March 18th, 2013 - Fremantle, WA, Australia
PERTH:
DAZED. NEED SLEEP. BLURRED. DIZZY.
DRY. INSTENSE SUN. EMPTY.
VISIBLE SKIN. (AND LOTS OF IT).
COLOURS. $$$. NO PEOPLE. HEADS DOWN.
WIDE EYED. JETLAG. HOMELESS.
MODERN. RICHES. CLEANLINESS. A/C. QUIET.
HELPLESS. COLD SHOULDER.
FRIENDLY. "MATE."
AUSTRALIA.
Some of these thoughts may seem commonplace to you all, but we were utterly overwhelmed. Upon arriving in Perth we gazed at the "normal" sights with sleep crusted eyes as big as saucers. We sat in the arrivals area of the airport for a while getting our bearings and then withdrew a whopping $600 from a nearby ATM, an amount that would last us very little time, and prepared to face the furnace.
We left the A/C of the airport and headed for the insanely expensive city bus stops. We floundered around for a while but eventually found out which one to take. Lugging our huge and unconveniently packed bags (we didn't have time to repack as we wanted to get to the city before sunset), we collapsed into the immaculately clean and foreign vehicle. The bus ride was uneventful save for a meeting with an American traveler who somehow managed to tell us SO MUCH, and SO LOUDLY about how much he knew about Australia while not actually answering any of our pressing (and somewhat desperate) questions. We wanted to know where to go and what to do and how to survive. Instead, we got the stereotypical loud-mouthed American show-off. We stopped asking him questions when we realized that we were getting nothing out of it. But we must remember to love our Yanky neighbours despite their often apparent social ineptitudes. We thought it would be better to just roll with it.
And roll we did! We also took out many rolls of bills, and spent them. We made it to Fremantle, the hippy arts and culture suburb, and started looking for rooms. It wasn't easy. Most of the five or so backpacker hostels were full, but we finally found one. They were pretty much full too, but somehow they made room for us. We were so exhasuted by this point and only wanted a room to ourselves to collapse and sleep for a day or two. Unfortuantely, we were split up into separate dorm rooms. Grateful at least for a place to sleep, we ditched our bags and paid 28$ each (!!!!!) for the beds.
We sat in the "quiet area" and talked for a bit before bed, trying to get our bearings. The rest of the hostel was basically a gigantic house party 24/7, and as we talked doors would slam, half naked people would run by double fisting strong Aussie beers, cheering would erupt, and the music pounded. It was not an ideal situation, but at least we had a room. We said goodnight and sadly parted ways.
The next week was really hard. We learned to cook again though, which was a fun experience! We had been seven months away from any kind of kitchen in India, but luckily the useful skill came back fairly easily, with some exception. With our small purse we came up with some interesting dishes: for example, fried onions on toast. That one was a winner...
We stayed in Fremantle for a few more nights. All of the travelers at the hostel were really nice but they were all rich and didn't really understand how urgent it was for us to get work. They all said that the best way to get a job was to party all day and night at the hostel and talk to people and ask them about jobs. It made sense, but getting wasted was the last thing on our minds! And we were so overstimulated by even hiding out in the quiet room that entering the party seemed like too much. We met some nice people of course, but the whole situation wasn't working out for us. Sitting out in a park late one night we decided that it was time to leave Fremantle. We were spending all of our money on this terrible room, the jobs looked doubtful, and we needed change. We made up our minds feeling like homeless people in the middle of the night and the next morning we left for Northbridge, an area in downtown Perth City.
Our time there wasn't much better, but we managed to get a decent room for only a few dollars more than the sketchy dorm situation in Freo (abbreviated Fremantle) which was nice. (Keep in mind that "only a few dollars more" amounts to a whopping $65 a night for a dingy cave!) We also met some more cool people who gave us some leads on jobs. We spent around another week in limbo. Our daily schedule was to wake up early, eat, and then hit the pavement looking for jobs for several hours. Then we'd come home late and eat a small dinner before heading to bed feeling drained and alone in the world. This got super tiring after a few days straight. But we kept our morales up and tirelessly worked at it, knowing that something would eventually present itself at the right moment. We did start eating considerably better too, as this new hostel had an amazing thing. A "free fridge!" There wasn't much, but every day there seemed to be new goodies that were exactly what we needed to stretch our cash and keep our bodies reasonably happy.
Then one morning we had an idea. We could do dreadlocks! We posted an ad on Gumtree (Australia and the UK and other countries' less shady version of Craigslist) and made a cardboard sign advertising our services as "The Rasta Masta." Within 24 hours we had a client. Woo hoo! With the money in our wallet almost gone, this was amazing. Suddenly we were self-employed and had a means of supporting ourselves. We took the train to our first customer's house and not only did we make some kick ass dreads, but we also made a couple of friends. Our client also told his friend about his new hair and got us another client within a day or two. Things were looking up! The traditional jobs that we were hunting for still hadn't been snared, but at least we had some income to bide our time.
Then one day we did some calculations and realized how much we were spending on our room compared to renting. We realized that for the same price we were paying for our terrible, dirty, tiny room, we could be renting an entire luxury apartement ON THE BEACH in a prime location. $65 a night amounted to $455 a WEEK and $1820 a month!!!!!!! Do you have ANY IDEA how expensive this is?!? I'm sure you do. We decided yet again that it was time to go! Everything lined up perfectly. We spent hours and days at the free wifi park down the road on Gumtree looking for places to rent, calling people, booking viewings, and viewing places, and finally we found a place. We decided we wanted to move back to Fremantle because Northbridge (where our hostel was, just north of central Perth) was a gnarly party town and on weekend nights the streets became the belly of hell. Drunk people yelling and stumbling everywhere, beer and cigarettes filling the air. But we managed to make some good money busking outside of bars! Haha! Drunk guys want to impress the ladies by generously tipping.
Anyway. We found a place! What a relief! It worked out amazingly. Our first dread customer had a friend out of town who wanted his hair done too, so he drove us a few hours out of the city to his farm and we did an epic 11 hour job on his golden locks, spent the night at his place (we checked out of our hostel and brought all of our stuff), and then got driven straight to our new house the next morning. It was fantastic! He also tipped us super generously for the hair-do, so we were thankfully in the clear again for another week or so.
HOME! You have no idea how grateful we were to have a place to ourselves after almost two weeks of uncertainty and essentially poverty. It felt like FOREVER. We were SO happy. Suddenly we had our own space where we could build up an energy and get our thoughts working even more to our advantage. We realized that having a positive space to be in to ourselves is so important to our sanity. Some people can thrive in the middle of a house party and sleep on a different couch every night, but that's not for us. Yeah, we can do it, and we did it, but we focused INTENSELY to get out of there in such a short time. I can tell you honestly that during those first few weeks, the thought that took up 90% of my brain was, "I want security, privacy, a routine, and enough income to feel safe." And for those of you who know me, you know that I usually like a bit more adventure in my life! But all I wanted was a simple 9-5 job and a place to call home. We got the home, and my dream changed soon after, but man were we grateful for our own space. The freedom!
Another thing we learned is how easy it is to survive while spending almost no money, and how if you're resourceful and fearless, you can make cash pretty easily. With dreads and busking, we survived for those first three weeks without ever having to go back to the ATM, which was good because there wasn't much in it to withdraw! It's reassuring knowing that even if we did end up nearly homeless, we could make do and get out of it relatively quickly. And now that we've got some street cred, I'm sure that we won't be in a situation any more difficult than what we've tackled before. It's sad thinking of all of the people in these developed countries who are so afraid to give up some of their material comforts that they would rather rack up their credit card bills and keep what they've got. Take away all of their "things" and put them on the streets for a week or two and they would learn really quickly how to survive. There is really no reason for anyone to go into debt besides their own fear of giving things up. At the end of this lifetime you're forced to give EVERYTHING up. May as well learn how to live without all of it now.
Things are obviously quite different at this point! We've been here a month and a half, and we are loving it! We're still in the same house, which is perfect. We live with a super nice lady who is really similar to us (vegetarian, musical, artist, etc). Her kids are there half the time and the other half with their dad, and we all get along great. The house is a five minute bike ride to the beach, and Nadja (our housemate) gave us bikes for FREE, so we're free to roam! We're a ten minute ride from downtown Freo. Funnily enough, we both got jobs in Perth City! So when we work we cycle to the train station and take the railway downtown, which we both actually quite enjoy. It's nice because you can't rush, it's nice and cool, and it's a great time to write and listen to talks and music every day. Marina is working at a fancy coffee shop as a barista (they're all super fancy in Australia) and I'm working at an outdoor store. Wages are double Canada's (that means the minimum wage is $20 an hour!!!) so the money situation isn't a problem any more. Perth is the most expensive city in Australia, so we're breaking ourselves in the hard way so the rest of our time will be a breeze! Rent is high ($210/week for us, but that's super reasonable for Perth) and so is food ($5/Kg for non-organic bananas! What the hell?! They're 69 cents a kilo in Canada and we can't even grow them there!!!), but it's easy to make plenty to get by and save heaps. We're busking and doing open mics and things a fair bit and lining up a few shows for OM while we accumulate the needed gear which is great. We just got a FANTASTIC djembe; once again, an amazing gift from the Gods of Gumtree. We're still doing dreads, and word is getting around! Check out our work at www.facebook.com/TheRastaMasta . I found out that while traveling in India I lost almost 15 pounds, so I've been focusing on eating really healthily and getting in shape. We're doing lots of yoga and our daily routine is back intact! Of course, we leave lots of room for variations to do fun things though.
Perth is a wonderful city! I would say that Australia is a wonderful country, but we haven't seen it yet! Everyone is so welcoming, the accent is a blast (we try out Aussie-isms and accents at work and see if customers notice to practice), everything is chilled out, the music in the big city is booming, and we're just loving it! John Butler lives in Freo and he actually started out busking on the streets and in the weekly market playing "Ocean" and his other old tunes. Our housemate actually used to live with him, and her fiancee's band used to have John open for them. Small world! It's cool because everyone here just treats Butler as "the young kid from down the road," not the worldwide touring professional musician. No creepy papparazzi here! It's such a great, laidback vibe. It makes total sense how the Aussies came about: put a bunch of uptight English criminals on a beach for a loooong time, and this is what you get. The accent and the pace of the people are definitely very beach and surf inspired. It's awesome.
So that's it! It's been a crazy adventure, and there will be more to come! We'll be writing less frequently from now on, but we'll still keep in touch. The internet in Australia is about 15 years behind North America, so unfortunately we don't have any way to post youtube videos or things like that, but we do have access, albeit limited access, to the "World Wide Web." It's actually worse than India's internet though. Pretty sad. But we'll do our best! We're planning on buying a camper van and taking it across the outback to see all four corners of this country that is still steeped in mystery for us. There is so much to see! Don't fret, I'm sure that many more tales will come of this journey... We miss you all, and send peace and love in your directions.
Cheers mates!
Orion (& Marina)
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