up the sky

My housemate had been looking for a cheap hot air balloon aviation tour and signed in a list to replace canceled seats for a discount price. I didn't know anything until the other afternoon at 8 pm when my mate got a call from this "haba" telling there are few seats available..... for the next morning! He told me about the opportunity and what did I do? I'm always ready when it comes to going to heights. So instead of paying whopping 250 something aud, I paid 50$$$!! Next thing was to set alarm to 4:50am and get to sleep.

The Sun must have been still on the other side of earth cus it was so dark when we woke up. We jumped on the haba bus and drove to the take-off site (paddick :) and waited till they ensured weather conditions with a helium air balloon with a red light on the bottom. It was too windy at the moment so they decided to relocate. We didn't make it up before sunrise but it was breathtaking anyways. The balloons are HUGE and it's amazing how just hot air is capable to lift off nearly two tons weiging basket with 16 persons in it.

See the man?

Taking air out of the balloon after landing. I'm the one going furthest away. How fun!

Finding work

Sorry all mates, been inactive! I'll fix it by writing longest text so far.

How do I find work? Where to start?
Questions I had to ask myself after finishing mangoes and longans. Not an easy task, I can tell you! In my case I have an advantage because I got my bullseye, nissan pulsar. I don't know what I would do without it. Anyways, we finish picking longans and farmer told me it would be the Last pick and there would be no work for the next week and a half and he reckon I should look for another farm. Righto, I'll do that.

With a korean housemate we started driving around farms we knew would stand a chance of hiring us. Potential farms turned out to be avocado and pawpaw plants, but in the end only one farmer wrote down my phone number. Hoping that he will call back, we were killing time at home by sleeping long, reading, playing games, eating and other stuff. All this happened on Monday.
Tuesday passed by, Wednesday afternoon started to feel desperate and thinking of doing another drive anywhere to find new farms. Finally, in the evening I received a call that there's work available the following day...from the farm I was working for last week! How big a relief it was, mate! And this farm has funny supervisors with pure aussie slang and accent which helps me learn big time. Some words I've learned are dog's eye and dead horse. Guess what they are? A pie and tomato sauce :) not necessarily the most useful words but by using them I feel more australian.

So started my 4th week with ample amounts of longans. Only five of us picking, we get around 3 tons of longans per day, which are then shipped down to brissy, Melbourne and Perth. I also realised that majority of Australian fruits are picked and packed by backpackers! Funny, hey?