grapes of wrath

"i aint gonna baptise. im gonna work in the fiel's, in the green fiel's, an' im gonna be near to folks. i aint gonna try to teach em nothin'. im gonna try to learn. gonna learn why the folks walks in the grass, gonna hear em talk, gonna hear em sing. gonna listen to kids eatin' mush. gonna hear husban' and wife a-poundin' the matress in the night. gonna eat with em an' learn." his eyes were wet and shining. "gonna lay in the grass, open an' honest with anybody that'll have me. gonna cuss an' swear an' hear the poetry of folks talkin'. all that's holy, all thats what i didn' understan'. all them things is the good things."

- grapes of wrath, steinbeck

jussis. so the last two weeks have been about work. manual work. down and dirty. like christina aguilera. hand-to-mouth. like jemma jameson. mixing with the proletariat in the fields. on the building sights. in the pub. talking their language. eating their food. drinking their beer. breathing their goddamn filthy air. life experience.

eish. so it started off in townsville. north of brisbane. south of cairns. a backward town. laying insulation in roofs. shweaty job. gets friggin hot up there. stuffy. and toight. like a toiger. not conducive to claustrophobia. or wet beer farts. we started each day at 2am. kitted out in dirty singlets. and short rugby shorts. and bundy trucker caps. unshaven and mean. hard ripped bodies. charging around in a construction bakkie. flashing orange light on top. swigging xxxx gold. charfing the abo chicks with inappropriately bad language. we owned that building site. was peasant heaven. but after a week i had to move on. no pay. one big fuck in the ass. such is life below the poverty line. god hates poor people.

so i moved onto a farm. a few hours west of sydney. just over the blue mountains. hazel nut crop. the email invitation sounded perfect:

"I hear you might be interested in some hard labour on the farm.
We can offer you $10/hour and board for two weeks.
Most of the work to be done is hand mowing and cleaning weeds from the nursery."

sounds all rainbows and butterflies. but its not. friggin hell. i feel like ive hand-mowed the whole entire fuckin world. that nursery... eish... its not small. seven rows of hazel nut bushes. each row is half a kilometer long. and 2m wide. with knee high grass (shoulder high if you're wiggy). on a steep rocky incline. full of extremely dangerous animals. spiders and snakes. all to be negotiated with a small petrol-powered handheld lawn-mower. i was clumsy at first. ploughing down nut bushes. ripping up irrigation piping. now i am lawn mower master jedi.

on the plus side my hands are all hard and shiny. dirty finger nails. no more soft manicured office hands. labourer's hands. value-adding hands. hands that hot chicks love. hands that gays hate. a metrosexual's worst nightmare.

one unrelated point: the nude girls are one of the top 10 greatest bands in the whole world ever. just for the song genie alone.

hey now with the fist of a man
now with the fist of a god
now with the fist of my oh my
i heard my daddy said
no more, no more, no more, no more
uh oh now a little bit of money
yeah yeah from a little bit of hurry
genie genie genie GENIE