought I would write my final week of ridesharing, Expedia travel agent work, and food delivery.
Monday
My Monday started with four nails in one of my tyres. It obviously didn’t start well and made me think about my opportunities in Australia even more so. My tyres were under warranty, which was good and I didn’t have to pay a red cent for them to be fixed. It just cost me hours of me actually working. The customer service industry can be brutal when well crap happens.
Tuesday
After Monday I worked my butt off to get as many food orders as possible in a short amount of time. I was making up for Monday. Then I got an email from one of the directors at Austral Archaeology saying that I was basically too expensive. I ended up taking the Melbourne job with Urban Colours. The director was a lady I had met in 2013 when I worked at Australian Cultural Heritage Management. She was with the Wirundjeri community and helped with the Mt William greenstone quarry handover. I obviously consulted all my family and they all said it was the best option, rather than doing food and passenger deliveries. Yes I’m an archaeologist and I was getting impatient with SRI and other companies handing me work. It was slim pickings in the USA and it was due to a mismanaged government without any consideration for the long term effects. Thousands of people were dying and all you could hear is a man blaming others for the pandemic. Cool we get it. China may have stuffed up royally or it was made to happen, the fact it is you the president hadn’t done jack. Meanwhile people would hear about the funding of vaccines from Germany and other countries, yet the USA hadn’t moved quick enough. It was frustrating. Meanwhile riots and protests were on the rise in a pandemic, people were divided and the aggression was on the rise. BLM, antifa, proud boys, and other groups were wreaking havoc across the nation. Me as an Australian watched and thought what the bloody hell is going on?? Confusion, aggression, and sadness overwhelmed me. It made Australia look like a beacon of light in the darkness. Do you leave your American family to double your savings and hope they will be safe or stay and ride out the storm? Was I a coward? Was I an idiot? That was remained to be seen.
Wednesday.
Melbourne bound. After a serious discussions with my other half. Melbourne was the winner in this storm. How could I not say no the money and the opportunity to work in potentially Australia’s oldest archaeology site? Plus see my family downunder. Meanwhile I had several orders for Thai food and noticed that there were numerous deer in town. Maybe because there were less people on the streets? I had never seen so many deer in one place before, besides the deer park in Armidale. This was wild, it is almost like the pandemic gave the wildlife an opportunity to bounce back. People were staying home and wanting food. I was the provider.
Thursday
I delivered food to a Grizzly machine and wood cutting business. This place was fascinating, machines I had never seen before. From automatic cutting implements to table saws that were bigger than Ben Hurr. I waited for the staff members to come, so they could collect their food. Took a bloody age. Next order said it was for a secret Santa. I thought no, it’s too early in the year for that. Wasn’t even July, for Xmas in July. It was a business at the port, and they had just forgotten to update their system.
Friday
Friday was a busy day of delivering food, however it was soured by a rude cyclist. They got upset at me for some reason, I honestly couldn’t take them seriously due to the over zealous lycra. I don’t recall cutting them off or anything. I may have. Oh well. That same day I used zoom whilst driving to listen in on the Expedia Cruise team meeting. I had finished the bulk of my training and was literally about to throw that down the dunny to go back to Australia. Yes it wasn’t the best thing to sign up for in a pandemic, but when I signed up nobody knew what was going to happen. Zombies? Maybe? Who the heck knows? I had to tell them of my decision and be done with it. It wasn’t a total waste of time though I learned a lot about customer service and navigating specific systems. That same day I almost got into an accident and reaffirmed my decision.
Saturday
My old mate from Singapore needed an uber ride to the airport. I was happy to oblige and as a gift he gave me several items for my flight to Melbourne including hand sanitizer, masks and a moon cake. He was off to California and was going to miss me. We chatted for a long time, but he understood my passion for archaeology and that I shouldn’t do anything else.
Next up my time in quarantine.
