Proper update :)

Im sure your all hanging off the edges of your seats for a proper update well, here the best i can do for now...

Im currently in a town called Murchison, which is near to a place called Shepparton (which is where I am now on the internet)

Murchison is as close to country as you can get, nothing happens there EVER!!!! They have one shop 1 hair dresser, 1 pub, 1 laundret and 2 pay phones.....oh and a bridge so that you can access all of these wonderful convieneces!

Right I got to Murch on the 25th of Feb and met up with Ricardo (A German friend of Ciiran's from Sydney) her was staying in the motel and had done 1 days work so far, he introduced me to his boss (Stu, it happened to be his 50th birthday that day and we were all invited to the party) I parked up were they said there was still power (there had been a power cut....great I though!!!) Went over to the motel with Rick and met the other dude stayin stayin there James, he was from England, sound lad, funny as hell!! (once i found out her was into Anchorman all we did was quote lines from the movie allday) anyhoo we went over to the party and all I'll say is OMG (bible bashers isnt the word, they had a band on that every song was a hymn and in between every song they thanked god for god giving stu 50 years of wonderfull life on this planet of his....I cudnt beleieve my ears to be honest, I was expecting a rite old party, everyone was sitting around stunned!!!) He seemed nice enough (would later learn he's a rite hipercrit and out to make as much money off people as he can, so he doesnt have to lift a fat finger of his own, fat samoan!!!) Got up for and waited where we were asked to, Stu turned up 30mins later, we all got in one of his vans and went to the fields, stopping at the shops to buy sopme rubber gloves, was told i wud need them....got stuck a few times in the mud, we all got out and pushed the van through the sloppy mud shite and this other car out there, we finally got to the machine, they got it started and we pretty much got goin then, you sit on this little plastic seat next to a conveyor belt that takes the tomatoes up the top bin, but you have to either scrunch your legs up or keep side stepping every time the machines edges along (you go along at about no-miles an hour, so slow!!! but i kept asking everyday if i could drive and they let on day 3, i drove one length of the paddock...thats a field to you an me... and then i drove back up the other way, took about 5 odd hours and during the last 45 mins I fell asleep about 15 times and woke up to people either shouting "stop" "go" or "get us out of the bushes" hahahahahaha was so funny, it absolutely recked me, never drove again, out of personal choice)

To cut a long story shoirt I did 5 days of this toomato picking and i felt like dying, its possibly the worst job I ever done, and will ever have to do....I rather clean toilet with my bare hands than do that, every part of my body ached, my back felt fcuked from leanin down all day to pick "the best colour" thats all you ever heard, "pick the colour, then some green". As there was 10 of us working and we got 40 dollars a bin (a bin is half a ton of toms) that equates to 27 bins is 108 bucks and let me tell you picking 13.5 tons of toms is no easy task, and these people want to stay and pick 38, 40 bins!!! starting at 7am 27 bins wud take till 6pm'ish, you'd felt like a broken person...but it really hits home, cus some of these people do this for a living everyday, they cant have any education, prospects or common sense!!!! no-one shud work like that for shit pay like that!! and we were always bein told dnt put the storks in and small green ones....i'll speak on behalf of everyone on them machines that has sense, you just reach into the tom plant and ripping everythin u can off it, brqanches, storks...the lot, all your thinkin is 27 bins before dark!!!! nothing else, 1 break lunch and that was about 20mins, they all cudnt wait to get bk on the machine and get working again, i was gud for nothing but sleeping!!!!

Anyway, we got talking to some people 1 night in the supermarket and they gave us a number of were we cud get some work in a shed, packing or stacking toms, so we called it....no luck, but the guy called me back at 4am the next day and asked us to work, I said no, but told him i would be in the next day, and that i had to sort things out with my current boss. Through 1 thing and another we cudnt get into with stu to tell hime we wudnt be in work friday, and we went straight to the new job at "Vraca" just down the road in Murch.

We have been working there ever since, we get 11 bucks an hour, and we have pretty long day, some day we are there for 5am and dpont leave till 7pm, so even though the pay isnt great, you can work long hours which helps to bulk up the pay check, me and rick work on the same section (1st's) and other james worked on 2nd's (I say worked cus he's now left for Brisbane to meet up with his bird etc, so just me and Rick at work now, but we know everyone there, everyone says hi when they go past, we are pretty much vetrans of the 1st class section, we see alot of newbies comin and goingm we have to show them the ropes and keep them in line hahaha its funny :)

We work with some pretty interesting people, although Rick gets down about his missus alot!!! She is in Sydney and he's dyin to be with her, and misses her loads and although he dont say it, you can tell cus, some days he dnt eat loads, and he's tiered, but conincidently he hasnt heard from his bird either!!! So note to all you women out there who's boyfriends are working away from you, its not all fun and piss ups...think of the people they have to work with for christs sake!!!!

Um had a day off the other day, think i worked somet like 23 days staright, I cud have gone in...I mean I had to drop Rick off at 6 so i was up anyway. But Ciiran Ha dcome down on our say so that there was work here, and then my boss let me down, whilst he was on the bus on the way down here (im sure he did it to spite me cus it was raining....things with the tomato game, when it rains, no toms get picked, cus the machines get stuck in the bogs etc....hence boss being pissed at no shiney red toms rolling through the door, so think he did it just to make himself feel happy.

Stupid facts about were I work:
1 bin (half a ton remember) goes into the system ever 3 mins, so an average 12 hour shift means we process 240 bins which is 120 ton....(this is fresh tomato's not gas).

1 bin of gas tomatos can be processed at 1 per min, so we could do 60 in 1 hour.

Tomatos that are green, can be riped super fast by gasing them with ethalene, apparently they give of ethalene as they ripen, and it can be used to speed the whole process up.

The room were toms are gased is nick named the "hitler room".

1 bos of toms is sold for 60 bucks, we fit 96 on a pallet, 960buck per pallet, weight 960 kilos.

On average 1st's send out between 40 and 50 pallets per day.

ummmm cant think of anymore off the top of my head!!!!

Im gonna shoot, the boys are waitin in the charriot.

Speak to you soon you lot. Hope everyone is ok, anyone from oz who is readin this, cant wait to get bk to uk and got partyin!!!!

(the pic above is of me at around 7am out in the tomato fields in my boxers and rubber gloves hahaha and the other one is of the machine that u have to sit on to pick the toms, me and ric crashed out at afternoon smoko ans the last one is this cool tree outside!!)