Mount Isa

Life in the mining town from then on was rather uneventful with my whole life pretty much evolving around work. I guess a bit of a dose of reality after all the travelling. Although I definitelty learnt a thing or two about Australia and Aussies in this crazy place.

I don't think i've been called 'mate' so many times in my life... In England its more a guy thing i'd say but here anyone is 'mate,' pretty strange if you ask me- I figured it was just part of the Aussie stereotyping you see on movies but apparently its not just Crocodile Dundee that says it!

I'm also still getting used to people saying 'good job!' to me when I serve them a drink or clear their plates- At first I couldn't work out if it meant 'well done' or 'thanks'... I'm pretty sure it means the latter now after hearing it a fair a fair few times but I always like to think that they think i'm good at what i'm doing- a nice little pick me up :)

Another thing i've learnt that if there's one thing that is worse than women with PMS its chefs. Jesus, they all must die from stress induced heart-attacks! Never happy, always wanting something done differently and yelling at you even if your doing something they've asked you to do!
If I had to give them one piece of advice it would be this: talk to each other. The amount of times I've been yelled at because of doing something in a way that they do not like- which is exactly how i've been told how to do it by someone else is ridiculious! They all need to sit down and communicate and then they might finally be happy...maybe.
Although in saying that they are always laughing and joking, ....so my conclusion is you either have to be really passionate about food if you want to be a chef.... or just plain mad!

Mount Isa may have been a place in the middle of nowhere, a dirty dusty old mining town with the beauty of an industrial plant but as I always say it really is the people who you meet that really make a place really mean something to me.

I met some amazing people in that place, from the weird and wonderful to the lovely to the damn right crazy- Mount Isa had them all.

Firstly I have to mention a forty-something Kiwi women who became one of my most treasured friends for the duration of my time there, Chris. She was my room mate and was probably the person I spent most of my time with- when not working! She is a wonderfully warm and generous lady and could talk like she was 'down with the kids.' She introduced me to a life of drinking green tea and fruit and yoghurt for breakfast. She was my groceries friend, cinema buddy and all round gossip queen. She probably knows as much about my friends and family in England as they do. As i've heard all about Callamallah and Culamullah! And just when you thought you had her pegged she'd do something to completely shock you like bringing a bag of shots home from work (a bottle shop) and insist we take five in a row!

My other room mate, Tim from Essex, an essex lad through and through always with the banter. A fellow Inbetweeners lover, (although shamefully I watched the film without him and even Chris saw it before him!) we spent most of the time cracking jokes and fooling about. And he's sad enough to be going back to Mount Isa after Christmas and New Years... what a loser haha.

The hostel owner was Kim an old Korean man, who who always pleasant. He spent most of his time of some kind of handy man mission, while his wife Polly ran the hostel. Polly was one of those all round lovely people- always happy and keeping busy.

The night manager was also called Chris, although he was a old grumbling man most of the time. Living off the glory of once being some kind of hot shot chef in London's Notting Hill (although just how good remains a suspicion of mine,) and boosting about his super large collection of downloaded films on the hostel hard drive. He spent most of his time making his famous salad and showing his cooking off to whoever listened and being wound up royally by a Kiwi lad called Tim.

Tim is defintely one of a kind. The type of person that is there was more than one of them in a room at one time the world would implode. Very quick witted but an absolute fool 100% of the time- he constantly had you in stiches and knew excatly how to drive Chris round the bend. The breadmaker inccident right before I left was probably one of the best.

Chris obviously a chef so has to show off and make his own bread, for some reason had asked Tim for his expertise in making cheese and bacon bread. Of course it led to diaster. Chris in bed asleep while the bread maker burnt down destroying the bread and almost taking Chris with it if Tim hadn't knocked on his door to wake him up when he spotted smoke coming out of his bedroom window. Although he didn't get get any thanks caused he was blamed for the who incident, but if your going to take Tim'd advice what do you expect! That was his first mistake!

Others staying at the hostel on a long term basis included Cat a girl from Melbourne working as a nurse in the mines, Clem and Matty who both worked in the mines, and Sisco a young guy from German on a 6 mth contract at the Isa working as a chef as part of his Chef training.

Cat had a fantasic sense of humour and initiatived the idea for 'Pet day' which was purely invented to wind Chris up, were we were going to get whatever animals we could find and bring them to the hostel for a day, (there was a house two doors down with bred camels and had a baby camel which was going to be the star attraction!) unfortunetly this idea didn't take off before I left.

Clem, a guy I got on really well with and had many fun nights with including the night where we played accent factor while reading ithe latest copy of 'famous' magazine. He had a built in radar for gossip girl and always managed to walk into the living room when i'd just put it on but claimed not to like it... likely story :p

Matty, a guy from Brissy, who also went by the name of 'suss cunt,' due to his large use of the word cunt. Never have I heard anyone manage to fit the word cunt so many times into one sentence.

Sisco was a lovely young german guy. Quiet but really sweet and passionate about karate and chefery and as it turns out Cat too!

And let me not forget Bill! Jesus Christ. A die-hard Christain who converted from his no good lifestyle when he saw God appear to him through a bright light through his window one night, (or it could have just been a headlight!) He had a dream that God had choosen him to travel around Australia by bicycle (!) and spread the gospel. Quite interesting to listen to and even more interesting when listening to him discussing how to attempt to tell a gay man that he's going to hell! I'd listened a lot to what he had to say but when he said that I thought enough is enough and I had to tell him to stop, as he didn't really care about the reprecussions set on serving 'God's word'- after all isn't religion supposed to be about loving all men despite their supposed flaws?!

Let's not forget all the girls and guys from the Rodeo bar where I worked for the last couple of months too! The two Phillapeano women Marylou and Filma, who were like the Cinderalla's fairy god mothers and Frank also from the Phillapeans, Dorothee from France who I laughed with at stupid customers, Crystal from Korea who's one of the sweetest people i've ever met and Ashani from Ski Lanka who's juist adorable- all who I got to know well working morning shifts.
Alisha from Ireland, Ashely from somewhere in England (!) who now lives is Oz, Liam from Blackburn who I shared a similar love of comedy with, Rod from Paris who's English isn't great but is full of life and is a lovely person although a little crazy :p , Mandi who lives in Mt Isa with her family and has some of the best dance moves i've seen :) Karlyn, Anna, Peta, Reana and then Carla, Sasha from the gaming room and Vicky and Ann-Marie our managers.

And of course those moaning stressed out but brilliant and funny Chefs Vicky, Amit, Krishna, Ida, Peter, Katsun and Ronnie (although I never did once see the last three complain about anything!)

For all it might have been a weird place in the middle of nowhere- i loved being there and wouldn't change it for the world :)