The Store

I waited out the New Zealand winter working as front of house in a restaurant in a spectacular location right next to the pacific ocean. The place was called Kekerengu and is in the middle of nowhere, I had to drive 70km to Blenheim to do my shopping. When I arrived it was absolutely freezing and it being New Zealand the staff house had no heating except a crap stove but it being a staff house there was no fuel - I slept in thermals in my sleeping bag with a duvet and two blankets and was still cold. I swear my room was designed as a fridge. I soon moved to a different staff house and got to foraging in the woods for wood - the daily chaw of dragging fallen pones back and cutting them up with a bow saw. Working in the store was a bit of a throw back since my very first job was in a restaurant! It could be fairly outrageous at times the staff hassle at the Store. The majority of the waiting staff employed are travelers and often don't have English as their first language (I was living and working with mostly South Americans) and they only stay a short while so the permenent staff are sick to the teeth of training new staff. I had to deal with raging chefs regularly - chefs have a tendency to act like 6 year old boys. It was tough at times, I worked really hard for 12 weeks - pruning on my days off. About the only exciting thing I did was a day skiing with one of the chefs, Rich. We went up to Rainbow Skifields for a day. It was 10 years since I'd last snow boarded but by the end of the day I'd reached the standard I was before. Rich on the other hand had never been before and hiss attitude was to go as fast as possible in a straight line until he fell off, much to the amusement of anybody watching. I drove him home shaking and white with pain in his ankle! Anyway, after 12 weeks hard graft and a long cold winter in New Zealand I was more than ready to leave for Bali - sunshine and fantastic surf!