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INTERVIEW WITH A BARTENDER MARIANNE VAN DER KOOY, 23 FROM THE NETHERLANDS
MARIANNE VAN DER KOOY, 23, NETHERLANDS
What made you come to Australia to work? I came to Australia on a working holiday visa, just as a back-up in case I ran out of money. There were three jobs I really wanted to do here because I thought they were ‘real Australian’. These were fruit picking, sheep shearing and working as a barmaid in a country pub. And what jobs have you done? I picked oranges and lemons in Renmark (South Australia), worked on a huge cattle station near Cunnamulla (Queensland) to muster goats and help shearing the sheep and eventually I found bar work in a little town called Bruce Rock (Western Australia). Is that what you’re doing now? Yes, I work in a pub which rents out motel rooms as well. The job involves working in the pub – which was also a bottle shop, housekeeping in the motel rooms, serving and preparing dinner for the guests and taking bookings. How did you land this job? I have been working in a homestead in Ross River (Northern Territory) before and I worked over there with a girl who’d been working in Bruce Rock Hotel before. As I planned to go to Perth anyway I thought it’d be perfect to try and get a job over there. I sent them an email with my CV and made a few phone calls – one week later I was working in the pub!
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to hear from the locals about living in remote areas (the Central Wheatbelt). I’ve met so many different people with different reasons for being there! If you’re really interested, the people will tell lots of stories about their (mainly sheep shearing and farming) jobs which I think is so cool to hear about. And actually living in the town makes me feel like a bit of a local. We don’t get paid heaps but there’s lot of work to do, so I am able to save up for my next travels. And what isn’t so great? Sometimes in pubs people get too drunk and start fighting, this can be exiting but it’s a bit scary as well. We have had to refuse some people if they were barred from the pub and that can be annoying too. What was your job back home? I just finished my study in Food Technology but had some random jobs like catering work, sport shops and giving presentations to high school students about Food Technology.
How’s the pay? The pay isn’t too good but I have free accomodation, free meals and a free drink every day so I was really happy with that.
Anything else to share? There is not too much sightseeing to be done in the Central Wheatbelt, but one tourist attraction is Wave Rock. This huge rock is located close to Hyden and has the shape of a wave. My Dutch colleague and I became friends with some locals and they spent a full day showing us around the area and took us to Wave Rock and the nearby Hippo’s Yawn. It was so awesome that the people were friendly enough to do that for us, and no one can beat these guided tours by real locals!
What are the good points? It is really nice to see how the lifestyle is up there and
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