Paid by the Plant

I'm getting ready for bed, anticipating an early start, when there is a knock on the door, and someone calls my name. It's Rodolph and Xavier, as well as several others from the vineyard crew.

"There is no more work," they tell me. "There is a sign... 'the vineyard owner pulled the plug.'"

"Wait, what? What do you mean?"

I take a minute to let this sink in. I suppose I always knew that the work could end suddenly. That's just the nature of the work: the backpackers come and go, the work does too. It shouldn't be so surprising, I suppose.

But I was enjoying my job. My boss was nice, the work was simple, and the crew was awesome. I had begun to enjoy the long vineyard rows, the slow process of thinning, the warm sunshine. I had discovered free audio books online, and was listening to a book a week at work. What could be easier?

Well, I think, it's over now. Disappointed, I go to bed-- but first, I speak to the hostel owner, who assures me that, with luck, she will be able to find me more work in a day or two. So, all is not lost. Maybe I will get work at the bottling factory, with John, packaging wine for 12 hours a day, surrounded by noisy machinery. I shudder. But, still, it would be better than nothing.

Late the following morning, I wake to another knock at the door. It's Karen (who looks rather surprised to see me in pajamas so late in the day). She says she's found me work: more fruit thinning. But, she warns me, this job is On Contract. That means, she says, I will be paid per plant I finish. If I can't make at least minimum wage, I'll be canned.

Gulp.

But, for the moment, it's a warm day, and I spend it lazily, doing laundry (hanging the clothes outside in the sunshine to dry), reading in the shade (a rather dry biography of Charlotte Bronte) and grocery shopping. By the time John comes home from work, there is a pasta bake in the oven and clean folded laundry on the bed, reminiscent of our Wellington days.

As usual, John and I spend the evening with our "group": Lindsay, from Nova Scotia; Xavier and Rodolph, from France; Martin, from Belgium; Bernhard, from Germany; and Megan, from Manchester. The eight of us crowd around a picnic table with salads and cold drinks, talking about our jobs and our countries, joking with each other about the Lemon Tree and New Zealand, and groaning at the thought of another day in the fields and factories tomorrow.

I have a knot of nervousness in my stomach about the contract work. What if I can't go fast enough? Martin was fired only yesterday for being too slow. That could be me.

John and I wake together, eating eggs on toast and making sandwiches for the day, sipping tea, packing our bags, and jostling others for a sink to brush our teeth. Two German girls, Lea and Selina, have agreed to drive me to work in exchange for a bit of gas money. We're meant to meet up with the rest of the crew at a petrol station at 6:45.

When we arrive, it's a gong show. There are fifteen or twenty vehicles, and at least forty backpackers standing around, waiting for instructions. After the necessary paperwork is handed around, and after a lot of shouting by the foreman, everyone piles into their respective vans again. We leave the petrol station in a long caravan. The girls' van, a crappy old thing from the early '80s, chokes into gear and eventually takes its place at the back of the line.

We navigate okay through several roundabouts, but on the highway, we fall behind. The van can't do more than 80 km/h, and soon, there are other vehicles passing us at 100 and 120 km/h. Eventually, we can't see the others at all.

We're lost.

By a miracle of chance, we pull into what happens to be the right vineyard. There are thousands of vineyards in Marlborough, but somehow we manage to drive into an enormous estate, find a winery, and ask someone for directions. We call Karen and she gives us the boss' phone number. I feel a little mortified. He sends someone to collect us and drives us, to our surprise, just across the field to where the crew are still setting up.

Crisis averted.

The boss tells us that we have to cut 12 bunches of grapes per plant for the first 300, and the contract is 100 plants per hour. That's 1200 bunches per hour, or 20 per minute. My name is on the row, and the grapes need to be left in a pile, so the boss can check my work later. I have to do it both correctly and quickly.

There is no way.

Sure enough, within two hours, the boss informs me that I'm forty or fifty plants behind schedule. "You're gonna have to pick up the pace, Canada," he says. "Just a little faster. Okay?"

"I'll try," I grumble. (I though I was going fast.)

Somehow I pull reserves of speed from somewhere inside of me (the terror of unemployment), and finish my row in an hour and a half. At one point, I uncover a large birds' nest with two baby birds inside, their mouths frozen open. I'm startled and cry out, but they don't move. I can't be sure they're alive. I don't have time to stare: have to go faster, have to go faster.

"That's all right," the boss says when I'm finished. "You're all right now."

For the afternoon, it's only 9 bunches per plant, so I think it'll be easier. Unfortunately, I have managed to lose my gloves and my snips (I think I left them on the grass while I drank 2 solid litres of water), so I'm now stuck with bare hands and rusty garden clips.

I finish my row by the end of the day, fingernails cracked and dirty, the smell of the vines in my clothes, sweat and dirt streaking my skin. The sun is relentless, and there are almost no shadows.

"How many did you finish?" asks the boss as I drag myself towards the van.

"One row plus fourteen plants," I tell him, uncertain whether this will be enough.

He consults his chart, does some quick math, and gives me a grimace.

"You'll need to go just a little faster," he tells me. "You were close, though. Tomorrow: a little faster, okay?"

Just a little faster.