08 June 2011

Did you know, Internet, that i am a travel agent? I dont know if you do know that, i havent spoken about work (or anything really) for a while.

ANYWAY, some times my job is pretty fun... though most of the time, it's a total pain in the arse with not all that much of a reward. People working in Safeway earn more than most of us. You see, we get to do all the boring bits for people... and then they get to go off and do all the good stuff. The greatest irony of all is perhaps how unfortunate it is that people who love travel soooo much, actually can't afford to go anywhere ever again, once they start working in the travel industry.

Everyone thinks... ohhh, you're a travel agent, you must get heaps of free holidays... Hmm, not quite. Occasionally you will win an incentive, and get a free holiday... but because we work on commission, the time you take off to go on said holiday, ends up costing you more than you physically spend. You end up missing the majority of the month you're away and therefore, dont make budget and wont get a bonus that month.

So, it's easy to get a but cynical about the old job... a bit jaded and perhaps even bitter. This may surprise you, but people are MEAN when they're going on holidays! They're mean about money, they speak to you like shit and threaten 'legal action' (my favourite) when you tell them they can't do something they want to. Nothing is ever their fault. They complain. They want compensation. And it really takes the fun out of everything...

Oh, so you want to go do your working visa in the UK?
Oh, so you want to backpack around Europe?
Oh, so Cambodia changed your life?
Oh, so you're going to Vegas to party?
Oh, so you're going to price beat me? On what, a Virgin Blue flight to Cairns?
Oh, you're going to go work on the ski fields in Canada?
Oh, you want a package to Phuket?
Oh, BALI?
Oh, you want a ski package in Queenstown?
Oh, you're doing the Inca trail?
Oh, you want to go to NYC on NYE?
Oh, you're going to Carnivale?
Oh, a full moon party!
Oh, you want to go from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh?
Oh, you're a student going back to Delhi? You want it what...? Cheap?!
Oh, BANGKOK!
Oh, LA!
Oh, LONDON!
Oh, BUENOS AIRIES!

OH!!!!!!!!! HAVE ANY OF YOU EVER HAD AN ORIGINAL IDEA EVER?!

I'm yet to meet anyone who's not passionate about travel. Everyone wants to go somewhere, it'd have to be pretty rare for someone to go somewhere, hate it and never leave home again... But, like anything good... when you're around it all the time, it gets a bit shit.

HOWEVER! Every now and again, I get a glimmer of the passion I once had for the whole deal. I get a little bit excited about a destination... I realise I dont know it all, haven't heard it all before and something really tickles my fancy. And today, it was Africa.

I don't even like animals, but the thought of going on one of those 4 wheel drive trucks and camping in that Ngorongoro crater thing, and seeing the rhinos and elephants and zebras and giraffes n shit got me all keen. I looked up flights, worked out how I was gonna get there and where i was gonna go.

3 weeks teaching English in Tanzania, a week or two at an orphanage in Mozambique, a trip to Cape Town, a safari, see the colourful Masai Mara, hear the animals at night, as i live amongst them, see the pink flamingos things and just be in awe of nature. Witness a cheetah chase down an antelope, see a baby elephant following its family along, hear an elephant trumpet, watch a giraffe gallop with its buckled legs... and at the end, 5 days in Zanzibar. It was going to be great!

Then I got a call, and it was some fuckwit who'd missed his flight yesterday... and i was back to being bitter again.

02 June 2011

I'm moving! A-fucking-gain.

When Dot and I lived together, we did so for 2.5 years. That's quite a while. Since moving from that house, I have moved nine times... in 3.5 years. And tomorrow, makes number 10!

Fucking ridiculous.

I'm gonna miss this little flat, it's only really just started to feel like home. For the first six months, I didnt even really bother to unpack... I finally did unpack and about a month later, got a call from my estate agent saying that the landlord was selling the property. Yaaaaay for Marsy.

So here's the stats, for Normanby St Prahran.

Dangerous drunken wobbles on the third floor balcony x2
Blokes (official count) x3
Saturday nights in since moving here x6
Episodes of the original 90210 watched since living here x82
Heard the neighbours fucking x14
Saw the dude across the way sitting naked on his (white) couch, lights on x6
Times I've see aforementioned dude having a pull x2
Caught the tram home drunk and missed the stop x4
Parties x1
Houseguests x4
Burned dinners x17
Cold showers x3
Spiders x1
Mice x0
Murdered house-plants x1
Number of times i've left the oven on overnight x22
Months with only channel 10 available x4

I think that's about it. Better luck next time, eh...