Bundy Backpackers, Bundaberg, Queensland 4670

 

One of my worst work experience in the outback started on Gumtree. It is a website where you can buy and sell anything, but it is mainly used to find jobs anywhere in Australia. All backpackers spent hours and days refreshing the job page to be the first one to apply. It’s a number games, first come first serve. You can tell if it is still worthy to apply by looking at the number of visits on the advert. Strange fact is that the website doesn’t look professional and you have a lot of fake adverts. Many backpackers lost big amounts of money or arrived on strange places that didn’t look like on the advert. Even though we keep using it because it’s all free and useful to find a job really quickly.

 

By searching for a job on Gumtree I discovered one at Bundy Backpackers in Bundaberg, Queensland. The job description was really unclear but I was blinded by the wage I could win which was $21,09/hour. I learnt from the fruit-picking job that getting paid by bin wasn’t the right thing to do to save money. Now I was getting paid by hour that would make a huge difference. But after several work experience I called the working hostel to make sure they got work and to be sure if it wasn’t a trick. They said there was work. I hadn’t other replies from other applications so I took the plane and went to Bundaberg.

 

It was another working hostel where I had a bad experience. Once I arrived I payed my one-week rent and gave my passport as a deposit. The woman at the reception said that at 5pm she would put a paper on the noticeboard so everyone would know where he or she works and at what time they should be ready. I waited in my room and I noticed a strange thing on the walls. There were burnt spots everywhere. I didn’t know why or what it was but I figured it out a bit later. So at 5pm I checked the noticeboard and I was on a waiting list! And I wasn’t the only one. There were other backpackers waiting as well, backpackers who came earlier than me so I was number 8 on the waiting list. I tried to find the backpackers who were in front of the list wondering how long they have been waiting for. The first one was waiting for two weeks!

 

I felt cheated again. I’d just paid my rent $210 for a week knowing at that moment that I wouldn’t have any job for the next two weeks. There was not even Wi-Fi, no decent television or seats, the showers were shit, not a single pan to cook with in the kitchen, and worst of all, the entire hostel was infected by bed bugs! Every bed was populated with at least 2 bed bugs families. It was even national news where a backpacker had to be transferred to the hospital back home due to many bug bites on her legs. The owner was even neglecting the fact. Google it, true story! One of the French girls from my dorm slept in her car because of those bugs while she paid the rent. That was also the reason why the walls had burnt spots, to burn the bed bugs hole. Later on I heard that the farmers didn’t want to work with that working hostel anymore because of the bad reputation. No wonder that there were no jobs anymore.

 

I spent all my days in the library trying to find another job. After 5 days I left the hostel because you had to give 2 days notice before your departure. If you didn’t do so you’d lose your $100 deposit or pay $100 to get your passport back. That moment was the moment where I promised myself no working hostel anymore!