Day 22 Thur 05/03/2012
Kalgoorlie with Frank & Roel
“It has been exactly one month since I quit the WWTA back in the USA. Train left from Perth at 7:10AM. We barely made it there. I think I was the last person on the train. Saw my first kangaroo at 8:30AM on the way. Approximately 8 hour ride on the Prospector (the name of the train).
KALGOORLIE! From the train station I wondered until I found the Kalgoorlie Backpackers Hostel. Brothels everywhere. Tossed my bags in my room, shared by 4 other guys at the moment. Frank, Roland,Franz, & _______.
Both Frank & Roland are from the Netherlands & work at Monty’s. I reported at 5:30PM for my new cooking position. Met Joe at Monty’s. She is the head server I think. Worked until 8:15PM. Called Mom & Kristen from my cell. Saw 2 rowdies playing with a fire extinguisher in our hall at the hostel. Went to sleep with OONCE OONCE music jamming so hard outside our room.”
Like it reads in the journal, I almost missed my train. We got near the train station in time, but the layout of the roads versus the train tracks with tunnels and overpasses was crazy. Leah could figure out how to get me to the entrance. However we made it.
I hugged Leah bye and checked my backpack onto the train. It was close to overweight. I still haven’t learned how to travel super light (or even semi-light). This is stupid because if you know me at all you realize I wear the same couple of t-shirts year round. What was I prepared for? Losing half of my clothes to thieves? Just give me my Monster Garage shirt for knock around/work and my Burton shirt for going out. Done! Anyways my bag is heavy, but I left all SCUBA gear and my bike with Leah.
The Prospector is the name of the train that runs deep into the bush in Western Australia. Kalgoorlie is in the middle of nowhere. All I know is the city is a gold mining town. There are a few places to eat and a couple of hotel bars. I did get to see my first kangaroo on the way out of Perth.
The train ride was long. I slept, ate my snacks, and read a little bit to pass the time. I arrived in Kal that afternoon. As I stepped off the train and grabbed my bag I realized I had no idea where I was going at all. There was no one to ask in the vicinity either. I looked at a map posted outside the train station to get my bearings, and I figured I needed to go west. I called the hostel to verify I was getting close and spoke with a lady who had a STRONG Aussie accent. She was a mess on the phone, but she assured me there would be someone to let me in and show me to my room.
After passing many brothels I found the Kalgoorlie Backpackers. I was super nervous. This was my first hostel experience in my life. I knew I was going to be older than most backpackers here. I remember waiting a bit for Sarah, the owners daughter, to show me to my room. Her mother would be back later for payment.
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| Frank from Holland cooking at Monty's |
I threw my bags onto my top bunk bed bear the window of my room. There was a guy named Frank in the room as well. He introduced himself and asked me if I was the new cook at Monty’s. I was! He was the other cook, and he let me know he would be the one training me. Awesome! He was from Holland and travelling with his friend Roland, who was also Dutch. Roland, or Roel, also worked at Monty’s as the server/bar tender. I was very glad to have met not only two of my roommates but two of the guys I would be working with. Little did I know at this point the amount of crazy fun times I was about to have with these two rowdies over the next five to six months.
After a short shift learning the menu and having Joe show me some dishes over at Monty’s I was headed back to the hostel early. When I got back there was booze being slung everywhere. Someone offered me a beer right when I almost made it into my room. I needed to keep making friends and I couldn’t turn down a beer. If I remember correctly Roel and I were outside our room in the hall when two drunk backpackers grabbed the fire extinguisher right by our room and started expending it everywhere. The second this began I dipped back into my room and was in the bed. I wanted no part of this. Roel agreed. Also don’t get confused when I am speaking of Roel or Roland. His name is Roel, but Australians (and Americans) have a hard time pronouncing his name. So when he introduces himself most of the time he says his name is Roland.
As I got into my top bunk bed I soon realized Leah did me a huge favor by getting me ear plugs. There were other rowdies literally five feet away from my head out the window playing the most ridiculous techno OONCE music. UNC music? Anyways, it was so loud and the ear plugs barely kept the noise out. I don’t remember sleeping too well this first night.
Day 23 Fri 05/04/2012
Fire Brigade
“Sarah, owners daughter, woke us accusing us of the fire extinguisher mess. It looked like Christmas outside our room. The 2 guys responsible just got tossed out. Jackasses.
K-Mart, Op Shop, Woolworths. Silverware, bowl, coffee mug, milk, cheese, ham. Ping pong with Scott (Irish), David, & Jacob (Hyundai).
Worked again with Frank. Once I got back to the hostel Julian and I walked over to the bottle shop. 6 beers turned into some Kiwi (Daniel) showing up with multiple liquor bottles. Jacob came into the hostel this night. Party!”
I was woken up early by the owner’s daughter, Sarah. She was not happy with the mess outside our room and I was immediately the number one suspect. “If you didn’t do it then who did?” Oh man I have just gotten here in my first hostel and I have to point out trouble makers already. I told her I had no idea who did it. Which was kinda true because I didn’t know the guys by name. Actually it was just one guy who actually fired the white mist and I didn’t know his name or even his nationality. Roel saved my bacon though and from under his sheets he tells Sarah the name of the clown she was looking for. Thanks buddy.
The guys or at least the one dude who fired the extinguisher was thrown out. He had to move to the only other hostel in Kal, Gold Diggers or something of the sorts was the name. He had a record already here at the hostel and more would unfold on this later when police came looking for him days later for other crimes. I think he slashed some ones tire or something completely random.
I needed to do some shopping today. I bought a bowl and coffee cup at the Op Shop (Thrift store) and a $2 set of silverware at K-Mart. Then a quick trip to the Wooly’s for groceries.
We fired up some ping pong today. Scott would be so pissed if he knew I wrote in my notes I thought he was Irish the first day I met him. There were lots of Irish guys in the hostel, but Scott was definitely English. Sorry Scottie! J David was German and the three of us played a few games of ping pong. I am sure Shahin played with us as well, but I had a hard time getting his name at first so I probably left it out of my logs. We spent lots of time around the ping pong table. I have written Jacob’s name into my notes a few times now but I am pretty sure he came to the hostel the night after I arrived.
I had another training shift at Monty’s with Frankie. I will take the time to write up a report on Monty’s on a later date. Frank is really a great guy to work with and I love the Dutch accent. He teaches me a few easy things to cook and he sticks with the more difficult dishes. By the way Frank I still don’t think I ever cooked that one pasta dish, the Carbonara, correctly. Hahaha. Not once! I always forgot something! J
Back at the hostel I met Julian, German, and the two of us set off for the bottle shop (liquor beer store). I bought a 6-pack of beers hoping for a chilled night. I remember giving most of these out to new friends, so there had to be another beer run in there somewhere. Jacob, or Hyundai, arrived at the hostel tonight. I had hit it off with about 10 guys now from all over the world. Jacob was also German. We all set outside by the pool tables that rarely had room to play pool on them due to the beers bottles all over the place. It was some girls birthday I think. Some Kiwi named Daniel rolls into the hostel, he is a local, and has a garbage bag full of liquor bottles. Super sketchy but when he hears I am from TN he can’t wait to dig through his bag of treats and find the Jack Daniel’s. I assume Frank and Roel were working all night tonight because I only remember Julian & Jacob getting rowdy with the birthday group this night.
Day 24 Sat 05/05/2012
Welcome to Monty’s
“Slept in and went to work. Nothing much else. Jacob & I watched Modern Family all night.”
Jacob really likes the TV series Modern Family, and I have a few seasons of the show on my hard drive. Maybe this is a good time to talk about Monty’s. When people ask me for a short description of Monty’s I tell them:
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| Frank, Roel & I working at Monty's |
Imagine Waffle House serving alcohol. Add a bartender slinging drinks and AC/DC blasting all night. This is Monty’s. It isn’t a roadhouse, but when your rush of customers comes in at 3AM Thur through Sunday night it feels like a roadhouse to me. The food is similar to Chili’s here. Steakburgers, pastas, chicken, toasties, pizzas, fish n chips, wedges… Lots of grillin and deep frying. They have a killer breakfast menu as well.
Frank is teaching me the late night menu for now. I will be working 3rd shift, 9PM to 6 or 7AM mostly. This is the easiest menu to cook. On the weekends all the miners get on the piss (drink booze). Monty’s will have a pretty laid back supper crowd from 5PM-7PM like most restaurants. Once the dinner crowd leaves the place is usually dead. All the miners are at the hotel bars and skimpy bars. A skimpy bar is has an all female staff working there and as the tips increase the girls lose clothes. Basically the servers and bar keeps will send around a tip jar and if they reach the designated amount they go topless. These pubs stay slammed until closing time. Closing time in Kal was somewhere between 2Am and 3AM depending on the crowd and the money being made.
There was also one dance club in Kal that I think turned into a strip club on weekends. When these pubs all closed (which I swear they called each other and closed together) the miners stormed Monty’s. We would go from almost falling asleep behind the bar and me over in the kitchen to having tons of drunk miners who have been staring at naked or half naked gals all night. None of them were happy about going home alone and they wanted more piss (alcohol). Did I mention the male to female ration in Kal was something like 10:1. I should look that number up. It’s gotta be something like that.
So Roel would have 20 drunk, loud, and angry mining blokes lined up or fighting for position to order more piss. In order for Monty’s to have this special license to sell alcohol all night it meant customers had to order at the register and pay there. You were required to order a meal. Chip (fries) did not count. Potato wedges did count. This was the cheapest item you could order and still be served drinks. This was a very strict law. Now there was a grey area on how many drinks you could have with one order of wedges. If people were getting too slammed we could offer them more food before serving more booze.
Roel, or whoever else was up front running the register, would take orders, take the money, give me the food order, then he had to make the drink or grab it from the fridge, and he had to by law serve the beverage to the person sitting at a table. You could NOT walk up to the bar/register, order a beer, pay the money and have it handed to you. This was very important for our licensing. If it was just a cook and server that night the guy up front had his hands full. On nights where the drunk-miner rush was expected there would be one cook, someone on the register (Roel), and one of the managers would be there to run food, run drinks, and call the cops. Actually usually I was the one calling the cops because the phone was back there closest to me. I remember the first time I needed to call them and I didn’t know the number. This will be another story.
Day 25 Sun 05/06/2012
Mining Party
“Woke up & ate breakfast. Noodles for lunch. TV. Worked the same 6PM-9PM shift with Frank. Due to a mining party of big wigs I was schedules to come back at 10:30PM. I road with Luca, another cook, and Roland to Monty’s. Luca mixed us up a couple of kitchen drinks. Joe worked in the kitchen with us. We were slammed with drink orders. I learned how to semi run the register thanks to Roland. Good times. I walked home after 3AM with the cute Irish girl, Niamh, that worked with us. Then I sat outside with Sarah and jammed out some. Then called Kristen & Daniel.”
Right now my staple diet is Weet Bix for brekkie and some noodles for lunch. Pretty basic. The hostel kitchen is super crowded during meal times so I rather have something I can grab and get out of the way.
I had another dinner shift helping Frank in the kitchen. Tonight the mining company was having lots of big wigs in for dinner and drinks. We were expecting a large crowd. I was sent home at told to come back and help out. Luca was one of the other cooks that usually worked nights. He was moving on soon so I was his replacement I think. He was Italian. I always called him Luca Toni, the great Italian soccer player. Luca had a car so Roel and I rode with him to the restaurant for the night shift.
Niamh, Irish, and I am pretty sure Claire, English, also stuck around with us to help with the large crowd. When it went full speed with orders from the table of 50 people coming in all at once and drink orders rolling by I was just in Luca’s way. He had it under control so I help Roel by grabbing beers and running them to the tables. It was chaos. My Dutch roomie had 15 people at the register wanting drinks and 10 up the side of the counter waiting for him to make many drinks. I started mixing a few drinks to help. This probably broke many rules considering I didn’t have the proper “training” to serve or make drinks. Roel didn’t seem to care, and I could have cared less. Once we got caught up I went back to the dishwasher and started getting what I could clean.
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| Zara from New Zealand & I in the kitchen at Monty's |
I forgot to mention that Luca had immediately made us some drinks for the night to tide us over as well. During all the chaos either the girls or Roel had opened up a dozen bottles of the wrong beer, or someone had changed an order on him. There were many beers left untouched behind the bar that never went out. We couldn’t let them be thrown away, so we helped ourselves when we could. The layout of the place was open floor. Back in the kitchen wasn’t through any doors. I stood on one side of a counter and the servers and register were on other side. There was no hiding from all the cameras up in the ceiling, but since no one seemed to care I went along with it. All in all it was a good night.
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