This weekend, our hotel hosted the New Zealand PGA Pro-Am Championship which was a bit crazy as we were sold out entirely. The golfing was held at the prestigious Hills course in nearby Arrowtown. Our hotel had a drawing for 20 passes to go and watch and Sean won one! I tried not to think about him enjoying the beautiful weather and hobnobbing with the rich and famous while I was folding towels inside all day. Overall, hosting the event and all of the hype and VIPs that came along with it went fine, unless you count the fact that one of the valets crashed two separate cars in a 24-hour period. Oops. I would have blamed it on the new give way rules . . .
When the hotel gets busy, there just simply aren't enough permanent housekeepers to get the job done. To deal with this, our manager uses local temporary agencies in town to find casual workers. Usually, these workers are people just like me - travelers/backpackers either just passing through and looking to make some extra cash or those who want to stay in Queenstown but who haven't found a job yet. It's fun to be able to work with different people from all over the world - most of them are ridiculously qualified/educated and have quit their jobs at home to travel. I have worked with engineers, nurses, lawyers, teachers and new graduates from both high school and university. You never know who you are going to get paired up with.
Normally, during busy times, every full-time housekeeper is given one temporary worker or "buddy" as we like to call them. This weekend, however, was so busy that we were each given two buddies. Having buddies can be both good and bad. It's great that they can help with the physically demanding tasks like hefting bags of laundry, vacuuming and general scrubbing but it can be bad in that you have to train them and that the amount of rooms you are required to do in a day is doubled.
Today I was given two strapping young strong Czech. guys to work with. One is a chef looking for a permanent job and another is a dedicated climber (he wore his climbing shoes to work) determined to climb in every country in the world (and he already has a pretty good start). We had kind of a rough beginning in that their English wasn't that great and we struggled to communicate. It was also hard because they were like bulls in a China shop - having three people work quickly and effectively in one room when two are big and don't know what they are doing was ridiculous. For the first two hours it just felt like a circus.
Eventually, we found our groove and everyone knew exactly what to do; we could be in, out and done with a room in minutes. I enjoyed the fact that I barely had to do any really hard work at all. I did all the little picky things like folding towels, arranging amenities and re-stocking tea, robes, slippers etc. while the guys went to town on the rest. It was awesome. I wish I could have a buddy every day. Or two.
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