I'm ripping up my degree, I think it would be more useful recycled and used as toilet paper

12 hours after arriving in Perth, I was offered a job and started on the spot, then I quit 3 hours later. The job was, what I thought would be perfect. Tour consultant at Discover West Holidays. They offered me the job on the spot which made it hard to refuse and asked me to start training right away. They then told me I could only wear black, white, beige and navy to work..even though I would have no customer contact. Apparently what I was wearing looked like I was on holiday! (I don't think these people know how to holiday). I hated it already. And then, I'm told we can't even have our cellphones on in the building...what about the lunch room?? Where is the trust in your employees??

I thought about it over lunch. My neck was already sore from sitting on my ass all morning. The pay was crap and it would take me 1 1/2 hours to get to work every day. BUT This job COULD be good for my career, right? But whats the point in being unhappy in a job that is only going to lead me to another, maybe higher payed and respected, but boring job in every way. I decided right there and then, I just cannot work in an office anymore.

So now I have no flippen idea what to do with my life. But it feels kind of good to be lost. At least it means theres lots of things to find! Good or bad...

I decided I need to do something on my feet, talking to people. Mainly because thats what I liked about working for ISV. First thing that comes to mind - retail.

But then I have a moral dillemma. I'm trying to become less materialistic, and would love others to be the same. Thats not really retail in a nutshell..

However, I don't have time for moral dilemmas, I'm running out of money, and I need a fun job to do. Fast!

Anyway, I've landed a job as Assistant Manager for Roger David which is a rather flash mens store in Aussie. The Manager is so lovely so I'm sure I will enjoy working with her. Its in a mall only 15 mins up the road, and the hours are good. It means I can be on my feet bouncing around all day talking to random people, yay!

Oh, but disapointment! Its rained 2 days since I got here! Come on Perth mr sunniest city in the world! Actually, I'm not complaining, I did get to spend an hour on the beach the other day. Plan to do that everyday after work alllll summer! You jelous? huh? You better be!!

Life will do a 180 on you at least twice a year...

I promise there has been a reason I haven't updated this for a while...

I've been contemplating whether to tell the world the truth I guess. So here I am deciding to say it…I got fired!

And I’m currently sitting back at a desk at SeaLink in New Zealand working on the phones because I’m practically bankrupt! I’m so thankful for them letting me come back for a few weeks while I’m home.

So I’m going to attempt to tell you the answer to the question I have been asking myself for the last few weeks. What the hell went wrong?

My last entry was talking about how hard the work was as a Recruiter, but how fun it was. And I certainly haven’t changed my mind on that. When it was good, I felt like a rock star. But, when it was bad, it was hell with no way out. No one will ever quite understand the intensity of it all, because at the end of the day, it was just a sales job, right?

No, it was not just a sales job. And I would love to go into the intensity of it but bad mouthing a good company publicly is not how I roll. I’m just disappointed, because I KNOW that had I been given equal opportunity I would still be in America and could be doing an awesome job of it. I keep looking at some of the other recruiters photos and feeling happy for them but sick to my stomach because I know I should be there selling the program. I don’t care that it was so stressful I started biting my nails again for the first time in years, swore more than ever, and that I almost wanted to start smoking (but didn’t). I don’t care! I feel like no one on this planet wants anyone to go on that program more than I want them to, because it was a beautiful thing for me and it changed my life. So why shouldn’t I be selling it?!! I’m a big believer that everything happens for a reason, I just wish that reason was evident right now…

Anyway, rant over. I do apologise to everyone I haven’t contacted since I’ve been back in NZ, I didn’t see the point in saying hello and goodbye all over again, since it was such a big goodbye when I left in June. I’m leaving for Australia again this Saturday morning. I’ll be spending a weekend in Sydney with my friend Greg then I’ll be starting life in Perth on Monday!

Since there’s always a lot of talk about people crossing the ditch for various reasons (mine being change, money and weather), I’m going to keep updating my blog as to how the adjustment is going.

So far I have already set up an Aussie bank account, which was super easy over the phone because Commonwealth Bank in Australia own ASB bank. All I need to do is go and pick up my debit card when I get to Perth. I’ve applied for jobs on Seek, and I will be staying with my friend Dionne till the end of summer. Hopefully this attempt to work in another country doesn’t turn out so badly! Wish me luck. :-D

ISV - the most intensive training ever.

I've just started my first week on campus and let me tell you... it hasn't come easy.

First let me explain what my job is..
Mon - Wed I am running between classes making announcements (At least 20), not just any old announcement, but a LOUD, fast and entertaining announcement in front of lecture halls filled with students! Then on Thursday I am giving 45 minute presentations with a partner talking about travel and volunteering opportunities overseas!
Does everyone understand this? (Nod head).

To get to this point all of the recruiters went through a 2 week training process starting in Sydney but the majority in Big Bear - California. Big Bear is 8000ft above sea level and being a Kiwi and always close to the sea it actually made it difficult to breath. And considering breathing is rather important especially when your running and yelling for 12 hours a day... we ALL got sick. I don't just mean we got the sniffles, there was Pneumonia and Bronchitis going around. I think overall 4 people ended up leaving training because they were too ill or realised that the job ahead was going to be a bit too intense.

And when I say 12 hours a day... it was actually more like 16... because on top of training we had homework. Homework yay!!!! We spent a lot of our 'homework' time complaining about things though to be honest, about how crap the food was or about how insane it is to be expected to train so much BUT, I hate to admit it, it was all necessary. I'm on campus now and my first 2 announcements were sooo shaky, even though Ive been practicing it for over a month.

Good news is, in my last round of announcements I actually got cheers and applauds by everyone in the lecture. Never before have I felt more like a ROCKSTAR! WOO!

Super amped.. but cant wait to get to bed tonight... the 5.45am start was killer especially being Jetlagged errrr

20 hours in Singapore

What a city! We ended up with an overnight stay in Singapore because we could get the most ridiculously cheap flight if we did. So sweet, a night out in Singapore! Except...Dionne was still feeling the affects of food poisoning :( Although we were staying in a dorm so I asked some of the English girls (Selena and Zoe) in our dorm if I could tag along when they went out for a 'Singapore Sling'.

Im glad I went with these girls, because they had been in the city a few days and knew their way around! I had no idea where they were taking me :P But we ended up at Raffles which is THE PLACE to get a Singapore Sling, for $22!!! (Around the same in NZD). F*** me Ive never had a cocktail that expensive! :P But it was pretty good...

We then moved on planning to get some food, and went down to the river which is apparently the place to be. It was soo busy because the following day was Singapore National Day and it was also the evening that the Olympics started so everyone was watching the opening ceremony on a big screen. Downtown was so pretty as well, it was so clean and lit really well. We met 2 other girls in town - Lindsey and Ada.
There was a bar called 'clinic' where you could sit in a wheelchair and drink out of a drip!! We were set on going to the biggest Ministry of Sound club in the world though, and after asking some Singaporeans where on earth we were, we found it! Although, I didn't even think to have ID on me and they almost didn't let me in! I didn't even know what the drinking age is...

Anyway, it was $20 to get in but that included 2 drink vouchers, and lucky Emily found another 2 drink vouchers in the Ladies! So I was pretty much set for the evening :) We all seemed to loose each other during the night so met up every hour, but me and Lindsey decided we wanted to stay out later than the others, I mean, you don't get to go to the worlds biggest MOS club everyday right?! Although Lindsey did end up going again the next day haha. The club had a few different rooms but we stayed in the main room where there was a rotating dance floor and much better music :)

We caught a cyclo home with a boom box attached so we sang Pussy Cat Dolls 'When I Grow Up' and Oasis all the way back down Orchard Street. Hahaha. It was a great night!

Next morning I was far too tired to get up for breakfast so we hung out in the hostel until it was time to go to the airport. I was soo not ready to leave Asia, but now Im in Perth and can't wait to be back here in November!

Hong Kong

When we were on the boat to Hong Kong, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Well I kind of could.. I WAS expecting a big city. But my God, did it ever end! There was just high rise after high rise for miles. Some were nice, and some looked like a bomb site. We were staying in Kowloon, and as soon as we got there went for a look around. Every single 'alley' was a MALL! It was insane. We probably never got more than 100metres from where we were staying because there was soo much to see. That evening it started raining and we saw a sign saying 'Typhoon warning 1 has been enforced'. Oh, great.

The next morning when we woke up the weather seemed a bit worse and we were meant to be going to Disneyland so I checked their website and now the Typhoon warning was up to number 8! I checked the HK weather site and warning number 8 meant everyone was to stay inside and not much was open. So, we spent the majority of that day in our room reading and sleeping and watching Chinese Soaps, ha! At that point we were more concerned that the typhoon would still be here when we were leaving and we wouldn't be able to catch a boat to Macau to fly out!

Thank goodness, the next day the typhoon warning was lifted and we could go out! It was a long day though, we had to fit a lot in! We went to Lantu Island and up to see the Giant Buddha and Monestry. The views out there were amazing and no pictures I could take gave it justice. The Buddha really is Giant - and it is situated right on top of a hill. Afterwards we went and had a really really yumm vegetarian lunch at the monestry (this is where the monks live).

Then we went to Disneyland! Where all your childhood dreams become true! Unfortunately we happened to be there during the school holidays and since it had been closed the day before it was PACKED! We spent so much time in lines and most of the rides were all of 30 seconds long. However the 30 seconds were still lots of fun! Its funny how it doesn't matter how old you are, if you've wanted to go on the teacups all your childhood its pretty damn exciting even when your 20 or 50! We watched a parade which was also really cool despite it being aimed at 10 year olds, haha. And at the end of the night we watched fireworks over the castle - in true Disney Style! It actually gave me goosebumps it was so cool. It really was like being a kid again...

There were 2 downsides to Disneyland. First was the kids (and adults) pushing in front of you in line. Now kids, I can understand, because they get excited and dont think about anyone but themselves. But Adults? Argh. Every single line we lined up in, including the ice cream line, someone pushed in front of us. Maybe its because we're foreign? I dont know. But it was really annoying!
The other downside was the food. (apart from the popcorn). We got these grosssss noodles for lunch and they ended up giving Dionne food poisoning, and she has been sick since.

I think I have to go back to Hong Kong, because I don't feel like I saw enough of it. Although I think it would take quite some time!

By the way I have uploaded LOTS of photos to Facebook so if you dont have FB, get it. You can search for me by my name!

Macau - Bungy and Casinos all in one day!

To get to Macau we flew from Hanoi to Bangkok, slept on the floor at the airport, then flew from Bangkok to Macau. What a mission! Somehow though when we flew into Macau I wasn't tired, I was excited. Well, I was about to do the worlds highest bungy jump!

I've never really thought of a city as beautiful before, its not really my thing. But Macau IS beautiful. It's so clean and so varied in everything from food to people to buildings. There are buildings as old as 1500 (which for a Kiwi is like the oldest building Ive ever seen!) and then there are a number of amazing modern buildings. Macau is a mini vegas, except more money is spent there annually than in Vegas! (Thanks to rich Chinese men)

The bungy...was REALLY REALLY high. It was so unreal when we got up there. I watched a girl go before me who had never done a bungy before and there she was, doing the worlds highest one. Apparently 95% of people who do the jump its their first time. And you thought I was mad!
I wasn't overly nervous until I was standing on the platform and felt how heavy the cord was, even if I didn't want to jump, I'd be going over the edge because that cord was so heavy it was going to pull me down with it! I closed my eyes for a second until I was falling and then I realised how awesome it was. I kept my eyes open and couldn't believel how fast I was falling! It was soo much fun. Well, it was fun until Id finished bouncing and hung upside down for about 5 mins. I honestly thought maybe they had forgotten about me as there was no one I could see at the bottom. My ankles were really hurting (and were sore for about 3 hours after) and I was pretty dizzy! Eventually I was lowered to the ground and wanted to do it all over again!

That night we got all dressed up for the first time in a while and headed out to the casinos. We didn't even need to go inside, just looking at them from the outside was awesome enough! We did go in and play some pokies, and watch a show or 2, but we really had no idea how to play any of the real games so we just watched other people lose their money! We ended up at MGM casino, where there was a nice little cocktail bar. While we were sitting there, in walked a group of pornstars! I don't know what is so fascinating about porn stars but we couldn't stop looking at them, and neither could the rest of the room. Although it was kind of funny, they looked really gross to me, and you could tell they all thought they were so extremely hot. Laughable.!

Thats really the end of Macau - the next morning we jumped on the boat to Hong Kong!

Vietnam - Hanoi and Halong Bay

* Im now back in Perth until Wednesday. Hoping to sit here for a few hours and update my blog and finish adding photos to facebook!*

As soon as we arrived in Vietnam Dionne and I were completely confused by the currency. I had no idea how much money I needed so got 600,000 dong out at the ATM, which turned out to be only $35, whoops. Then, in true Vietnamese fashion, we got seriously ripped off by a taxi driver. It didnt help we couldn't figure out for ourselves how much he was actually charging us, but by the time we got to the hostel...after being driven to a different hostel we didnt ask for... I had already spent all my dong. We paid more for the taxi than I would ever pay for a taxi at home, and he was STILL arguing with us for more money. We were like 'You've got to be f**king kidding mate, we've already paid your yearly wages!'. Grrr.

Anyway, shit happens, I was pretty pissed off but really just had to get over it. Thank god our hostel was awesome, and we were greeted by some Aussie guys who made us feel right at home. We booked an overnight tour to Halong Bay through the hostel because it was called something like 'rock hard, rock out tour' and promised it to be a whole lot of drunken fun, with the possibility of nakedness. haha.

We set off the next day for 3 hours to Halong Bay, when we got on our boat I was stoked! I thought it was quite possibly the most luxurious place we had stayed our whole trip...until we got our room... Me and Dionne got the room right above the kitchen and beside the engine. SO it was like an extremely noisy sauna. And our shower head didnt work so we had to use the tap and a cup to wash ourselves. Lol. But to be honest I was more concerned about dying of toxic fumes in my sleep.
During the day we went kayaking, the boat had taken us to a place none of the other boats so it was so amazing because I've never heard a place so quiet! A few of us jumped off the roof of the boat which the boys soon discovered wasn't so much fun for their bits. Although I kept jumping because we all know how much Emily loves to jump off high platforms.

During the day a lady in a little boat came around selling bottles of Vodka for 80,000 dong, which is about $5!!! I don't mean a small bottle, I mean a decent sized 40% vodka.

So, we had to get some of that! Later that night when we started drinking it, we realised why it was so cheap, it was DISGUSTING. And even though I haven't really had Cocacola since sometime last year, I felt it was the only thing to drown out the taste at all. We tried playing drinking games but there was way to many of us to know what was going on. At some stage during the night a few of us, including myself, thought it would be smart to jump off the roof of the boat again, drunk and in pitch blackness, knowing from the day that there are jellyfish lurking. And of course, all 4 of us got stung. I was the luckiest, my sting didn't bubble up like the others.

The breakfast they provided the next morning was not really sufficient enough to soak up all the foul vodka, and most of us went back feeling pretty under the weather.

That night Tom, Mike, me and Dionne went out to find a restaurant that was in the Lonely planet and couldn't find it so ended up at some random place where the boys ordered Pigeon! Yum. Ive got some lovely photos of the boys eating Pigeon head.

The next day we went to see Ho Chi Mihns body but unfortunately it was closed sooo we went shopping and I bought a HEAP of stuff, too much stuff to take to the states so I'm going to have to leave it in Perth :(

Best thing about Hanoi: Hanoi Backpackers
Worst thing about Hanoi: Taxi drivers, the heat and only being able to eat spinach and rice.
Verdict: Done Vietnam twice now, don't need to do it again!

Compared to Thailand...
Best things: Food, friendly people, plenty to do, amazing shopping, easy to travel, beautiful country.
Worst things: The afternoon rain, although I learnt to love this too!