Tom Price... Top Town in WA?

01/02/2011

6am: This morning mum took me to the airport to start my life as a new graduate physiotherapist in Tom Price, one of Western Australia's most remote towns, looking like I'd been punched in the face due to excessive crying...

7am: I pay a whopping $120 in excess baggage (probably my fault, I last minute packed giving myself no time to ship things up).

8:30am: I arrive at Paraburdoo airport, and straight away see maybe 5 out of the top ten world's largest bugs... some type of record? I think so! The airport is archaic to say the least. I walk inside to find the 'baggage claim' only to be told to 'wait outside for the trolley love'. I lug my excess baggage towards the Tom Price bus to discover I am not booked on it... 30 more dollars down the drain... and an insight into the West Australian Health Department.

10:00am: I arrive in Tom Price, top town in the pilbra? My senior physio Beth picks me up to take me on a tour of the town. This takes all of 2 minutes, and I leave my sunglasses on to hide the now common 'face punched' look I'm rocking. She tells me it is a telstra town only, I do not have a home phone or internet ($140 on an internet USB later) and I am not provided with a hospital car. All things I probably should have looked into before packing up my blissful life in Mosman Park.

10:02 am: Beth drops me at my new apartment.
FOUR THINGS I NOTICE STRAIGHT AWAY...
1.) My 70's style shit-hole is insanely hot!! Is the air-con old and rusty? Probably....
2.) It is very sparsely furnished... will I cope with only one chair? Have to...
3.) There is a large sign on the fridge... 'common household snakes, who to call'. Great, snakes are now of a household variety.
4.) I potentially have provided home to half of Tom Price's spider population.

1am: The air-con is not old and rusty, it just doesn't work. I sit in the cold shower wondering whether I've made the worst decision of my life...