Chapter 1

Work and Holiday Visa (Subclass 462)

With this visa you can:

● have a holiday

● do any kind of work

● travel to and from Australia as many times as you want

“This is an important message from the Australian government,” said a cheerful female voice over the airplane’s PA system. “Australia has strict biosecurity laws that apply to you. We need your help to protect Australia’s environment, unique wildlife, farming, and way of life from dangerous pests and diseases.”

I took out my ear plugs and lifted up my eye mask. I was on a 16-hour flight from Los Angeles to Melbourne, about to begin a year-long working holiday in Australia. I had just turned 30 — the maximum age to qualify for the visa — and was desperate for a break from the shitty wages and cold, rainy winters of Portland, Oregon. It would be summer in Australia — and the minimum wage was $18.29 an hour.

The cabin lights were on, and one of the flight attendants was handing out arrival cards for passengers to fill out: What was my intended length of stay in Australia? Did I have any criminal convictions? Was I carrying any weapons, drugs, or pornography?

I answered no to the first two, but hesitated over the third. I had just started an OnlyFans account, and although I didn’t think nude selfies were illegal in Australia, I didn’t want to take any chances. Should I do a factory reset on my phone just in case?

“Excuse me, sir,” said the flight attendant. “Could you please put away your tray table and put your seat in the upright position for landing?”

I nodded, hurrying through the rest of the questions. What was my intended address in Australia? Some backpacker’s hostel in Melbourne. What was my usual occupation? I didn’t really have one, aside from the odd jobs I’d been working in Portland.

I had already applied for the working holiday visa online, and had uploaded documents to show that I had a high school education and had saved up enough money to support myself once I arrived. The visa had arrived in my inbox within seconds.

But what if, upon closer inspection, I was deemed unfit for a working holiday after all? What if my patchy work history, or my student loan debt — or even worse, my lack of health insurance — meant I was unsuitable for entry to a stable, affluent country like Australia?

I’d barely had time to sign and date the declaration when the plane came in for a landing at the Melbourne Airport. I could see the eucalyptus trees stretching away to either side of the runway and the afternoon sun beating down on the bushland beyond.

***

Crossing the border turned out to be a breeze. In addition to manned kiosks with ABF officers, there was a line of SmartGates you could use if you were from one of a handful of countries with electronic passports like mine. I put my passport face-down on the scanner, then stepped forward so the camera could take my photo and match it to the one on my ID. After a moment, a light below the camera turned green, and the automated gates opened up to let me through.

And just like that, I was in!

All that was left was to hand my arrival card to a biosecurity officer who did a cursory inspection of my hiking shoes to make sure I hadn’t brought along any soil.

It was easier than getting back into my own country, where a uniformed border agent always wanted to know who I was travelling with and where I’d been.

I took out my phone to call my best friend Nathan back in Portland. It was 1pm here and 6pm there — but Australia was a full calendar day ahead, which meant that I’d entirely skipped the 28th of November. “Did you make it?” he asked.

“I’m in!” I said. “No questions asked.”

“Well, you are a straight white male,” he said. “With a U.S. passport.”

“A queer white male,” I reminded him. I had only come out to him as pansexual a few months before the trip. The only thing that had changed in our friendship was that he’d started using they/them pronouns for me — and I had to remind him that I was still cisgender and he could keep referring to me as he/him.

“You’re still thinking of coming down here, right?” I asked. When I’d told Nathan about my plans, he had suggested coming along for a roadtrip around Australia. He was one year too old to get a working holiday visa, so the longest he could stay in the country was three months at a stretch.

“Yeah, I just need to take the time off work,” he said. “Three months should be enough, right? I want to see the Great Barrier Reef while it’s still there. And climb Uluru. Can you line up a place for us to stay in Melbourne?”

“Of course!” I said. “I’ve already reached out to some people on Couchsurfing. I’ll just have to … well, look for a job and save up for a bit.”

“Awesome!” said Nathan. “Let’s check back in once you’ve sorted that out. Say hi to some koalas for me!”

After he hung up, I pulled up my mobile banking app. I hadn’t looked at it since before the trip, and was dreading what I’d find.

Sure, I’d had sufficient funds a few months ago, when I’d sent in my visa application; I’d even uploaded a bank statement to prove it. But after a few months of rent, and some new travel gear, and an international plane ticket — not to mention some overpriced drinks at the airport — I was down to my last hundred dollars.

$92.94 USD. That was all I had left.

It would be enough to pay for a few nights in a dorm at a backpacker’s hostel. But how I was going to earn enough money to go travelling around the country with Nathan for three months, I had no idea. I didn’t want to get stuck in an office job in Melbourne while he went road tripping without me.

I’d have to find myself a seasonal job right away.

***

There weren’t many public transit options from the Melbourne Airport, so I caught the SkyBus, a bright red double-decker bus with free WiFi, which used up another $19 of my AUD. Thirty minutes later, it dropped me off at a bus stop in the CBD — the Central Business District, or the Australian term for "downtown".

It was hotter outside than I was dressed for, not because I hadn’t checked the weather, but because I wasn’t prepared for the intensity of the midday sun. Back in Portland, the days were getting short and cold as the Pacific Northwest entered its extended rainy season. Here, it was already summer, and the temperature was a toasty 25°C.

I scrambled to find a shady spot to take off my hoodie, and pulled out my phone to snatch one last bit of free WiFi before the bus pulled away.

Luckily, one of the hostels I’d looked up online was only a short walk away: Vagabond Hostel, a former industrial building in the university district that advertised dorm beds for $18 per night. I wished I could check myself into a private hotel room to sleep off my jet lag, but that wasn’t in my budget right now. I carried my luggage the last few blocks to the hostel and walked inside.

The lobby was full of young twenty-somethings dressed in shorts and sandals, and there was loud, upbeat music blasting from overhead speakers. I wondered if I’d accidentally walked into a dance party. But no: all of the party-goers were carrying backpacks and suitcases, or else perched on stools and couches, waiting to check in at reception. I wasn’t the only one who’d had the idea of a working holiday in Melbourne.

When I finally made it to the front desk, a laid-back receptionist with a German accent confirmed that they did, in fact, have $18 dorms available.

“That’s in the 12-bed dorm,” he said. “If you want something a little more private, we have an 8-bed dorm for $25 per night, and a 4-bed dorm for $32. They all come with one free welcome drink at the bar.” He nodded toward the crowded far corner of the lobby, where a bartender was serving beer. “How long do you want to stay?”

“Can I start with, uh, two nights?” I said, counting out the handful of Australian dollars I’d exchanged at LAX. “In the 12-bed dorm?”

“No problem,” he said. “Can I see your ID?” I handed him my passport, and he tapped on his keyboard for what seemed like an unreasonably long time before handing it back. “Let’s see — it looks like that room is still being cleaned. We can get you checked in, but the room won’t be ready for a few more hours. Is that all right?”

I nodded. All I wanted to do right now was take a shower and a nap, but I wasn’t about to go traipsing around the CBD to look for another hostel. “That’s fine,” I said. “I can wait in the lobby.”

“Here’s the WiFi password,” he said, handing me a slip of paper. “And here’s a free token for your welcome drink. Enjoy!”

I carried my bags over to the bar and waited for the bartender to finish serving the group ahead of me. “Uh — what does this get me?” I asked, handing over my token.

“A pot of Cooper’s Pale,” he said dispassionately, as he handed me a small glass of beer that looked about the size of a whiskey tumbler; I tried not to look disappointed.

“Thanks,” I said, and pulled out a $1 coin to leave a tip.

“Oh, you don’t have to do that here,” said a guy sitting next to me on the left. He had a strong American accent that I pegged as being from somewhere in the Midwest. 

“What’s that?” I said.

“You don’t have to tip in Australia,” he said. “I know, I know, it’s hard to get used to. Everything costs more here, but service is included. No one works for tips.”

“That’s good to know,” I said, slightly embarrassed, and hoping the bartender hadn’t noticed; I took the coin back and put it away.

“You just got here?” the guy asked. I nodded. “I’m Perry,” he said. “My friends and I just got back from South Australia. Want to join us for a drink?”

He pointed at a group of three girls and another guy sitting at a nearby table. They were all wearing hats and long-sleeved shirts, and they looked sunburned and exhausted.

“Sure,” I said. We carried our drinks over, and Perry introduced us. Ethan was from the U.K., Ruby was from Canada, Julie was from France, and Meiling was from Taiwan.

“What were you doing in South Australia?” I asked.

“Picking cherries,” said Ethan. “We were only there for a couple of weeks. Just enough to save up some money for the holidays.”

“We want to get to Sydney for New Year’s Eve,” said Meiling. “I hear the fireworks are one-of-a-kind.”

“There’s still room in the car for one more person,” said Ruby. “Do you want to come? We can split gas and take turns driving.”

“I don’t know,” I said. Tagging along with them sounded fun, but I really needed to find a job before I went on any road trips. "How was cherry-picking?”

Perry shrugged. “It pays well,” he said. “I mean, they pay you by the box, so it depends on how fast you are. Ethan made $300 in a day once.”

“Really? That’s like $1500 a week.”

“Kind of,” said Perry. “But some days the weather’s bad, or there isn’t enough fruit to harvest. And then you’re just sitting around with nothing to do.”

“And you still have to pay for room and board,” said Ethan. “Most of the farms have a hostel you can stay at, but they deduct that from your wages.”

“Not going to lie,” said Julie. “It was brooh-tal. I’m French and even we don’t have sun like this. Zee ooh-vee rays are incroyable.”

“Yeah,” said Perry. “Bring a hat and plenty of sunscreen. You don’t think you’ll need it, but you do. There’s like, a hole in the ozone layer, or something.”

“Right,” I said, discouraged. I hadn’t come all this way to be stuck on a farm, living paycheck to paycheck. “What are you doing after Sydney?” I asked.

“After that we’re heading up to Queensland,” said Meiling. “It’s mango season there.”

***

By the time I’d finished my beer — and helped drain the jug that Ethan had generously bought for the table — my room was ready. The receptionist handed me a key card and the door code for getting into the shared kitchen, lounge, and laundry room.

I carried my luggage up the narrow stairway, dodging other backpackers on their way down. In one stairwell, there was a bulletin board advertising vans for sale and seasonal employment opportunities: Pick packing. Construction. Call center staffing. Nothing that sounded any better than picking fruit in South Australia. Except for one:

Want to earn $200 per hour?

Be a nude model.

Seeking men and women ages 18-35.

I nearly walked past it, thinking it sounded too good to be true. But I ripped off a tab from the bottom of the flier just in case. It wouldn’t hurt to check out the website.

Finally, I swiped my electronic key card on the dorm room door. As soon as I entered the room, I could hear the sound of snoring from one of the lower bunks; its occupant had rigged up bed sheets like a makeshift curtain. It was too dim to see anything, so I turned on the flashlight on my phone so I wouldn’t wake them up.

At first, I doubted the receptionist’s claim that the room had been cleaned while I was waiting in the lobby: there was a line of dirt-encrusted work boots next to the lockers, and several damp towels and high-vis vests hanging from the coat rack. One person had a veritable pantry under their bed, with packages of energy bars and Gatorade bottles half-hidden beneath piles of dirty laundry. The exterior window was closed, and the room smelled like a mix of stale Doritos and Axe body spray.

But it appeared that the trash bin near the door had in fact been emptied, and one of the upper bunks was made with freshly-cleaned sheets.

I squeezed my backpack into the open locker beside the empty bunk and climbed into bed. All I wanted to do now was get some sleep.

But first, I pulled out my laptop and opened up a search engine — making sure that my VPN was connected for privacy — and typed: “Is sex work legal in Australia?”

The modeling flier had given me an idea. What if I could make easy money working as an escort? I wouldn’t have to leave the city to pick fruit on a farm. I’d be able to stay in nicer accommodations than a hostel dorm. And I could keep on doing it when Nathan was here, to pay for our road trip up the coast.

A few of the top search results told me that yes, sex work was legal in most parts of the country — including the state of Victoria, where Melbourne was located. I could even apply for a “sex work license” with the Business Licensing Authority so that clients would know I was legit.

I wasn’t new to the idea of doing sex work — I had friends who worked as strippers, or dommes, or professional cuddlers. Hell, I’d even started my own OnlyFans page. But it was such a legal gray area in the U.S. Here, it was practically above-board; it wouldn’t even violate the terms of my visa.

Of course, it would mean hooking up with male clients — not something I had a lot of experience with — and I wasn’t sure I was ready to be a “bottom” or a “top”. Maybe I could ease into it with something less … full-on? I opened up a new browser tab: “Do you need a license to give massages in Australia?”

Once again, I found the answer I wanted. Unlike in Oregon — where you could be fined for practicing without a license — Australia was pretty much a free-for-all. I could offer any kind of massage services I wanted, as long as I didn’t lie about my level of training; the going rate for sensual massage was around $100 per hour.

I found a site called MassageMate, where you could advertise erotic massage services by city, and uploaded a few selfies from my OnlyFans — cropping them a bit to leave something to the imagination. But all of the other masseurs looked more experienced than I did. Most of them either had a private studio for incalls or a portable massage table they could bring to clients. How could I set myself apart?

I remembered a nude yoga session I’d been to a while back, at which both the instructor and the students had been naked. He’d offered private lessons for an extra fee.

“Nude yoga and massage,” I typed. “Enjoy a 30-minute nude yoga session followed by a relaxing sensual massage on the yoga mat.”

I posted the ad before I could change my mind. Then I put my laptop away, pulled my eye mask on, and went to sleep.