Work

1-3-2014

    Hey, that's the first time I've gotten to write "2014". 

    We're busy here, working at the blueberry farm. It seems we're very useful, especially Luke with all his experience driving tractors and four-wheelers before, not to mention his mechanical and electrical know-how. We've been asked to stay the whole season, which would be sometime in February. I don't know that I want to stay too long into February, but we're both willing to stay through the end of January. We were given the choice between working here, in Ohuopo on the North Island, or in Southland on the South Island, but we like it here and we don't want to rush to the south island and miss good stuff on the north island, so we're staying here. 

    We work a lot. We typically work 12 hour shifts but Luke has worked up to 17 hours. Or I should say nights, since we work through the night. The shortest day we've worked was actually a day, and it was actually a timely 9 hours, but it was on a Sunday which everyone normally has off. We haven't had a day off yet. Soon we will, though.

    When we're not working we're usually sleeping. We get into town every couple of days to get groceries and supplies, but otherwise we don't do much else. 

   Work is not hard, it's just tiring. It's factory line work. We stand at a belt and pick out squishy blueberries from the hordes of berries that move past. Sometimes we load the front of the machine with the blueberries, sometimes we run around with bins of sorted blueberries and put them where they're supposed to go. Where they go depends on the quality of blueberries in the bin. Eventually they will either be frozen and packaged, or mushed and juiced for jellies, spreads, and ice cream. The green ones get composted. Luke gets to drive the fork lift sometimes, and he also helps unload the trucks that come and deliver loads of blueberries. He knows as much, if not more (probably more), than our supervisor. Our supervisor's supervisor and the owners work with Luke more frequently than not, because he's just so handy. Me, I just mostly work the line, and pick up odds and ends chores to break up the days a bit. I have a great advantage in what I do, in that I'm not at all afraid of spiders, or any bugs in general. That's good because there are bugs everywhere. Or course, Luke isn't afraid of bugs either. I guess no-one on the wet line (our particular belt) is, or we wouldn't be working there.

   Our feet are sore, our backs are aching, and our fingers are stained blue and brown. At a certain point, even lemon juice doesn't work. We end our days soaked because of all the hosing down we do for cleaning, and I'm usually cold because I hose out the freezer every night. But I actually like it. The freezer never feels that cold, and on Christmas I was elated to be in any sort of cold at all. It made it feel more like Christmas. 

    We live on campus of the factory/farm here, and we have been given free reign to use the bathrooms and shower whenever we want. Hot shower. We use it every day right after work. By then everyone else has left, except the manager (the supervisor's supervisor), but by the time we're done showering even he's gone. We lock up. 

   It's kind of nice to be able to use the amenities when the place isn't full of activity. Night shift isn't so bad. Plus, night shift is where the long hours are are at, and more hours mean more money. That opens up a lot more options for us, like maybe we can go to Australia too, or scuba dive in a world class spot, or ski out west (in the US) on our way back home. Or just stay in New Zealand longer. We'll let you know when once we decide.