Workplace 38 - Gips

3 days of confusing work at a Toowoomba restaurant before the owner realised that 'Event Manager' and 'Functions Coordinator' were different roles.

Questions like "Didn't you learn how to lay out formal tableware at tafe?" and "Can't you assist putting together the hors d'oeuvres?" were large red markers that I was not who they were looking for. Gratefully parted ways after a few unpleasant shifts.

Workplace 37 - Festivus Brisbanarious

Working for Major Brisbane Festivals was a goal achieved, a level unlocked, a huge step along the road of my career in Event Managements.
This job looked great on a resume, gave me heaps of amazingly talented and creative contacts, plus loads of opportunities to learn about working in major government funded festivals.


Unfortunately my role was as assistant to two people who were the assistants to the Program Director. The Program Director was an dynamic and incredibly talented man who rarely needed assisting in anything. This meant that the two staff above me rarely had enough work to fill their time and definitely nothing that could be filtered down to me. I spent a lot of my contracted 3 months bringing in books on usb sticks and sitting at my desk reading them, or meandering around the lovely West End, finding the best book shops, cafes and hidden treasures of that part of Brisbane.
On a few occasions other departments would need a hand with something and I was allowed to excitedly scoot over and research suppliers of orange zip ties, or photocopy and staple together hundreds of pages of artist itineraries.
The office had about 40 staff in it, with more appearing each week the festival got closer. Government funding makes a wonderful difference to events, the contrast between private event companies and government run events is phenomenal. So many helpers! And no matter how ridiculously extravagant an idea seemed to me, it seemed to always go through. The amount of money in the event was unimaginable for me. Fantastic.
On one occasions I was taken to a meeting at GOMA to finalise details for an exhibition - I had no reason to be there but apparently you need to take numbers to look serious. I was happy to be a number.
For me, the best part of this contract was once the festival had started. Our team was in charge of an amazing custom built stage that sat outside the Powerhouse in New Farm and played every night for the three weeks. We had sensational acrobat and gymnast shows, Shakespeare performances, matinee songstresses and The Dirty Brothers Sideshow, each mind blowing and wonderful in their own very different ways.
If you're interested in working in events then Brisbane Festival is an excellent one to get into, I volunteered one year and then applied for staff the next. I would recommend this method for any event, it will definitely put you ahead of anyone just applying, even if it is a bit of a long term plan!

Workplace 36 - Funny Stuff

Have you ever watched a stand up comedy act and thought “I wonder if they’re that funny ALL THE TIME?” 

Unfortunately, the answer is no. A comedian offstage is trying to be that funny and that is a different thing altogether. Mostly it comes across as immature and makes for slightly disjointed conversation. See, most comedians take their material from everyday stuff so they are either performing or researching. If anything remotely amusing happens in the course of their day they’ll immediately add it to the never ending iPhone note called ‘This Could Be Good Material’. 

How do I know this? Another job, ofcourse. I worked for the Sit Down Comedy Club in Paddington on and off for about a year. It was a tiny little office in what was (still mostly is) a one bedroom apartment. No joke, my office was in the kitchen. As was the foyer and front entrance. People regularly got confused trying to find the place, and stayed confused after they had found it.

I was the receptionist part time there, answering the phones, booking in the open mic-ers, updating the facebook and twitter accounts and folding and stuffing MILLIONS of letters into envelopes. They were big into mailing stuff. They owned another apartment down the street which travelling comedians stayed at so some days my job was folding all the sheets and towels for the next person. Over time I also helped out occasionally on the door of the venue and eventually scored a sweet gig managing a comedy room at the Transcontinental Hotel every Friday night. 

The Trans is actually a beautiful old building, built in 1883 to cater to the upper class of Brisbane and was known for only stoking the best liquor. Unfortunately that is no longer the case and most weeks when the comedians and I were leaving at about 9pm on a Friday night, they were already packed up and empty, having shoved the last of the lunch drinkers out of the pokies room.

Anyway, running a comedy room is awesome. I would arrive about 6, technically to set up the room but after showing the staff how it should be set up on the first week, they always had it ready for me. So I would have dinner and a drink and chat to the staff, the comedians would arrive anywhere between 5 and 10 minutes before they were due to go on so I didn’t need to look after them. I’d pick up my til from the manager and, take/sell tickets at the door for about half an hour then sit and laugh myself stupid at the show for a few hours. And that was it. And I was paid for the whole time. Fantastic gig. 

The other random opportunity that came out of working for the Comedy Club was getting to judge a high school Theatre Sports competition (If you don’t know what theatre sports are, just think of that Who’s Line Is It Anyway? Show). Anyway, one night they were short a judge and I got to fill in for them. Before the comp I was super nervous as I hadn’t done theatre sports in ages and spent my high school years being routinely rubbished by a particularly unpleasant drama teacher but it was awesome! The kids were so funny and creative and scoring was pretty simple. I was never too different from the other two judges (Yay for panel judging!) so I figured I must have been doing alright. (Added bonus – got to judge the horrible drama teachers team. Ofcourse I judged the kids fairly but her face at seeing me on the judges table made up for at least two years of soul crushing drama classes.)

Working for the Comedy Club was at times deathly boring – weeks of letter stuffing – and at times an unexpected adventure so all up I consider it a win. You should definitely get along to one of the shows and if you tell them when you’re birthday is you’ll get two free tickets in the mail for that month – huzzah!

Workplace 35 - Luscious

Lush is lushtastic. Is fantastic and bombastic and enthusiastic and amazing and other words that you use when you are way too excited.

Before I worked there I was a fan but after working there I’m like the new guy in the cult – everything is the most amazing ever!! So please forgive me if this comes off as preachy, or worse, like being spammed with junk mail. If it helps you can replace every ‘Lush’ reference with a word of your own choosing. (eg. Pants.)

While I was working at Hexters (see previous post – why aren’t you reading these in order?!) I started looking for somewhere else to pay me, as minimum wage in Canada is really really minimum. I handed out a bunch of resumes at the local shopping centre, Market Mall, but didn’t hear back from most. Darn foreigners, out to steal jobs I assume was the response. But I walked into Lush, found the manager and told her “Hi, I need to work here, this place is amazing. Here’s my resume so you can call me when you get a minute” Sassy as. A few days later they did call me, but they said that they were doing a group job interview session in two weeks’ time and did I want to go. I said yes, thanks, end of conversation. Then I thought, that’s rubbish – another two weeks?! So I drove down there and told them that I would prefer starting tomorrow and would that work for them? Ten minutes of interview later and I started the next day – yay!

A week after that and I was made a keyholder so that I could do the opening and closing and pretty much worked every single day for the next few months for them. If I had a day off and it got to midday I’d start to worry coz I hadn’t been called in yet, but it never got to 1pm without my little flip phone going off. Also, Lush paid me $12 an hour which kicked butt over the bars $8! Woo!

Basically, Lush is a dream place to work. The girls were so fun and energetic, I genuinely believe in the product and we could make our own mix tapes to play in the store. I know it sounds minor but a place that lets you play your own music has the right idea. 
Happy staff –> happy store –> sales.

Working at Lush requires a lot of product knowledge. Staff need to be able to say 3 things about every product, ideally a few of the ingredients and what makes it unique over something else in the range. Also we had to be able to diagnose skin issues/types and recommend products for it that could help or work well. I learnt heaps about different oils/fruits/nuts/ organic products and what they do. Fortunately I found it fascinating so it was easy to learn and I was always hitting the other girls up for more info. We’d talk shop a lot, alternative uses for the products and why certain things work so well or what works best with what. (For instance, if you buy a bath bubble bar and put a little bit of it in with your washing it cleans your clothes and they smell amazing!)

We’d always have shop demonstrations going on and we’d regularly being trying the face masks or foot scrubs or even the shampoo’s/conditioners while we were working so that we knew more about them. Demonstrating the bubble bars was so much fun coz kids would always lose their minds over the giant sparkling bubbles. The other thing we'd do was decorating the store in themes and dressing up for holidays or new product launches. Like when Halloween  happened and it was so crazy! The mall got totally decked out, all the stores went overboard with it and people were walking around in costumes the entire week. Little kids go trick or treating all along the shops and they were so ADORABLE! In my opinion kids who are too little to walk should always be in costumes. 

Management team meeting

We had a shop digital camera and would do crazy photo shoots while we were working as well as taking it to nights out as we all hung out together outside of work as well. My favourite goodbye party when I left Canada was when all the Lush crew got together and we went to a Mexican restaurant - so much tequila!

And the managers would organise closed store parties for the staff and our favourite regulars where we could just go nuts with all the products. We'd give each other facials and spa treatment - just use everything hey! 

Best of all we got to take home heaps of the product, any testers that were too low, any broken stuff or nearly out of date stuff - we used it all! Or if you made big sales  or hit targets you got Lush money to spend so you could get more stuff, AND on top of that there was the 50% staff discount! Oh how I miss the staff discount! It was so clever tho because the more we used the products the more we loved them. Amazing.

But seriously, I miss the 50% discount.

In store staff massage line

Mucking around during Halloween week

Aislinn dressing the window for a new product

I made the Sydney Opera House out of soap!

My best friend in Canada, Jade was our beautiful store fairy this day!

Our fearless store managers =)

Basically it was great fun, great product, great people – I have never come across a better retail job. There were sales targets and competitions but they were easy to hit, you never got told off for not reaching them, there were just prizes if you did. Super motivating. Honestly I would go back to working at Lush in a heartbeat. (If Lush ever open a Toowoomba store I'm just going to send them this as my resume!)

*End of crazy raving cult lady*

Workplace 34 - Dive Bar

Think of the dodgiest suburban pub you’ve ever been to. The one with the same number of people on a Tuesday afternoon as on a Saturday night. And they’re the same people. There’s pokies in the corner, karaoke once a week and brawls pretty regularly. It smells of stale beer and sweaty people.

That’s where I worked when I moved to Calgary after Summer Camp and my epic road trip. It was on the same street as where I was staying, a few blocks down. And it was…dodgy. I could’ve earnt a lot more in tips at any of the pubs/clubs downtown but I had no idea how to get there or where they were. Gaaah! (Also, bar’s operate differently in Canada so for all you Aussies reading this I’ll explain. The behind the bar staff very rarely talk to customers. Customers sit at the tables/pokies and the wait staff take their orders, put it into the computer system, wait for the bar staff to make it then take it out to the customers who then pay for it. The wait staff keep all the change in their little bum bag (or fanny pack hehe) and at the end of the night count out what they put into the computer then keep the rest as tips. Can’t remember how the kitchen staff and bar staff made their tips…)

So I worked at Hexters. They sold lots of beer, some awful shots and cocktails and had the standard Canadian pub food. Plus wine, in either red or white! The staff never really leave, if they get fired they just come back and hang out as customers so everyone knew everyone. I worked there for about two months, earning $8/hr plus tips. I got to know a lot of the regulars and enjoyed it. It was a relaxed place to work most of the time. People looked out for each other and the little blonde Aussie girl was quiet a novelty. If you ever hear me say my name Canadian style, this is where I started doing it as no one could understand what my name was with an Australian accent.

The most vivid memory of my time there was one night when one of the regulars decided to take offense at something another guy in the bar said and started throwing the pool balls and cues at him. This was after lots of yelling and screaming at each other and a bit of punching… He broke a bunch of windows and glasses and scared the shit out of me. Fortunately one of the old staff members found me hiding under a table while this was going on and quickly got me out the back with the rest of the staff. Meanwhile a different previous staff member (I told you, they never leave) was yelling at him to stop being such a dickhead and she could take him yeah? She was very drunk and pretty shocked when we told her about it the next day. This guy was a true psycho. Anyway, once he’d left the rest of the staff just got on with cleaning up like it was nothing. Apparently it happens often enough to be common place. So we tidied up, gave our statements to the police and knocked off. I was a bit skittish at work after that and apparently the police are still showing up at where I lived even 2 years later for me to make a witness statement. I’m assuming every time he gets caught for something else? If you're in Canada please let them know I've moved on, ta.

Anyway. The other big night that I worked there was when they got a decent sized Canadian band in and the bar was PACKED. Like couldn’t even move packed. This was one of my last nights and I was really looking forward to earning a mountain of tips to fund my couple of weeks traveling to my mates at various snowboarding resorts.  I was kept crazy busy all night, fortunately a bunch of the tables just wanted the same round of beers every time so they’d just wave at me as I was going past and I could bring their orders back as well. Most people were ordering doubles and several drinks at a time coz it took so long to get around everyone in my section. 

My little apron pocket was so full of cash and I was really looking forward to the influx of wealth to my single digit bank account. At the end of the night the other wait staff and I were counting up our tips and it was awesome. Until I got to my total. $100 bucks? $100 BUCKS!?!?! The rest of the girls were pulling in over a thousand and I only got one hundred?!? Recounting made no difference. I wish I could say people took my money. Or that the calculator was wrong. Or even that ….something else. But no. The truth is that I am an idiot. In my rush I somehow missed that a double drink should cost more than a single and spent the night paying for peoples drinks with my own tips. Super sad face! No wonder everyone was so happy to see me and always ordered doubles. I am ashamed.

So after that super disappointment I worked a few more nights to scrape up the tips I could and headed off on my snowboarding journey of awesomeness. That entire trip is still one of my favourite memories but you’ll have to ask me in person as the stories have no place in this blog.

Memorable lessons when working in a Canadian bar – stay out of reach of the drunks, double check the cost of drinks, don’t spend all your tips/pay on the bar food and always know the escape route out the back in case of crazies. 

If you actually want to see Hexters, there's pictures here: http://hexterspub.com/Gallery.php  =) or below are some of my pics from one night there.

 This is me and the other regular waitress - Jess I think??

This is Jess and one of the regulars, a previous waitress and a crazy fun chick

Workplace 33 - Summer Camping

Woo! This one’s going to be long.

I spent a few months working for a summer camp in Canada. 

Camp Chief Hector is in the gorgeous Rocky Mountains and has been running for nearly a hundred years covering 1000 acres of forest/mountain/rivers. All the campers and staff (called councilors) sleep in teepees, lighting fires at night to keep warm and eating together in the giant lodge.

I was part of the horse staff, crazily. The camp has a herd of about 80 horses and there were about a dozen of us on the horse team to look after them all. Everyone else on the team had either grown up on ranches, worked with herds or done show jumping all their lives, meaning I had a lot to catch up on really quickly! Each day we were down at the barn at 7am to bring all the horses in, get them organised for the day into their lines, fed, any first aid that they needed and then we rode bikes the 2-3k’s to the lodge to quickly eat before racing back down to the barn to get the horses ready before the kids arrived. Then the groups would rock up and the other horse staff would teach them how to groom, saddle up and basic riding instructions – go, turn, stop. That sort of thing.

My responsibility over camp was for the littlest campers. We took campers from about 8 years old I think and so rather than teaching them to saddle up and groom and things like that, I would take the oldest, most docile horses and saddle them up and lead them down to the big flat riding corrals where the kids would meet me. I spent my days down there, getting kids on and off the horses and getting them to walk around the corral. We’d play games and I’d teach them a few basic things. If the kids were doing really well I’d sometimes get them to trot but the old horses weren’t big fans of that. Every so often you’d get a kid who was scared of horses or didn’t like being so high so the councilors for that group would walk along next to them or lead the horse for them. My horses ranged from a massive black guy with feet like dinner plates to some tiny miniature horses and a couple of really gorgeous old nags that had been at the camp forever and were so obedient. I could go on for a long time about my old horses, they were so funny. I was incredibly sad to leave them at the end of camp.

As well as supervising the little chiniquays (the group name for the youngest camp group), we would sometimes go on staff rides. These were the best. We’d each pick our favourite horse and we’d just go way out into the open valleys and fields and run around like a crazy wild herd. Most of the other staff had their regular rides as they were out on trail rides twice a day but I chose a different horse most opportunities til I found my favourite. 

He was a dappled grey that was donated to the herd while we were at camp, and while he wasn’t ready for trail rides or for campers to ride yet I loved him. And hated him. He was so feisty and head strong but he was also 

one of the fastest horses at the camp and so beautifully fun to gallop on. The only trouble was getting him to stop. Heading out from the barn and running around he was so responsive and easy. Until it was time to stop and head home. A more stubborn horse I have never ridden (this isn’t saying much but still he was a pain in the butt). He would try and go any direction except home, even leaving the herd and brushing against things to get me off. Several times I just gave up and had to lead him home, walking in front of him and dragging him forward. This might say a lot more about my riding skills than the horse but I still chose him to ride for the rest of the camp as the first part of any excursion made up for the second. 

Other riding things – every two weeks a camp group would graduate and there was a ceremony in the forest with all their leaders and stuff and they would be lead there by two silent horsemen (horsepeople). It was all very symbolic and traditional and I hated it. Every single time we did this, the horse that I was one would lose it’s mind. I had a horse bolt, a horse that wouldn’t go near a particular clump of trees we needed to go through, one night we were doing it in a thunderstorm – horses are particularly easy to spook, I got kicked… They were awful. By the end of it I was on the most docile of horses, normally used for the kids, and begging to not have to do it. (Even then this horse suddenly tried to bolt from a deer that appeared ages away) I was so scared that I was going to trample a group of kids. 

I got pretty good at horse first aid. As I was at the barn more than most of the staff who were out on trail rides, I was tasked with making sure the relevant horses got their medicine, wounds were washed out and treated, eye drops put in… a whole range of stuff. Horses do not take medicine well so it was tricky but interesting work. Also I got really fit. Carrying saddles, bales of hay and children all day, as well as pushing around horses and a million other chores means you get buff in no time. It was awesome.

Other than horsey stuff…

All of the councilors got a day and a half off every two weeks and, as a staff team of 200 young people, we would choose a venue to descend upon and party out all our hard work. Days off were chaotic and messy and fun. Most of the next day was spent being very quiet.

The horse staff and the higher ground (high ropes/climbing etc) staff were really close, whenever we had time off we always hung out together. Or at meals. Or when there was nothing going on at the barn. Or after chores were done. Pretty much all the time. We were the resources team and we were elite. Oooh yeeeeah.

A million other stories happened over the two and a half months that I was at Camp Hector but you’ll have to come and find me to hear about those. Basically working at a Summer Camp is an incredible experience and I’m so glad that I did it. Anyone can go and work at a summer camp, I went through a great company called NYQUEST who looked after my placement and application, even arranging transport to the camp. The average age of the councilors is about 20 but anyone can go and work there and it’s such an adventure. Get into it! =)

My Teepee, Wakanabi

Workplace 32 - Crowded Control

A few years ago young Catholics from around the world descended on Sydney like a well behaved invasion. The overrun for those that didn’t fit in Sydney came to Brisbane and, presumably, other capital cities, for what was known as WYD SYD or World Youth Day. This is a catholic thing celebrating…youth? I’m not entirely sure. Oh wait, I have Wikipedia! Here you go:

“World Youth Day was initiated by Blessed Pope John Paul II in 1985. It is celebrated diocesan level annually, and at a week-long international level every two to three years at different locations. The international level events attract hundreds of thousands of youth from almost every country on the planet. It is a major part of the upsurge in Catholic Youth Work in some countries over recent years; for example, the Director of Catholic Youth Services for England and Wales has said of the event that it would have far-reaching effects, not restricted to those who attended.”

Wow. New thing every day.

So as part of WYDSYD in Brisbane, henceforth known as WYDBRIS (hmmm…) there’s this epic walk of thousands of young people from all the major churches through the CBD ending up at a catholic funpark and concert in Roma St Parklands. Each of the churches and the route were all prepped ages in advanced, roads blocked off that sort of thing and I got to be the venue manager for Albert St Uniting Church on the corner of Albert and Ann St. 

Albert St Uniting is a BEAUTIFUL old church. Not big and cathedrally but very cute and full of gorgeous little touches, stained glass windows, massive old organ etc. And it’s been there for 160 years! So the city grew up around it and it’s now hidden in amongst massive hi-rises but it’s such a cute little church. You should go visit. Take your Mum.

Anyway. So we get there nice and early and the different schools/tour/groups of catholics from around the world start gradually arriving. About 50-100 people per group and I think I had 4 different groups. Regardless the church was paaaaacked! They held a mini service and did a heap of worship songs while they were waiting for the walking procession to reach us.

Albert St was the last church for the procession and so it was ungraciously dubbed Fat Alberts as all the groups that had people that couldn’t make the full walking route were sent there. Please don’t be offended by this, it was just too convenient to not do it.

I remember while we were waiting for the main group to arrive, I became quite concerned that the church was actually going to fall apart. There were SO many people squashed in, all around the balconys upstairs and sitting on the stairs – just anywhere they could get in. And they were dancing and stomping and clapping like crazy in the excitement of all being together and worshiping in a foreign country. There was a lot of shaking of the building going on and I wasn’t sure I wanted this beautiful old churches destruction on my conscience!  Fortunately those builders knew what they were doing as the church is still there. The walking procession arrived and we all piled out into the street to watch it pass and join in at the end. I think it took a good half hour for it to go past but was entertaining to watch. Each countries group was trying to be more decorative and outlandish than the next so there were some funny things going on. Finally we were going and walked slowly up to Roma St Parklands. My favourite was these three girls who stopped to get a photo and more and more people kept jumping in the shot so it ended up being a photo of about 30-40 people by the time she could take the picture. This happened to every photo anyone tried to take of their friends walking. Was hilarious seeing people hurl themselves at any posed group.

The actual WYDBRIS park event was great. Big stage, some of the more important Catholics talking, there were stalls and food vendors and some activities scattered around and hundreds and hundreds (thousands?) of young people just having fun. Awesome.

So, working on a one-off international event is fun but challenging in terms of communicating with people who speak other languages. And the fear of destroying a heritage building is a bit nerve racking. Being a part of an event with a thousand ecstatic young people that didn’t need security is fantastic tho. Fun, friendly vibes all round =)