Chapter 3: Selling Fruit, Roadside

Can you spot Moose?

***Sorry for some of the redundant information, see it was SO LONG since I wrote anything that I forgot what I had already told all of you lovely people about and then...well....things....but I'm sure you appreciate the reminder anyway :P ***

Upon arriving in Tauranga Renee found the hostel she would be staying at for a while which had promised assistance in finding work. The first morning Renee was there she happened to be standing around, eating breakfast and deciding what to do with her empty day, when the owner asked if anyone wanted to work. Resolved to say yes to things Renee said ok and went with a German girl named Annette to work with a guy on his property – doing some cleaning and weeding and such. He was nice enough and it was an interesting introduction to the working style of a backpacker. He mentioned further work opportunity for the next day but Renee was not as much interested and so allowed others in the hostel to have the opportunity to make money while she had a day to explore her surroundings.

Shortly thereafter the hostel owner, Shiree, asked her if she would like to sell fruit by the roadside during the weekend. Still resolved to have new experiences, and wanting to earn SOME money instead of just spending Renee accepted and drove to Peys Pa where she was introduced to Corey who got her set up in a large diesel van which she then drove to Te Puke and set up selling on the side of the road. On the one hand she had a lovely day in the sun, talking to people, bagging fruit and staring at the ever growing wad of cash that she accumulated. One of the things she found surprising was the immediate level of trust that was given to her with almost no questions asked. She was essentially left alone with the keys to a van and a bunch of cash and trusted to come back with everything intact. Since Renee is a trustworthy person she did all of these things and was asked if she would like to return the following weekend which she did. The next weekend she drove a larger truck which was quite the experience! Kind of fun but challenging and a little scary as well. Unfortunately the weather was not as good and so many people were not there for one reason or another and it was a much slower day. And it began raining which kind of ruined the whole “fun in the sun” part of the job. Still Renee had a good enough time and moose helped (as well as having a good book) but with the oncoming public holiday weekends and making plans with her roommates Renee decided that she would not be selling fruit out of a truck on the weekend any further. She had also found a job (thanks to Shiree and again being in the right place at the right time) and so would be making a steady income without fruit selling on the weekends. Nevertheless, a good and interesting experience to have had!

Not a bad view as things go :)

Where is Moose?

XP: Amount of money Renee collected from customers: 1706