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The FIFO Blues
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Commencer à lireLongueur: 292 pages7 heures
- Éditeur:
- ReadOnTime BV
- Sortie:
- Dec 4, 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781742845012
- Format:
- Livre
Description
John Mancetti is a third generation Italian immigrant who has been employed in the Western Australian resources sector as a construction worker for the last four years. He is one of nearly a hundred thousand Fly In, Fly Out (FIFO) workers, that serve the industry by travelling over one thousand, five hundred kilometres to and from work by aeroplane. This type of lifestyle is somewhat unique to Western Australia. While life seems to be good in many respects, John eventually becomes a victim of the various stress that are associated with working in the remote Pilbara region of Western Australia. John’s family want him to give up his high paid job as a FIFO worker to return to full time employment in Perth. John is very reluctant to change and keeps delaying the decision to do so because he has onerous financial commitments. Through a serious of unexpected events he finally realises that he is suffering from “the FIFO Blues”...
Informations sur le livre
The FIFO Blues
Longueur: 292 pages7 heures
Description
John Mancetti is a third generation Italian immigrant who has been employed in the Western Australian resources sector as a construction worker for the last four years. He is one of nearly a hundred thousand Fly In, Fly Out (FIFO) workers, that serve the industry by travelling over one thousand, five hundred kilometres to and from work by aeroplane. This type of lifestyle is somewhat unique to Western Australia. While life seems to be good in many respects, John eventually becomes a victim of the various stress that are associated with working in the remote Pilbara region of Western Australia. John’s family want him to give up his high paid job as a FIFO worker to return to full time employment in Perth. John is very reluctant to change and keeps delaying the decision to do so because he has onerous financial commitments. Through a serious of unexpected events he finally realises that he is suffering from “the FIFO Blues”...
- Éditeur:
- ReadOnTime BV
- Sortie:
- Dec 4, 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781742845012
- Format:
- Livre
À propos de l'auteur
Anthony Pignat was born in 1965 and grew up in the small country town in northern New South Wales. Anthony's parents were farmers who struggled to make a living off the land. Anthony attended St Joseph Primary School in Coraki and Marist Brothers High School in Lismore. After graduating from high school, Anthony moved to Sydney to study a Bachelor Of Civil Engineering Degree and graduated with honours. In 1989, Anthony moved from Sydney to Perth to work on various projects around the state of Western Australia. Anthony met his wife just before relocating to Hong Kong to work as a senior manager on various large scale civil engineering projects and their two children were born overseas. Anthony has successfully completed his Masters of Business Administration degree and his Doctorate of Business Administration degree. In 2004, the family decided to move back to Perth so that their children could attend secondary school. Since moving back to Western Australia, Anthony has worked in various senior roles for various construction contractors on several of the major resource projects.
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Aperçu du livre
The FIFO Blues - Anthony Pignat
24
The FIFO Blues
Part A – Doubts
Chapter 1
Life Is Good
John was relaxing on Sorrento beach enjoying the warmth of the late summer sunshine. He had just finished swimming in the ocean and his body was still dripping wet from the cool, salty sea water. He placed a brightly coloured beach towel on the sand and laid on his back to soak up the sun’s rays. It had been a long hot summer and he found swimming and sun-baking at the beach to be quite relaxing. Unfortunately, his wife was at work and his children were still at school, so he had no one with him to share the good weather, to play beach cricket, or to even just have a casual chat.
He was going to catch up with work mates at lunch time for a quick meal and some casual drinks in the afternoon. They were working the same "Fly In, Fly Out" (FIFO) roster as John, so that meant they were all in Perth at the same time. Not that he really missed any of them at all; they all worked in the same construction crew, on the same mine site, and they all lived in the same construction camp.
He did not like sitting around the house or just lounging on the beach doing nothing on his R&R weeks off. Initially, when John had started working at the mine site on a four week on site and one week off site roster, he had used his weeks off to renovate the old house that he had purchased when he and his current wife, Sarah, were first married. He had planned to renovate the old place from the start, as soon as they had finished their honeymoon. However, the ongoing alimony payments to his first wife and the unexpected cost of a new child, who was born six months after their marriage, had put a stop on his immediate plans.
The limited amount of money that he was making from his part time job working for a residential building company in Perth did not help this situation at all, and it was often difficult to scrape together enough cash to pay the monthly bills. John did not like the fact that his job was only part time, but there was not much he could do about it because the residential building market had been depressed for some time, with a general oversupply of the various building trades that made it difficult to earn decent wages and to secure full time employment.
His wife had also stopped work to have their first child, so they only had John’s income to live on. Unfortunately, John’s salary was not enough to buy all of the building materials he needed to renovate the property. This situation had changed for the better after his wife was able to return to the workforce, when both of their children had started pre-school. John was then able to secure a permanent position with a larger sized construction firm performing work for the mining industry.
Initially, John liked his FIFO job because the pay was significantly higher than his old residential building job. His job was now secure which meant he could get a decent loan from the bank and he could spend more time renovating his house during the weeks off on his R&R breaks. It had all worked out quite well, although he did tend to miss his wife and children while he was away on site. He had found that the apparent loneliness associated with working in remote mine sites and living in construction camps was only a problem if he let the solitude overwhelm him.
Over the past several years through his work, he had developed a network of good friends that had similar interests as him. The various relationships had significantly helped him to overcome the obvious frustrations that most remote workers experienced in going back to the camp every day to a small twelve foot long by eight foot wide donga
room, which often felt like a self-imposed prison. He had frequently contemplated the obvious trade-off that he had to make to support his family. He could decide to work in Perth on lower wages to be with his family full time or he could choose to work away from home to earn higher wages so that his family could enjoy a better lifestyle. If only he could find a job where he could have both, then his life would be ideal!
John realised that it was very unlikely he would ever find his dream job
that would pay the higher wages associated with working in the mines, yet allow him to live full time with his family in Perth. He had looked for a job like this but he was sure that it did not exist. Given that he had made the choice to work away, he could do nothing but accept the fact that was the way it had to be for the moment and that life in general was relatively good considering the alternatives. After all, they had a very comfortable home with a reasonable sized mortgage that was manageable on the wages from his current job. Also, both he and his wife had new cars, the children went to a private school, and they enjoyed overseas holidays twice a year.
His grandparents on his father’s side had worked hard and toiled their entire lives just to pay off their small weatherboard house in Fremantle, scraping together enough money to make ends meet. It was very much the same story for John’s parents, who had also bought a small house in Fremantle, close to their parent’s house, to raise John and his three brothers. As a child, their family had never enjoyed any real luxuries such as long holidays away from home, let alone the numerous overseas vacations that John and his wife had taken to exotic beaches, where the strength of the Australian dollar meant they were treated like royalty.
In fact, John had never been on an aeroplane until he started work in the mines and it became necessary for him to travel by aeroplane to the remote sites for work. Even when he worked in Kalgoorlie, he had not been able to travel by aeroplane due to the exorbitant cost; instead, he drove the six hundred kilometres to work, which often took more than eight hours, in his old beaten up work truck. He was amazed at how things had changed so quickly in just the last ten years.
He never thought that he would have married, divorced and married again, with three children to now support and look after in such a short period of time. After the divorce from his first wife, he never thought that he would be able to afford the mortgage payments for a house, let alone the other benefits that his family now enjoyed. They really did enjoy their current cosy lifestyle, including the numerous overseas vacations that they all looked forward to on a regular basis. John realised that he was, to some extent, lucky to have found a good job in the mines, as his brothers did not enjoy the same lifestyle that he had now grown accustomed.
His brother, Mark, had taken an apprenticeship as a plumber with one of the larger companies in Osborne Park and completed his trade qualifications when he was twenty one years old. Like most of his fellow apprentices, he was let go once he had completed his training course and managed to find a job with a small plumbing company closer to home.
The wages that Mark earned as an apprentice were meagre, which made it difficult for him to move out of his parent’s home. When he grew tired of his mother’s constant whining, he finally decided that enough was enough and moved in with an old school friend in a run-down rental property in Victoria Park. His portion of the rent was more than he could really afford, but at least he had his own place and he could come and go as he pleased, without interference from anyone in his family. It also gave him an opportunity to date whomever he liked without worrying about the approval of his mother.
As the eldest, John had always been more adventurous than his brothers, preferring to follow his own path and make his own destiny. Even though John’s apprenticeship wages had been no better than his brother’s, he had forced himself to move out of home as early as possible. He had moved into a derelict house with three of his mates, with no furniture other than an old wood burning stove. The four of them had scraped together $100 to buy an old refrigerator to keep their food fresh and their beer cold. After sometime, they discovered that the refrigerator was used mainly for beer as they tended to get take-away food almost every night of the week because it was so quick and easy compared to preparing a full sized meal at home.
Besides, they rarely agreed on what to cook and when they did, they usually produced something that was either totally inedible or just plain disgusting. The living arrangements were also complicated when their girlfriends came around to stay overnight. None of the girls really got on that well with each other and made a habit of complaining about the general state of decay of the house, the lawns and the surrounding gardens.
Cleanliness was also not one of their strong points, with dishes remaining unwashed for days at a time and clothes scattered about all over the place. They had scavenged an old washing machine from the verge in the next street, just prior to the local council rubbish collection date, with the intention of repairing it, but it had all become too difficult. Eventually, they started to take their washing back to their respective mothers to do or resorted to using the local laundromat whenever they had time. John’s clothes were probably the worst of the bunch because his supervisor gave him the dirtiest and most demeaning tasks he could find. There was definitely no love lost between the two of them, as his supervisor wanted John, as a lowly apprentice, to learn everything that he possibly could about the trade. He also wanted to teach him some respect for the more senior carpenters in their crew. If anything, it had the opposite effect, with John eventually despising the man completely.
Once he had left home, John did not want to rely on his mother anymore for anything at all, so he made a point of doing his own washing at the local laundromat no matter what the circumstances. He actually enjoyed the task to some degree because it gave him a chance to sit and read the newspapers and magazines that other people had discarded on the laundromat benches. It also gave him an opportunity to get out of the rental house which had become overly crowded with girlfriends and various strangers calling in at their own discretion. Sometimes he wondered if some of the strangers actually knew one of the tenants or had just wandered into the house off the street.
The house had also become a convenient place for impromptu parties on Friday and Saturday nights, when none of their other friends would volunteer their own houses for such an event. This was becoming a problem as the police had intervened on at least two occasions, after complaints from neighbours about the excessive noise, foul language and radical driving habits of some of their guests speeding up and down the quiet suburban street. As far as John was concerned, the police were just doing their job, but two of his flatmates had taken the last episode to the extreme, resulting in harsh retaliatory action by the police, who had impounded one of the vehicles of their many guests under the guise of the newly enacted Hoon Legislation.
Ironically, he had left his parent’s home to gain more independence and freedom, but now seemed to have less privacy in the rented house than he had enjoyed while living with his parents. The more time he spent with his flatmates, the less he liked them and the more he wanted to find a place of his own. An opportunity suddenly presented itself when he had met his first serious girlfriend at one of the frequent parties that he had attended. He had spent about three months with her when it became obvious that she was just out for a good time and she did not really care about him.
He knew it was only a matter of time before she would give him the flick for one of his house mates or someone else he did not even know. His girlfriend lived with two other girls, about the same age, whom had attended the same school. John thought that one of the girls was quite unattractive and uninteresting, but he liked the other girl and found it easy to speak to her whenever he visited their house. He had already decided that when he broke up with his first serious girlfriend, he would ask this girl out on a date. So when the time came, he was well prepared and he did not hesitate to ask her out.
After about three months, they decided that it was time to move in together and they found a small two bedroom flat that fell within their meagre budget. Initially, it felt like bliss, an unknown freedom that neither of them had ever felt before. It was a new form of love with a girlfriend who liked him simply for who he was - no flatmates constantly bothering him, no wild, uncontrolled parties to worry about, and for once it seemed his life was moving in a positive direction. The time moved quickly after that and John proposed to her within six months of them moving in together. John and June were married less than three months later and their first child, James, was born six months later.
Marriage and a child were a big responsibility that John was more than willing to accept. It felt like he had grown up and matured into a man capable of supporting his new family. However, he still did not feel completely happy or content and found himself constantly worrying about how to make ends meet, how to pay the outstanding amount owing on the rent, or if they would ever save enough money to put down a deposit on a house. He went to see his bank manager twice about a home loan, but the responses were negative with an outright rejection on both occasions. Even though he had been a customer of that particular bank since establishing his first savings account in primary school, they were not willing to offer him a loan due to his prior credit history. His wages could not service the amount of money that he was seeking to borrow and he did not have a secure job. He tried other banks, but got a similar level of rejection across the board.
As time went by, his insecurity increased and his confidence completely eroded. The more he tried to find security in his life, the more his life became unbalanced, with work consuming him day and night. Insignificant things became major issues that seemed insurmountable, no matter how hard he tried to resolve them. The initial feelings of young love and freedom did not survive for very long, as he could no longer cope with the stress of supporting his young family. He grew increasingly distant from his family and friends, and later his new wife, to the point where he could not face her constant questioning about his feelings.
Rather than helping the situation, she seemed to be unwittingly driving a wedge further between the two of them. Eventually they divorced, as neither of them wanted to be in a relationship that was no longer enjoyable. Their separation occurred quickly, with both of them realising that their initial love for each other would never return, and the more they were apart, the more their relationship seemed to have been just an infatuation, built on possibilities that had never eventuated.
They were both concerned that their young son was going to be a casualty of divorce. However, they felt that it would be better to separate while he was still young and could not comprehend the full consequences of an unhappy home. At that time, John’s parents had been married for more than twenty years and they did not want John and his wife planning separate lives that did not provide a secure home for their grandchild. They argued with John in an attempt to force him to save his marriage. However, John knew that his marriage was irreconcilable and he did not even consider speaking to his wife about it and they went their separate ways.
John was forced to move back in with his family so that his ex-wife could have full use of their rented flat to raise their son. As a diligent father, he paid his alimony on time and had visitation rights to his son every second weekend. While it was not an ideal situation, it was enough to make him feel like a good father, and ironically, he had suddenly lost the feeling of uncertainty that had overwhelmed him for the past twelve months. He did not understand how his feelings had changed in this way, because he no longer had a wife or a stable family environment.
Some time went by before John started to socialise again with his mates on a regular basis. At first he did not want to date any women, although it seemed that there were more girls interested in him now than before he was married. It shocked him that his mates were always chasing girls for a quick one night stand, as he was no longer interested in casual sexual interactions that had no evident meaning or potential for a long term relationship.
This situation finally changed about fifteen months after his divorce when he bumped into an old school friend, Sarah. She had been in a relationship with someone else since she had left high school. Unfortunately for her, it had not worked out. She still liked the guy but he had no intention of settling down any time soon. And she definitely did not feel like waiting any longer to start a family. John and Sarah’s relationship started slow, as they were both very cautious and did not want to end up in the same situation as before. After a further six months, they realised that they were well suited for each other and wanted to share their lives together.
They were married in late October, during what many consider to be the best time of year in Perth, with temperate days and gentle winds that were cool and refreshing. It felt like a good start to what he hoped would be a better, more secure marriage. Once again, he now seemed happy and content.
Chapter 2
The Team
John was meeting some of his workmates at the Breakwater Restaurant at Hillary’s Boat Harbour for a quick lunch. It was a nice day and they would most likely sit at an outside table near the water’s edge.
Hillary’s Boat Harbour and Mindarie Quay were the only two major ocean front developments north of the famous Fremantle Quay, which was the home of the America’s Cup in the late 1980’s. The various restaurants, children’s play centres and novelty shops normally drew a large crowd on the weekends, with many wanting to get out of the house and enjoy shopping on the jetties and the sunshine while not necessarily lying on the beach.
Today it was not so busy because most of the children were still at school and most of the housewives were out at the local shopping malls. Many of the people John passed on the boardwalk seemed to be tourists from England, Ireland, France or the United States. It was not difficult to place their country of origin from the obvious accents that he overheard as they ordered food from the small open front cafe.
John did not mind the tourists as much as he despised the imported tradesmen who entered the country on 457 Visas to work in the higher paying mine jobs. In his mind, the tourists brought money to the country, while the immigrant workers on 457 Visas generally sent money out of the country, with relatively minor benefits for the local community.
Some argued that the influx of foreign workers was good for the state, but from what John could see, all it did was take jobs away from the local people and increase the cost of housing to a point where it was no longer affordable to the average Western Australian because of artificially high demand. It also reduced the opportunity for longer term employment, as many immigrant workers on 457 Visas later applied for 857 Visas for permanent residency.
John really believed that the Western Australian State Government was mostly to blame for this situation because it had not properly planned the long term employment opportunities for the state. Rather than spreading out the approvals of the large resource infrastructure developments so that one development flowed onto the next, it had, in fact, caused the opposite effect in the form of a short term labour shortage.
The Western Australian State Government had even gone as far as to threaten the withdrawal of mining and petroleum leases from the global resource developers, especially if they did not commit substantial amounts of capital for development within the first five year period of being granted a lease.
He thought that it was obvious that the Western Australian State Government was out for immediate short term gains, in the form of royalties, at the expense of well-planned, long term developments that would ultimately bring more benefits to the community. The Western Australian State Government used the excuse that it was now the right time to push the large scale developments as the commodity prices were relatively high. In this respect it seemed to have failed to take into account that most global resource companies worked on a minimum planning period of thirty years.
He felt betrayed by the state government that he was meant to trust because he knew that oil, gas and iron ore were limited resources that would always have high levels of demand. If anything, the natural resources of Western Australia would only increase in value over time and, if properly managed and conserved, they would provide long term wealth for the entire state for the next hundred years.
Instead, the short term objectives of the politicians in the state government now jeopardised the future of his job and his children’s potential employment opportunities after that. Even if his children were able to secure a good job with reasonable levels of pay, the affordability of housing was declining at a rapid rate and they would have to work longer to save a deposit on a house.
When John bought his first house in 1992 he paid around $150,000 which was the medium housing price at that time, representing four times the average annual wage. Because of the artificially high housing prices caused by excessive demand, the medium housing price was now $550,000 which represented eight times the average annual wage. In relative terms, the cost of housing had doubled over the past twenty years, which was something that had never happened in the previous one hundred and eighty five year history of the state. As far as John was concerned, the Western Australian State Government had failed in its duty to look after the long term interest of the people that it was meant to serve.
John was already sitting at the table when Neil arrived.
How are you today, John?
asked Neil.
I’m fine. I went down to the beach this morning for a swim, which was really refreshing. There were not many people around considering how hot it has been lately,
responded John.
Did you see any white pointers?
inquired Neil, referring to topless girls who might have been sun-baking on the beach rather than the massive giant sharks that tended to prowl the Western Australian coastline from late November to early February, during the best part of the swimming season.
"There were a couple of young tourist girls, but nothing that would interest a dirty old pervert
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