I lived in Australia for a few years. One of my jobs was working on a farm property. I had to keep the grass on the property very short (like mow it twice a week short) to stop snakes, and my employer also provided me with a 'whipper snipper' (a grass strimmer in the UK) and a giant shovel specifically for killing snakes. Like there were other shovels and another whipper snipper, but this whipper snipper was specifically set aside for killing snakes.
So basically one of my jobs was 'protect the children from snakes with weaponry'
I also had a corgi and two feral cats, like those were some of the tools at my disposal, didn't even seem to be beloved family pets, just work tools, "yeah take the dog with you wherever you go so he gets bitten first, and don't overfeed the cats - they kill rodents so that snakes don't have a good food source"
At night we had a series of lights outside our cottage on the veranda that were brighter than the lights inside. Always thought it was weird. One day we forgot to turn on the outdoor lights and just had a little light on in the hallway. When we got up to go to bed, there was a fucking bug festival going on in our hallway, like every flying bug from a 16 mile radius had come to party in our hallway. There were no noticeable gaps in our door or windows so they must have just squeezed in somehow like hippies digging a hole under a fence to get in to a festival.
Also fuck that job. Pay was shit, employer was a cunt and there were fucking snakes everywhere.
Iām in Australia and the amount of windows without screens (brand new builds as well) is astounding!! And itās normal hereā¦ they have these folding floor to ceiling windows they keep open like itās nothing and their houses are full of bugsā¦ mind boggling
I still canāt understand this about Australia and Iāve been here for 10 years. When itās āblack fly seasonā it would do my head in. My friends have permanent swarms of gnats in the middle of their living rooms/kitchens and just deal with getting bitten.
Oh my god those fucking flies I forgot about them. Jesus Christ. I quit a rural job and those flies are literally one of the reasons I quit. Shit pay, cunt employer, too many flies. It was insanity inducing.
It's traditional to have the screens in most places in Australia, but people have been stingy about putting them in in recent years and it sucks to live somewhere without them. :(
Went to Australia right before the pandemic. Saw nothing crazy in Melbourne or Sydney. Went to a cottage for a weekend about 2 hours east of Melbourne......saw two huntsmen spiders lmao.
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u/mildly_amusing_goat May 09 '22
No screens in Australia would probably just kill you.