Innisfail: Banana Farming!

Working Hostel (Grey Building)

We were pretty apprehensive on our way to Innisfail where we had potentially found work on banana farms. We had heard tons of horror stories about farm work and working hostels so had no idea what to expect. We had been told that if we came Friday (Oct. 29th) we should be able to start work for Monday so were excited and arrived in late afternoon. We were happy to find that Innisfail was a reasonably big town, only about 8,000 people but had grocery stores, a Kmart, Target and even McDonald's and KFC. Walking up to the hostel was a different story - it resembled more of a homeless shelter than somewhere we should be staying.

Graham, Meg & Fred

The hostel was a two-storey scary grey building on the edge of town with a caged area out front that we found out later was the designated party/hang out area (nicknamed the cage). :) We checked in and found our 10-bed dorm room which was crazy dirty and the beds were more like dirty hammocks but we laughed it off and went to explore the town. After walking around a bit, we went out for Chinese food at a cheap eatery and picked up some beer at the drive-through beer store beside the hostel. We knew we would be at the hostel for at least a week so decided to get to know everyone that night and it turned out to be great fun. A lot of the people had been at the hostel for quite a while, many because they were getting their second year work visas (you have to do like three months farm work to extend a one year visa to two years) and some just because they didn't want to leave! :)

Dev and Glenn

We played drinking games and got to know everyone and found out they were having a Halloween party the next day so we were super excited, I had thought we would be missing dressing up! :) Also, that night we met two more Canadians from Vancouver who had been at the hostel for a month and a half. One of the Canadians, Graham had a three person room and the couple had just moved out of the double bed, so he suggested we become roomies, so we made arrangements to move the next day. Way better, this room had a decent bed, a TV, and a bar fridge. :)

Waterfalls

The next day we got up early to go buy some work clothes and groceries before a couple of the work vans picked up like thirty people to take us all to some really beautiful waterfalls near Innisfail. We spent the day swimming in the rock pools and sliding down a natural rock waterslide and just hanging out, then we headed back to the hostel to make dinner and put our costumes on! Australia is not really big into Halloween and there was a really limited selection so Dev and I, as well as a few others at the party showed up with Christmas gear, I was a tree and Dev was Santa. Pretty lame I know, but the best we could do. The best costume of the night went to the strange little gay guy at the hostel who dressed up as Queen Ratsy, with a rat tail and crown and stuff. Very strange, but hilarious. There was also a Flava Flav, another rapper and two pirates.



Halloween Party!



A lot of people chipped in to make an alcholic punch but we had just bought a case of beer so we opted out and boy were we happy with that decision! :) The punch consisted of approximately six different kinds of booze (arbitrarily picked) and about two boxes of juice. There were so many hands in and out of it and some of the glow sticks they put in it leaked! :) It was a great party though, Glenn (one of the pirates became buds with Dev) made a bunch of us drink the remainder of a bottle of tequila which put him out for the night :) and we took some great group photos! :) The next day we slept in, did laundry and generally dreaded the next day at work (but were happy that we were both on the work list, there were about eight on the waiting list). :)

The boys are generally given physically harder jobs than the girls and because of Dev's size, he was given one of the hardest jobs (they mistakingly judged my chubbiness and girth as muscle and braun - mistake!). He was assigned to a larger banana farm (actually the second largest in Australia) which is more like a factory with an assembly line where everyone has a small, repetiitve task to do all day. He was a Hanger which means he took the banana bunchs off the trailer after they were brought in and lifted them and attached them to the hydralic conveyer to take to the next step. We didn't know this until we arrived, but bananas come in bunches of like 150 bananas that weigh between 50 to 80 kilos!! I think that's probably the hardest he's ever worked in his life!! :)



Meg's Crazy Rash

 I was assigned to a much smaller farm where we generally rotated responsibilities. For the first two and a half days, I walked up and down the banana paddock rows with a tractor which stopped every hundred metres or so. As two guys cut down banana bunches, me and another guy would untie the bags and wash them, then as he cut them into smaller bunches I had to stack them into the trailers. It really wasn't so bad, except that because of the spraying, I was soaking wet and filthy (banana sap is super sticky and only came off after putting diesel fuel on it!). I got some pretty terrible rashes on my legs and bruises where I had to lean over the trailer and it was pretty exhausting but overall was okay. So when I came home the first day and saw what terrible shape Dev was in, I felt pretty bad although it was pretty funny too. :) He could barely move without his back or his legs cramping, his toes kept pointing all different directions! but after a back and foot rub, we had him moving around again and we made sure to get him chocolate milk and a good dinner.

Dev's Hands - Ewww :)

We were super dreading the next day, but by the second day our bodies were already becoming used to the work so it wasn't so bad. Devin's hands had become crazy blistered on the second day (I literally worked them to the bone!) My hands were so blistered that I couldn't finish the third day and went home around noon (although I got paid for the whole day - whoa!) I figured this was for the best as I spent much of my time at work thinking of ways that I could injure myself seriously enough to go home, but not serious enough that it would hurt long term (my best idea was a broken finger in the conveyor belt - glad it didn't come to that). When Meg got home on Wednesday, she was also pretty exhausted and grumpy. After finishing gathering bananas, she had been enlisted to help pull out all the old irrigation and leftover bags out of an old banana paddock they were tearing down. She worked all day in the rain and was so dirty. The worst part was pulling leftover bags off the rotting banana bunches, she had so much rotton banana all over her and in her boots! and twice rats crawled out of the bags!!! So when Dev suggested we finish off the week and then escape to Asia, I agreed :) He stayed home the next day because of his hands and I got an easy job labeling and putting lids on paw paws (or papayas) and then we gave the bad news to our new roomie and caught the bus on Friday morning!

We had had a great time and made almost $1000 in a total of six and a half working days but we worked it out and would only clear about $200 a week after all expenses so decided it wasn't worth it, although we missed it a bit after we left! :) Funny, we decided that week had been one of the highlights of the trip! :)