Never Come Back Again

First of all, I’d just like to say that the amount of supportive messages I received after posting my last blog was amazing! For the first time since I moved to Australia, I had felt myself at an all-time low, and so many people stepped up to show that they had my back. I appreciate each and every single one of you :) 

In other news, we’re all settled in our new house now!! It’s my third house since I first moved to Warragul three months ago. Third times a charm, right? As I mentioned before, I had written a post on the Warragul Facebook group and we ended up getting three responses from random people who just happened to have a spare room in their house. Gabi and I looked at the houses two weekends ago, and then we decided which one we’d want to move to so that we could give our landlords two weeks’ notice (I had asked them if they could just keep our bond money so that we wouldn’t have to pay the last two weeks’ rent and they agreed, luckily).

On the Friday evening, we looked at our first option. It was about a 20-minute walk away from our house, and the owner was a 27-year-old guy who grew up in the area, but had been travelling for the past few years. He had a two-bedroom place, so it would just be him with me and Gabi. He was offering $100/week (which is what I was paying at Ali’s place - I was paying $125/week in my second house), and would be able to furnish the room with two single beds.

We went to our second and third options on Saturday morning. The second option was close to the first option and would be with a 34-year-old woman in a three-bedroom house. The plus side of this place was that Gabi and I would each get our own room, meaning we’d get some space to ourselves. She was offering $125/week, and the house was huge so we’d have lots of room. However, Gabi and I both felt that the conversation was a bit more forced, and we could tell that there might be a few more rules in this house.

The third option, Gabi and I had already ruled out before we even got there because it was a 50-minute walk away from our house, and even further away from our work. However, we decided to give it a chance just in case. It was with a middle-aged woman and her 18-year-old son. She ran a daycare, was a smoker, and had two dogs. Nope, nope, and nope. I couldn’t imagine coming home from work and having to deal with a bunch of kids, since I already had to deal with Chloe in the first house.  The lady seemed nice and actually gave us a ride back to town once she found out that we had walked to her house, but it just wasn’t the right fit for us. 

Gabi and I went to McDonald’s to have a long discussion over lunch. We wrote a Pro and Con list about our first two options and it was obvious that we both agreed on where we were wanting to stay. Our decision was mostly based on the fact that we’re in Australia to have an experience so we want to live somewhere that will feel like home. Somewhere where we could potentially see ourselves hanging out with the owner - having long chats or going out. We didn’t want to just live somewhere where we felt like we were living in someone else’s home, cooking in someone else’s kitchen, and casually just saying, “Hey, how was your day?” in the evenings while passing in the hallway. Therefore, even though it would have been really awesome to have our own rooms, we

Summer clothes vs Winter clothes :( 

decided to go with option 1, as we decided it would be the most comfortable situation. I messaged Paul and told him that we’d be happy to move in two weeks later if he’d still have us, and he said yes!

Last week at work was pretty quiet… my supervisor sent us home at lunch on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, which kind of sucked. On Wednesday and Friday, he gave us the option to help clean out another shed, which I did on Wednesday, but on Friday I decided not to since I needed to pack up the house. I planned out my time so that I could pack up my room on Thursday night and pack up the kitchen on Friday night. I didn’t realize how much stuff we had accumulated!! On Friday after work, I had to walk to the car rental place in order to pick up the car at 4pm and by the time I got there, it started pouring rain (which has basically continued from that moment up until now)!! I then drove to the grocery store to pick up some boxes for moving and then started packing up the kitchen. The next morning, I woke up early to start packing up the car, clean the kitchen, and vacuum the floors. I was determined to get out as early as possible since we had picked up our key at 9am on a Saturday and I was pretty sure the landlords weren’t going to be too lenient, given our history with them. I also decided to leave the place somewhat clean because I didn’t want to end up hearing from them again.

Paul messaged me at 9:45am to say that he just got back home, so we jumped in the car and drove over. He was shocked when we

When you know everyone at the grocery store...

just kept bringing more and more stuff in the house. We spent a couple of hours unpacking everything in the kitchen and our rooms. I decided to only take out my winter clothes since my summer clothes are no longer necessary in this weather (which meant I literally only had to take out like five things). For those of you who don’t know, I had put my other two suitcases in storage so that I wouldn’t have to carry them around (for $14/bag/month, which wasn’t too bad). When I first got to Melbourne, I bought a smaller suitcase and put all of my summer clothes in that since I assumed that I’d only be gone for three months. However, the weather has gotten so cool and I was constantly freezing, so I decided I HAD to get my suitcases back. Lucky for me, Gabi has a friend who’s an au pair in Melbourne so I was able to get the suitcases delivered to that house on Thursday. Then we could pick them up when we went to Melbourne! After we finished unpacking, we went to the last 15 minutes of the Warragul Farmers’ Market just to see what it was like. I was actually surprised as to how many stalls they had, even though most of them had already shut down. It only happens once every month, so I guess we’ll have to wait until next time! We went to a sushi restaurant for lunch, and then we did our grocery shopping for the week. That evening, we just decided to relax since we’d have a busy day on Sunday.

On Sunday morning, we got up early so that we could leave the house by 9am. We drove to Melbourne to go to Gabi’s friend’s house and I was finally reunited with my suitcases! It felt like Christmas, because it had been four months since I last opened them and I

didn’t even remember what was inside. I was just happy to see my winter jacket again! After we put the suitcases in the car, we went to a nearby mall, where we stopped at K-Mart and The Big W (Walmart) to buy everything we needed for the new place. Then we had a quick lunch before driving to our big destination: Healesville Sanctuary! Gabi and I had booked (and paid for) close-up encounters with some of the animals, and we arrived ten minutes before the first encounter. Gabi went on her encounter with the kangaroos, so I just took pictures. We then had about a half hour to look at some of the other animals before our next encounter, which was with a KOALA!!! So folks, I finally got to see a koala in Australia; I was so excited! We only got to stand under it, as I think holding koalas in Victoria is illegal. But it was so cute! It definitely made my day. After our encounter, we only had about 45 minutes left until the park closed, so we ran around with our umbrellas in the rain to see emus, dingos, tasmanian devils, and platypuses (platypi?). We drove back to Warragul to drop everything off at the house, and I unpacked my suitcases. Afterwards, we had to take the car back to the car rental, and Allen came to pick us up and take us to his house because

he and Viola invited us over for dinner, which was beef noodles - so delicious!! We didn’t get home until late that night, but it was such a good day! Also, since we moved to this house, I’ve been sleeping like a baby! In the last house, I would wake up in the middle of the night every single day, and I’d be exhausted at work all the time. Now, I haven’t had a problem and I feel so refreshed. I must have let go of all the stress, which is good.

Kangaroos!

This week at work, our supervisors have been struggling to give us hours. They said that since we don’t have any sunlight, the plants aren’t growing fast enough, so there’s less work for us to do, and then we end up finishing too fast. Today, he cut the Arch Support team down to three people (lately there’s been 9 people), so we worked until 2 and then he sent us to another shed to help with cleaning. I’m happy that he’s at least trying to find us work because my paycheques keep getting smaller and smaller as we get more and more into winter. Anyway, after this week is finished, I’ll only have eight weeks left at the farm! The time goes by so fast over here. I’d also just like to point out that this weekend will be my ten-year high school reunion, which absolutely blows my mind. At this time ten years ago, I would have been trying to decide if I wanted to au pair in France or Germany, or work at Disneyworld. I don’t know if I ever shared that decision on here.. Back when I was trying to figure out my life (okay, let’s face it, I’m STILL trying to figure out my life), I was searching aupairworld.com, looking for the perfect family. I got in contact with two main families - one in Germany and one in France. Upon further research, I found out that in order to get a Visa for Germany, I would have to pass a German test and since I didn’t know one word of German, I figured I should probably go for France. However, I was ALSO applying to work at Disneyworld. Not as a Disney princess (as much as I would have liked), but just as your normal fastfood/restaurant worker. Who wouldn’t want to work at the happiest place on earth?! I filled in all of the applications, got my references, did the half hour Skype interview, and I waited for a response. The response never seemed to come though, and when my French family said that they needed a decision by the end of the week, I decided to just go for it. I wrote them back and said that I would be their au pair. Three days later, I received a massive Welcome package in the mail from Disneyworld. I had been offered the job… Well, fate brought me to France, which is what started all of my travels and I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for those decisions that I had made when I was 18. So here I am! I hope everyone has been doing well! I have never felt so jealous to see all of the sunny pictures that everyone is posting! Love always

Never Come Back Again - Austin Plaine

Hold On

I just spent the last ten minutes sitting on the couch, contemplating whether I should cry or write... What would help let out the most emotion? I guess writing won, because here I am… The truth is, I’ve finally reached the point of feeling defeated. So much has happened during the past week, specifically during a 24-hour period from Thursday night to Friday night. I swear that you could name any type of emotion, and I would have felt it at least once during those 24 hours. I am so emotionally drained right now, and it’s already been three days. Let me catch you up…

Last weekend, Gabi and I looked at our three house options, which I think I’ll write about in a completely different post. The good news is we’ve found a place that we’ll be moving into this Saturday, on the 19th. On Saturday night, Gabi decided to go into Melbourne to visit her friend, so I spent the evening with my two French roommates since they were moving out the following day. Gauthier helped me make cookies, which I don’t think he was too happy about, but I appreciated the gesture. Then Nico, Gauthier, and I watched Love Actually, because why not force two guys to watch a rom-com on a Saturday night? The next morning, they left to go work on a different farm about 7 hours away, and I was so sad to see them leave!

On Monday, we went back to work, and my department collectively decided to work as slow as possible while still meeting the target. Unfortunately for my coworkers, on Thursday, my supervisor told everyone that they’d be going to a different shed after lunch. Then he came up to me and said that everyone would be leaving after lunch except me! I tried to hide how happy I was, but it didn’t work. Anyway, I did arch support all by myself that afternoon, and I left in such a good mood! My supervisor said that the next day, it would just be me and another girl. That evening, I was just getting ready for bed when my friend Judy sent me a message with a link. A link to an ad with the house that I was currently living in.. It said that the house would be available for inspection on May 19th at 11am (the day that we were moving out), and people could move in on the 20th. It also said that there was a minimum 6-month term, and they raised all of the prices for the rooms ($200 for one person, $300 for two - we were currently paying $125 each). I was livid. I felt stupid because I ACTUALLY thought that they might be having family problems at home, which was the reason why they needed to repossess the house. But no.. they were kicking us out just to get more money. I decided to write a post of my own and post it on Gumtree, which I’ll attach. I actually ended up getting a reply that evening, asking more about it and thanking me for the heads up. 

On Friday morning, I got up to get ready for work and then came back into the bedroom to get changed. Gabi then went to the bathroom so that she could get ready.  As I was changing, the heater was on so it was drowning out all of the background noise, but

I kept hearing yelling by the front door. I honestly thought that the landladies had shown up to the house at 5:30 in the morning to get mad about the post. Then I heard my name being called, and I really didn’t want to deal with them. I finished getting dressed and walked out, only to see Gabi lying on the floor in the front entrance, and a couple of my housemates kneeling beside her. I instantly knew that Gabi had had a seizure, as she had told me that she had epilepsy, but she hadn’t had an episode in 3.5 years. I ran over and she was lying on her back, motionless, with her face as white as a ghost and her lips blue. I had never seen anything like it! I knew we had to get her to lie on her side - thanks to my previous flatmate in London who had epilepsy, and told me that if she ever had an episode (which luckily, I never had to deal with), I needed to roll her on her side. When we rolled her onto her side, she woke up but her eyes were rolled back and she was frothing at the mouth, and she was trying to talk but only noises were coming out. It was like she was braindead, or a zombie. She then started pulling away from us, trying to get on her stomach instead of her side, which I let her do because at least she could breathe. Everything else is a blur - all I remember is running back to my room to grab my phone so I could call an ambulance. We all thought the number was 999 but I tried it twice, and it said that the number was disconnected! Up until that point, I remained quite calm, but I started freaking out when I couldn’t call for an emergency. I literally had to Google what number I had to dial (which for future reference is 000). The lady kept me calm and told me to put Gabi back on her side, which Mei and Wendy helped me with. She then asked me if I could try to wake her up so I tried. Gabi kept going in and out of sleep, waking up, looking confused and wanting to get up, then lying back down and sleeping again. The lady stayed on the line with me until the ambulance arrived, which took 12 minutes (they came at 5:50am). Then the two paramedics got Gabi onto the couch. I had to run into the room to look for Gabi’s passport and insurance information, while the paramedics tried to keep Gabi awake. One of them asked if I could come with her to the hospital so that she’d have someone there when she woke up so I grabbed my things (completely forgetting any money or credit card) and Gabi’s things while they put her on the stretcher to take her into the ambulance. The paramedics were quite nice and visited with me on the way to the hospital, asking what my plans were after the tomato farm and what it was like working there. We then got to the hospital, where they transferred her onto a bed. Then there were two nurses and two doctors who came in and out (I think they were just changing from night shift to day shift) to do numerous tests. They took blood samples but then the doctor came in and said that they cancelled the blood tests because it might end up costing Gabi a bunch of money, so they were just going to stick to basic tests. Gabi fell in and out of sleep during the morning and I was completely exhausted from everything that had happened, but the doctors wanted to keep an eye on her for a couple of hours. They finally let us go around 10am so I called a taxi and we got home just before 10:30. Four hours in the hospital and both of us were exhausted!

At 11, I got a text message from the landperson, which said, “Hi Janelle just read your house warning on gumtree, very poor form young lady & slanderous as well. All of the other tenants had already given US 2 weeks notice and were not evicted & after discussion with u we gave you 28 days notice which doesn’t seem to be mentioned. We require longer term tenants for this property & unfortunately we had to ask u to leave. The comments u have made are stretching the truth in your favour & quite frankly are defamatory to us. You have the right to your say but when it is a personal attack & what I consider defamation of our character on a public site, I will advise you that we will be seeking legal advice. Leanne.” I decided I should call my family for advice and they told me I should remove the post and then apologize, which I did, “Hi Leanne, I have removed the post and I am sorry if it seemed like a personal attack. When we were told you wanted to repossess the house, I understood because I thought that maybe you were having problems at home or with your family, and I was truly trying to empathize. However, when I saw the post that you were looking for new tenants, I did feel like it was a personal attack on us. Personally, I would have liked to know that this situation was going to occur before I moved in, because it caused both of us a lot of undue stress, and Gabi actually ended up having a seizure this morning because of everything that’s been happening, so we both aren’t at work today because we had to go to the hospital. I don’t want this to cause more stress on her or me, and again I’m sorry about the post but I just didn’t want this happening to more of my coworkers. Janelle.” I then phoned her as a follow-up and she was nice once again and asked how we’d be getting to work since everyone would be moved out that weekend, then asked if we wanted to take the beds and said that they could help us move them if we wanted, asked how Gabi was doing, and wished us the best of luck. I just told her I wanted to move on and not have to worry about this any longer, as the stress was obviously not worth it for either Gabi nor I. I still felt horrible and nervous that something else would come out of it, but there wasn’t much more that I could do. I then went on my Facebook and saw that my mom had sent me a message about being kind to unkind people, and not letting a person’s bitterness change the person you are. To keep your character at all times. And that’s when I realized that maybe, I was letting this situation really get to me, and I was dealing it in a way that I probably shouldn’t be proud of. I was disappointed in myself.

On Saturday and Sunday, other than walking to the shops and back, I was still too tired to do anything. I felt lost. I was still feeling all of the emotions from the day before, and I felt like I needed to escape. The past three months of me being in Warragul, I feel like I’ve been constantly trying to defend myself. I haven’t been able to fully relax because as soon as I do, a new problem arises. I have finally reached my breaking point and while I’ve remained strong during this entire time, I don’t know how much longer I can do it for. Even though I haven’t reached my 88 days at the farm (I'm only on day 60), I've been seriously contemplating moving to Melbourne so that I can just start my life there because I feel like Warragul is making me into a toxic person. On Monday morning, our housemates said that they would come pick us up for work at 6:40 (I started at 7) since they normally drove us when they lived here. However, at 6:45, they still weren’t there. I then called them at 6:50 and there wasn’t an answer. I then started freaking out because I figured we wouldn’t be getting to work on time and since I already missed work on the Friday, it wasn’t looking good for me. They arrived at our house at 6:56 and we didn’t make it to the parking lot until 7:02. It usually takes 10 minutes just to walk from the parking lot to the front door so I had to sprint into work and walk into the staff meeting late, at 7:08. :( After the meeting, my supervisor asked to talk to me and another guy who was also late, and said that we couldn’t do that again. He said he knows that we’re good people, but if we start coming in late then everyone else would start coming in late as well if they don't see it as a problem. I assured him that if I had known I was going to be late, I would have just walked to work and that it wouldn’t happen again. I absolutely hate disappointing people so it definitely started work on a sour note, and I was still full of emotions from the weekend. On top of that, I got the following seven hours to myself just to think about everything (I swear if the tomatoes could hear my thoughts, they’d know everything about me). All of a sudden, my chest felt extremely heavy, the air felt extremely thick, and I was having difficulty breathing. I had to bend over and take deep breaths, and fight back tears. I actually felt full. Like I couldn’t fit anymore feelings inside of me. I got through the day, but spoke with my colleagues about how I wanted to escape Warragul. They were all so good with trying to cheer me up (which is why I love my job and my coworkers!) and telling me to just wait until I move into my new place, and things will get better.

I came back home, which is what brought me to writing my blog. Actually, halfway through me writing it, Gabi came home from work, saw me, asked if I was okay and if I wanted a hug, and I instantly burst into tears (sorry if I made you feel awkward, Gabi!). I feel a MILLION times better now - I must have just needed a good cry. I haven’t let myself cry since I’ve moved to Australia because I needed to stay strong so I could figure out plan B and C and D and E, etc. But I think it was finally just too much for me to handle. So I should be good for another four months at least :) Hope everyone is doing well!! Love always

Hold On - RIVVRS

Diamond Dreams

It's already the beginning of May and the things to catch everyone up on never end (it’s a good thing though)! Two weeks ago, Katie

My Salmon Poke Salad

and her husband Gerry were in Melbourne, so I decided to meet up with them there. I had been planning to take the train but then Allen and Viola graciously offered me a ride. We arrived in Melbourne at around 11am and then I took the tram to Queen Victoria Market and met up with Katie and Gerry around 11:30am. We were also meeting with Gerry’s cousin Andrew and his wife Janine, who live in Melbourne, so they were able to show us around. Gerry has an account on instagram, which is dedicated solely to food pictures, so he wanted to go to as many restaurants as possible. We went for lunch to a place called Kitty Burns, and I order a salmon poke salad, which was absolutely gorgeous (and tasted great too!). After lunch, we went to the Abbotsford Convent to take a walk through the park, and then we headed over to Fitzroy, which is kind of like a hipster neighbourhood. Katie and I got gelato, and then we all walked down the street and checked out the shops. We went back to Andrew and Janine’s house so that everyone could recharge, and then they took us to a microbrewery called Two Birds, where Katie and I split a sample tray of beer and some patatas bravas (which is all I ate when I was in Spain). After that, I had to catch my train back to Warragul or I’d have to wait a couple of hours for the next one, so they dropped me off at the station. It was such a

Drinks with Katie!

nice visit and so good to see some familiar faces in Melbourne!

On Sunday, we just had a relaxing day and walked to the grocery store to stock up on groceries for the week. The next week was a short week at work since there was a public holiday on Wednesday called Anzac Day. It’s more of a sad day and is kind of like a day of remembrance. The tomato farm wanted us to work extra fast that week since we’d need to finish the whole shed in four days this time (which we had been doing for the past couple of weeks anyway). We actually finished everything by Friday morning so then we had to do stumping, which is basically just walking through the rows, finding any of the dead plants, and cutting them down. It’s superboring and no one likes doing it, so we’ve been trying to avoid it at all costs. On my day off on Wednesday, I was in a huge baking mood so I made cinnamon loaf in the morning, followed by my traditional lemon cupcakes in the afternoon. It all disappeared quite fast, but it’s always nice knowing that people enjoy it! Thursday was the day that we got the eviction message from our landlords, so I spent the day letting out all of my emotions and then tried to forget about it for the weekend.

My hair!!

On Friday, it was my birthday!!!! I went to work that morning and one of my friends (Judy) made me some brownies! We luckily got sent home early that day (around 1:30pm), so I went home and relaxed before going out that evening. One of my coworkers (Jun) is a hairdresser back at home, so she offered to come over before we went out so that she could do my hair as a gift. She came over around 6pm and did such a nice job on my hair! I might have to see if she can be my permanent hairdresser while I’m in Australia. We all made our way to the bowling alley but didn’t get started until about 7:30. There was such a big turnout - I think about 23 people showed up! Not only that, but it’s the first Facebook event that I’ve made where everyone RSVP’d on time AND there was a 100% “Attending” list. A dream for me! I’ve never had an event planned so flawlessly! It was actually my first time playing a full game of 10-pin bowling so it’s no surprise that I didn’t do the best. But it was so fun! That entire night, my cheeks were hurting from smiling and laughing constantly. I haven’t had a birthday where I’ve felt so special in years! After bowling, a bunch of us headed to the pub (Newmason) for drinks. I was only able to keep myself awake until 12:30 and then we headed home. 

The next day, I went to Melbourne with Allen, Viola, and Nina. We drove to a regional park northwest of Melbourne called Mount Macedon, where we got to see the autumn leaves in full force. We met up wth some other people from work and stopped at a cafe for lunch, and then we checked out the area. For me, it was pretty entertaining to watch everyone take photo after photo, trying to get the perfect shot of throwing leaves up in the air or jumping in the middle of the street. We spent a few hours in the area and then we drove back to Melbourne, where we met up with MORE people from work to have dinner at a Korean barbecue restaurant called Drumtong. It was so cool! There was a grill in the middle of the table and then they would cook the meat right in front of us. What I didn’t realize about Korean chopsticks though is that they’re flat instead of round, so that was a bit difficult to get used to! I ended up just using a fork instead :) We basically just ate a lot of beef and pork, and then for dessert, they had these taco-like things 

So happy this girl came to see me!!
Me, Roberta (Italy), and Akane (Japan)

with green tea ice cream inside. After dinner, we spent some time in central Melbourne to check out the Asian supermarket and get some bubble tea, and then we drove back to Warragul, so I didn’t get home until after midnight again. The following day, I just relaxed as I was completely exhausted from the weekend. 

This week at work, we worked too fast once again so our supervisor put a lot of us in different departments. We ended up having to spend a full day doing random tasks, which was so boring! I think I’ve convinced the other girls to start working slower so that we don’t have to do all of the random work. I’ve been getting a ride home with one of the supervisor’s friends and he said that right now, they’re able to find us random tasks to do but soon, there won’t be much left to do. He said that if we continue working at the same speed, we’ll end up not having work on Fridays so we have to work slower in order to ensure that we get five days each week. 

In other news, I received an anonymous comment on one of my blog posts from Ali’s newest ex-au pair. This is what it said:

Well, I am one of the following aupairs and made my decision to quit after 4 days.

It makes me feel a bit better to read that I'm not the only one she's upset with.

When I arrived the house was a mess! I spend my first two days with cleaning all day long - while Ali sat on the couch in front of her phone (well who'd guessed haha). The day she wanted to show me everything ended up with me asking her where to put things and where to find x y. She couldn't give me proper answers so I just tried to sort things myself. (Btw the aupair room wasn't even prepared, she was an hour late and I was told to look after Chloe 15 min after we first met ....)

After the last days of tidying up and cleaning I told her that I'm not a maid and I wouldn't tidy up HER room where she just slaps

The Dream Team - My department!
Judy, Jun, Me, Ming, Suzuka & Akane

down everything. And that she need to find someone else replacing me. I have her a week to figure out how to deal with it.

Today she came home and said "all my aupairs has helped me, but you are not" (because I didn't wash 5 cloth items to safe water, as we ran out of water the day befor!!!). I told her that she needs to find an other person and I'm not the right one for helping her. "I need to spend the whole day cleaning tomorrow" (Anzac day). Well yep. I guess that's your part then. Not mine.

(Bathrooms still disgusting, microwave still disgusting, still not organized, still "the asians", still she wants to kick people out but doesn't, still a mess everywhere... nothing has changed)

Well, I guess this lady might not change and always will have trouble in cooping with humans. 

Thanks for sharing your story. Just got a hint about this story after my discussion with Ali tonight.

Church in Mt. Macedon

I decided to look into seeing if there was some way that you could report a family and prevent them from getting anymore au pairs, but it seems like there’s absolutely no protection that is set-up, which is quite sad. Interesting to read the comment though! I don’t think Ali will be getting many au pairs that would be willing to stay for a long period of time.

On the topic of looking for houses, I decided to add a post to the Warragul facebook page, saying that Gabi and I would need new accommodation by May 23rd, and I actually got quite a lot of responses back. The most entertaining comment, however, was one lady who posted, “I’m not sure if this is real. Someone just posted a similar request from Taiwan. Do these people even have visas to work here? I don’t think I’d feel safe about having someone illegal in my house.” Someone actually commented, “Yes, I agree. I have a friend who works there and I can ask about this person.” Gabi and I were shocked that people had enough time on their hands to write comments such as these! I then replied that the company has over 300 employees and we all have visas in order to work there. She responded thank you for the reassurance and then the guy commented that my profile looked real, so the post might be legit. The lady then deleted all of the comments, which was nice since it probably would have stopped us from finding somewhere to live. I got three replies from people who live in Drouin (which is where Sonia and I lived for two days but it was too difficult to get back and forth to work), and then I got three messages from people in Warragul. Gabi and I will be looking at one place tonight, and then two places tomorrow, and hopefully we'll be able to choose one of the three options. It's nice to know that we don't have any competition since all of these people are literally just opening up their homes for us - a couple of them are even going to buy us beds! As usual, I believe that everything happens for a reason so I know this will all make sense in a few months. Until then, we have some decisions to make! Hope everyone is doing well. Love always

Diamond Dreams - Castro

Korean BBQ

Me with my ice cream taco

Old roommates - Jason, Ailee, Viola, Allen, Me

Current roommates (for now) - Me, Gabi, Nicolas, and Gauthier