Farmwork in Kyabram

Hello everyone,

When I came back from Germany after Christmas, I was 100% sure that I would do my 88 days of farmwork to apply for my second working visa here in Australia. Farmwork usually involves helping farmers with harvest in remote areas. As backpackers, we are often exploited, but I still wanted to give it a chance, so I applied to several farmers before even going on the Great Ocean Road trip. One farmer replied and said that my friend Anna and I could work there, on the condition that we work very hard. At that time, this did not discourage us, so we decided to go to Kyabram, three hours away from Melbourne, a week later. The bus cost me $80 and unfortunately, Anna cancelled on me just before. So I went alone, with a uneasy feeling, to the farm.

I wasn't greeted by the farmer but by 4 German guys. Two arrived on the same day as me and the other two had been there for a few weeks already.

Based on their stories, I had an even more uncomfortable feeling, but the visa gave me motivation.

The accommodation was cheap and you could tell. Everything was dirty, the water was brown, the rooms were cold and full of insects.

The next morning, we were supposed to start at 7 am, but the farmer arrived 45 minutes late. In the beginning, he was still nice and explained everything to us. When we asked him about the payment, he said that he (the owner and boss) didn't know and that his brother would handle it, so we should ask him. That's when we realized that something was not right. When we finally started picking fruits, we were all still very slow, but that's not uncommon in the beginning. It was a very hard work, as we had our picking bag on our shoulders the whole time, and it could get really heavy.

During the lunch break, we were already exhausted because it was just so tiring, and when we finally met the boss's brother and he revealed the payment, we were completely discouraged. He said that you would get $18 for half a bucket. It took me 2.5-3 hours to fill such a bucket. The guys who had been there longer took 1-1.5 hours if they were fast, so I could have at most reduced that to 1.5-2 hours. So we decided on the first day during the lunch break to quit the whole thing. After some consideration, of course, we didn't do it because I wanted to stay long enough to get out of it without any costs. That meant 7 days of terrible farm work. During this time, I decided that Australia is just not worth it for me. I really love my life here, but that's not a reason to let myself be exploited like this.

The worst day was the second to last day when we had to work in 42°C midday heat without shade and without a break. That was really awful. But I survived all of that. Here are some pictures:

(We often found spiders, which was pretty disgusting)

After 7 days, I packed my things and went back to Melbourne. Until today, I don't regret that decision at all, because what was waiting for me in Melbs was much better, but I'll tell you about that in the next post.

See you later,

xoxo

M.