During my working holidays in New Zealand, I have worked at several places doing different kind of jobs. I have worked as factory operators, packing kiwi fruits into tray and boxes for Zespri ltd, later on as chicken catcher for Tegel ltd, from there as skilled worker, landscape gardener with Price Landscaping ltd after a month as general labourer at Fleming Buildings.
While I was in New Zealand, most of my friends thought that I went there just for a vacation, spending unlimited amount of funds. That’s the case when I just show only the beautiful side of traveling or working holidays. Beautiful landscape, endless mountainous range, mesmerizing turquoise lake, wild lupin flowers, adrenaline rush activities, and hanging out with fellow travelers by a vibrant sunset.
So this entry is specifically for those who are wondering if I ever had any harsh job while in New Zealand. Indeed, I have. The most ‘dirty job’ I have ever done was working with a contractor for Tegel ltd as chicken catcher in Christchurch. I worked here just for a month, enough for me to save up a little to go further south, Queenstown.
Anderson Poultry Transport ltd. That was the name of the company I worked with. The owner is Mr.Kim who is Kiwi of South Korean root. I got this job through a friend of a friend recommendation. When I arrive in south island from the north island, my account was so depleted and I was really desperate to land myself a job. Any job. With my visa running out within 3 weeks, I have to spend another NZD 208 for a visa extension which will further depletes my already depleted wallet. Lols.
The schedule was not fix but the idea is working during the night which starts around 10pm, to 2am and continue till noon the next morning. On average we clocked in around 10-11 hours a day, BUT, the net working hours were just around 6 hours. We start the clock when we arrived at the assembly point, the yard at assigned time. From there we will go to the assigned poultry farm which sometimes will take around 40 minutes to an hour. There goes one paid hour sitting in the van.
Once arrived, we might or might not wait for a truck to arrive. Then, the forklift driver will start to load and unload the ‘modules’ (the cages where we put in the birds) another 30 minutes just flew away. Ready, now its our turn, the catchers to catch the birds and put them into the module depends on how many Tegel wants us to put into each module slot.
On average, we caught around 50000-60000 birds a night. There are two teams, and our team consists of 6 catcher. Thats around 4000-5000 birds for each of us, a NIGHT. Crazy right? How do we catch that many birds in a night at just 6 net hours of catching? By the way at the rate of around 900 birds an hour.
Here is the deal, first we catch them at night since chicken are actually night blinded. The birds were kind of calmed and surrendered. Second, we caught them by grabbing each bird’s leg in between two fingers. We have 4 spaces each hand, so at most we will catch 4 birds with each hand. Imagine that in repetitious order, Squat, grab 1,2,3,4 birds right hand, 5,6,7,8 birds on left hand, then move to the module, and put them into the slot, repeat faster.
One session usually last for half an hour, then forklift driver will again load and unloading the modules to and fro the truck. Which took another half an hour. Once the truck is filled with the birds, we have to wait for the next truck, which most of the time came late an hour or up to 3 hours. So, yeah, 3 hours to sleep in the van. We were being paid as long as we have not reach back to the yard. Sounds cool?
It was kind of cool for me. The pay was NZD16/hour, with that kind of long clocked in, short net work hours, I made quite a lot for just a month. Then there came the thought that I came to New Zealand to meet people, travel and get new experience, not to just work and save. Working here really exhaust me a lot. The biological clock were messed up, body ache everywhere. On off day, I don’t do that much other than on bed and watching movies. Not much human interaction, or none at all, other than interaction with the chicken.
After a month, I decided to move further south into Queenstown and work there for the remaining 4-5 months.
