Visa Mechanics
One of the privileges of being a well-known backpacker and self help guru is the different types of people one meets on the road. All nations under one roof, joined by the common bond of a love for travel. Certainly it’s hard to find someone as enthusiastic as I am for travel, but there are plenty of people I’ve met who enjoy it.
Stories are shared in the communal kitchen or the common room, at the Galah Bar or, increasingly, in the bathrooms. I’ve actually made it a morning ritual to sit on the cracked seat of the middle stall and await the morning rush to evacuate one’s bowels the morning after the Galah Bar’s weekly Mexican special nights. I somehow know tales of when I walked La Ciudad Perdida in flip-flops or lived on a secluded Thai beach for years, are of some comfort as the resident men vomit and/or shit away. I know the women would very much appreciate the opportunity to listen too. [1]
It’s over such stories we learn about hidden places, quirky cultures. Etc. It happens also to be where backpackers discuss their visas and hopes of emulating me by staying in Australia for such a long time.
GAME OF DRAFTS: The Spanish woman spent her two days sitting at the best table in the Galah Bar typing away on her laptop. When residents (namely me) doubted her claims about having worked at the Amundsen-Scott Research station, she pulled out a laminated security card and her passport with several stamps. As if, in these days of fake news, she couldn't have knocked these up on Photoshop herself. No, the reason I could tell she was lying was because she couldn't cope with the draft entering the dorm room, on account of the broken glass which Darryl & Quentin said they'd fix in 2015. Given Antarctica has recorded wind speeds of over 300km/h, that she couldn't cope with a gentle ocean breeze (and a patch of mould on the wall next to her bed) tells it all. If you want to write a script based on someone's travel experiences, try me.
Inevitably, some stories are preposterous and blatantly made up - or, at the very least, exaggerated. [2] There was a Spanish woman once who stayed at the hostel for only two night. During this time she must have told everybody in the Galah that she was in the process of writing a film script about her experiences as a scientist based on the Amundsen-Scott South Pole research station. Given she complained how her dorm room was too drafty, it’s clear this woman never set foot on the coldest continent on earth.
Still, she was pretty enough.
Lately, it’s Rafinho - the Brazilian chap I may have mentioned previously - who has been over compensating for his poor travel history, with claims he is applying for a Skilled work visa. According to his “girlfriend” Flavia, Rafinho is a qualified mechanic and has been offered a position with a VW dealership. [3]
When I confronted Flavia later, she looked at me with disdain and told me it was none of my business. Then she asked me to leave the bathroom so she could towel off. [4]
Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for Rafinho and Flavia and truly wish them all the best. If Raf really does have the relevant qualifications to apply for a Skilled work visa, then good luck to him. Something told me, however, it wasn’t all roses. It was my duty, then, to seek him out [5] and offer some advice.
I told him that Brazilian qualifications would be different to Australia in that they - the Brazilian qualifications - were probably worth only half what an Australian qualification is worth [6]. Therefore, he should prepare himself for further study. Somewhat unnecessarily, he said he’d commenced a Doctor in Mechanical Engineering four months ago.
Undeterred, I continued. I warned him there would be a strict language assessment and that, given his English was, at best, rudimentary, he unfortunately wouldn’t pass the language requirement.
GREASE AND DIRT: I don't rule out that Rafinho is a qualified mechanic in his home country, but are those qualifications transferable to Australia? Unlikely. Having happened to stumble across him in the showers on multiple occasions, it also hasn't passed my observation that I've never seen him use a jar of Swarfega to clean his oily hands with. Hence, does he even know how to change a spark plug?
“You should probably think about returning to Sao Paulo,” I said, arm across his broad sweating shoulders.
“I scored 8 in the IELTS,” he replied.
“Really?!” I smiled. So happy for him and Flavia that their visa dreams could come true.
And I am. But it does make one think, doesn’t it. Unbeknownst to me, it’s apparent the Australian visa system has implemented the Rooney Rule [7] and is lowering the bar for non-Anglo applicants. How else to explain why Rafinho has had it so easy since entering the country; that his route to permanent residency is practically served to him on a plate. All while others - who have been in the country for years, struggling away - are told time and again that A-Level qualifications in, say, Art & Design, are insufficient to apply for a Skilled Visa.
I’m all about multiculturalism and giving those less fortunate a chance, but it does seem he has “jumped the queue”.
Certainly this is the advice of Chandrakant, my long-time Migration agent. He’s from India, so he’d know.
[1] Disappointingly - and not to mention, outmoded - Darryl & Quintin continue to veto my suggestion to make the male and female bathrooms a communal bathroom, a la Ali McBeal. They claim women need a “safe space” within the hostel. It’s an attitude I find quite troubling in these progressive times. And, to think, as gay men they’d have expected every single one of us to vote “yes” in support of gay marriage!
[2] You can trust mine, however, are accurate. No need to exaggerate when my back catalogue of hits/stories are so seemingly full of wacky over the top characters and incidents it would (almost) be forgivable to think I’d made them up.
[3] Firstly, it may have been BMW but Flavia was difficult to understand on account of her thick accent, and because she was in the shower at the time talking to her friend Silvia in the next shower and water muffled her voice. Secondly, it’s pretty insulting that Rafinho may have a job with VW when, for years, I have been a loyal admirer of their Kombi vans and, as detailed earlier this year in “Kombi-ah, my lord”, still a frequent user of them. If anyone gets a skilled work visa from VW it should be me.
[4] Part of my duties around the Galah is to fill up the toilet paper dispensers in the bathrooms. As a team player, I often volunteer to do the both the mens AND womens toilets, so the look of alarm on Flavia’s face was mostly unwarranted.
[5] I waited out the front of the Galah for him to return from his evening gym session.
[6] Likewise, an Australian qualification - say, Bachelor of Medicine - is only the equivalent of a Certificate III in Health and Safety in the UK.
[7] The Rooney Rule was established by the National American Football League in 2003 to ensure coaches from minorities were given equal opportunities for jobs. It was named after the white actor Micky Rooney (see right), who, in 1961, portrayed Mr Yunioshi - an angry uptight Japanese landlord. Viewed from today’s world we can see the concept of a white actor playing a Japanese man as deeply insensitive and would never happen. Sensibly, Denzel Washington is mooted to take the role of Mr Yunioshi in the upcoming remake.