Jobs I did in New Zealand

Of all the odd jobs I did while I was in New Zealand for working holiday. 

Part 1 ~ Here you go ;)

The view from our mussel factory's smoko room facing Port of Havelock
NZ's term of smoko which means smoking/ coffee break.
Havelock is a town so small where it has more sheep than the local residents (according to wikipedia there's only 500 people living in the town)

This is the first job I did and its interesting how we managed to secure this job. We were just having a break en route to Blenheim at the local petrol kiosk and happened to talk to a local mechanic working there. He asked us what are we doing and we told him that we are looking for jobs. He told us to try our luck at the nearby mussel factory and off we went. Voila we got that job of course with our impressive resume consisting of auditor, HR, piano teacher, bank admin for a factory job LOL.

Okay...don't laugh when you see this picture!
Haha this is basically our work outfit in the factory - gumboots, white top and pants, apron, earphones with built in radio to protect our ears from the noise of the machines and this i dont know what you call thing that we have to wear to cover our hair.
It's freaking cold in the the grading room and i always wear like at least 3 layers of clothes

Benefit of working there is that we get to buy cheap mussel from the factory at 1.70 NZD per kg.
In this pic, I was cooking seafood porridge. We can have mussel buffet every week. We were doing the night shift from 4.30pm till 2am. Another of my friend and I took up extra part time as well working as the cleaning team for the morning shift staff. We have to clean the machines in the factory everyday and oh boy my friend and I were given the harder task (hello we're petite Asian girls) whereby we have to move the stainless steal part of the machine - cleanse with water, rinse with detergent, scrub every inch of the machines, rinse with water again and sanitizer and put back the stainless steal part. Crazy work where I got my muscles from this mussel factory ;D

One of my best friend/ colleague. Marion from France
Behind is the locker where we put our belongings during work. The factory has strict regulations which we had to follow.

Traveled for 2 weeks down to West Coast, Southland and Otago.

Settled down at a lil' town called Roxburgh in Central Otago and started hunting for jobs.

Did one day of raspberry picking in a small orchard. That was my first time trying out an outdoor job.
The raspberry trees were almost the same height as us human and we sometimes had to squad up and down to pick the berries hidden below. After the whole day of picking my knees were aching like crazy *ahem sign of ageing probably ;p

Few days later we got a job in a pack house packing mainly apricots and some nectarines and plums. There were this sign in the pack house saying no eating in the working area but after some time of working everyone started to just take the nice fruits to eat while doing our work half way. *wtf who can stand the temptations of all these yummeh fruits especially when they are right in front of you.....gulp.

Apricots going into the grading belt according to their size.

Different sizes of apricots will then be sent to its own belt

From there, we will pack the fruits into the overseas, local and jam bins.
Fruits are then kept in the fridge and will then reach overseas in 3 days time.

Packing the mini ones which will be sold in the local supermarket.

Work in the pack house for 1 month+, quit the job and me and Chris went to travel again, doing the Southern Scenic Route, Dunedin and Oamaru.
Had the time of our life during this trip.....every place is so beautiful and special in its own way.

We initially planned to head back up to the Northern part of the South Island for apple packing job. Unfortunately, because of some certain reason we had to cancel the plan and came back to Roxburgh.

Here, we got a new job in another pack house packing nectarines and apricots as well. Since the fruits season are reaching its end, we were asked to wash the crates which they use to put the fruits in. I think i've washed over hundred of it in the outdoor no matter rain or shine. The weather was crazy. It can be so cold in the morning and sometimes in the afternoon when the sun is out it gets crazily burning hot or even rain.

During the weekend, we went to the orchard for picking, this time around we picked green cages and plums. We were enjoying ourselves eating the fruits there rather then working hard to pick more because we don't get any GREEN CAGES back at home.

I think i'm good at climbing wtf ;p

Monkey in action ;>

Green cages and plums that we picked!

Ohai, i is plum picker =}

Got tired of washing the crates in the packhouse partly because my hands were aching and so we quit to travel again for another 4 days.

My Favourite Cafe in Chiang Mai ~ The Coffee Bull

After visiting Chiang Rai I went back to Chiang Mai. Mariko, my japanese friend joined me there a day later. One thing that we share in common is that we both love coffee. Every morning, we'll walk around the city and hunt for a cup of coffee.

The Coffee Bull is one of the place I found that serve really GOOD and CHEAP coffee as compared to the rest of the cafe in Chiang Mai. Another extra point is that they have free WIFI.

It is located at the old city of Chiang Mai at Ratchadamneon Road if not mistaken which is very close to the famous Wat Chedi Luang.

Thumbs up for the service there and super friendly staff. The next morning, we went back there hoping to get our coffee fix only the found out that it's closed for that day. Ahhh...

The outlook of The Coffee Bull

 We were asked to leave some comment on the book

Some vintage collection inside the shop

 

Its a small cafe where there's only like 3-4 tables there

The bar

Our table facing the road. 

My Thai Iced Coffee (25 baht = RM2.50) which is probably one of the best that I've ever tasted. 

 With Mariko, my travel partner for a week. Had a hard time communicating with her at the beginning because she speaks limited English and I can't really speak Japanese but we both got used to it eventually. We used some hand signals, translator on my Ipod and also guessing what each others is trying to say! LOL

 Cheers !

 

Spent the afternoon there watching the hustle and bustle of the town ;)

 

I Kid You Not, Niagara Falls in Catlins, New Zealand

Reallyyyyyyy??!!!!! There's another Niagara Falls in NZ?

 You've got punk'd dude! Biggest travel joke in Catlins, New Zealand.

Just for laugh =)

Settling Down

Its been almost 2 years since I started traveling around first with a group of friends for working holiday in New Zealand and later on solo backpacking in SEA countries.

I've experienced so much of interesting things throughout my journey and get to see things that I once only saw it on the television such as Cambodia's Angkor Wat, China's Terra-cotta warriors, so on and stuff. It was a dream came true.

I am really glad that I picked up the guts to pursue something that I really want when I'm still young. It is not a common practice among Asians and especially for a girl to travel alone and what not backpacking alone. I graduated much earlier than most of my friends because I attended university straight after I graduated from high school. Worked for 1.5 years and left for traveling. So while most of my friends are finishing their degree, I've already experienced the reality of working life and later on traveling.

This was the best decision ever that I've learned so much and so to say that I am different now from the way I see the perspective of life. I worked more than 7 different jobs throughout the 2 years that I'm glad to say well its just another job so take it easy and make the best out of it.

So finally after 2 years it suddenly hit me that I'm a tired of traveling. Sometimes the loneliness kicks in when you are backpacking alone. There is times that you don't even feel like socializing with the dorm mates. I decided to take a travel break and get settled down for some time. I have chosen a new city, a place I'm not sure that whether or not I will like it but I will try to make the best out of it. No more weeks of holidays, probably just short getaways, save some money and see how things go.

Hint* This will be the city that I will be for 2 years at least...easy guess ain't it? ;)