BUNAC Work America Diaries; Becoming a Working Girl

The job i had lined up was working at Ice Cream and Candy Bazaar, in Edgartown. After two days rest in order to recuperate after travelling, and in order for the boss to start the two new girls together, we were in the shop at 9:30am and given our new T-shirts.

The first few days of my new job mostly involved learning where things were kept, what the prices of different things were, and how to do the simple things around the shop such as restocking, serving an ice cream perfectly, and using the till. Thankfully, because it was early on in the summer season, business was quiet and it was easy to learn on the job.

The first time I served a 'small' ice cream i was told by the boss that it was no where near big enough. Whereas in the UK one scoop would be a small, here it seemed the the equivalent of two and a half scoops was a small! Even the size down which is called a 'kiddie' is still a scoop and a half! That's the ice cream meant for tiny children in prams!

Learning on the job, we made sure that serving customers and keeping everything neat and tidy was our main priority, but there was lots of side jobs to do, such as bagging up sweeties (candy) into little clear bags weighing half a pound, or restocking the teddies and gifts that were hidden in every nook and cranny of the shop! Although at the start id have to try to remember what i should be doing once I finished a task, towards the end of the summer it was all just coming naturally, always keep busy. 

My favourite 'side task' was to make waffle cones, even though they burnt your fingers a bit and i was utterly rubbish when I first made them, and couldn't get them to stick in the correct neatly rolled shape. However, as I practised, i got the hang of it, and was able to multi-task whilst making them, and only muck up a few of them in each batch!

One of the (many) bonus's about working in America for the summer, as opposed to staying in the UK and getting a summer job, is the pay. If you work it right, you can get the same rate of pay as you would get at home, plus tips. Generally, summer jobs in the UK are barely above minimum wage, so if you're between 18 and 20, you would get £5.03 an hour. This is the equivalent to $8.30. A lot of the jobs that were available to the BUNAC work America participants were over $9 per hour, with bonus's available the longer you stayed towards the end of summer. Employers are desperate to ensure you stay at least until Labour Day (1st of September) so a lot of them raise the wage about 50c per hour each month you work, so for every hour i work in September, ill be earning $1.50 extra compared to June.

Tips in the UK are uncommon. I can work a 4 hour shift at a hectic gig behind the bar, and barely break £10 in tips, the average for the majority of shifts is £6. Tipping in the UK just doesn't really happen, unless the person you're serving doesn't want change jangling around in their pocket, or if you are waitressing a sit down meal. In America, its just common to tip. This is because a lot of serving jobs get a much much lower minimum wage, and rely on tips to make it up to a normal rate of pay. However, if you start off with a decent wage, any tips you earn are just bonus to your day. It wasn't uncommon on a busy evening shift to break $50 in tips, which is about £30. Tips paid my rent, and I was left with my weekly wage to live on, and save.

Its going to be hard to go back to the UK and not give evil glances to people who aren't atomically dropping their coin change into my tip jar...

BUNAC Work America Diaries; To the Vineyard!

12th of June

Waking up early in room 314 with a bit of a sore head, i realised i had made a stupid mistake. After purchasing a padlock for the locker in the hostel room to keep all my important things safe, i had managed to come in the night before and thinking i was being clever, locked everything inside the locker to make sure no-one tried to steal anything.

However, this included my purse, phone, key card for the room, money and finally, the key for the padlock. All locked inside the giant locker.

Idiot.

BUNAC Work America Diaries; Flying High and New York

10th of June

After deciding upon travelling to London the night before and staying in a hotel near to the airport due to an early 7:30 am flight, my father and I decided to have a america themed meal and cocktails to celebrate me leaving for my Big Adventure. Salted caramel ice cream sundae demolished, belly full of good food and hands full of American money, I was ready for the next morning.

BUNAC Work America Diaries; Flights and getting to America

I travelled by myself last summer when I left home at the end of June to pop half way round the world and visit my best friend who had been studying a semester abroad in Auckland, NZ. I felt confident that I could navigate the airport and connecting flights, but i still wrote a comprehensive list of what time each flight was, what time it was boarding, which terminal it left from, and which gate (if i could find the information online!)

Although i was later than i would have liked buying my flights, I purchased them about three weeks before the fly date, they weren't too expensive. Make sure you're in constant contact with your American employer, and ask if the start/arrival date is flexible. There is a massive price difference between certain days, times, and flight durations, and thankfully my employer was flexible, so i was allowed to arrive two days later than i said i would when originally accepting the job. This saved me £200, which was useful for the first few weeks of living expenses.

There have been studies which prove that Wednesday is the cheapest day to fly, due to most holidays wanting to start/finish on the weekend, with Friday and Sunday being the most expensive. Flying early morning (yes, that means being at the airport at the crack of dawn) is usually cheaper, but it also means you can sleep once your on your flight. Take a look at slightly different duration flights also if you want to save. For me, it was cheaper to get a slightly later flight, but with a half 40 minutes less time in between my two connecting flights. Shop around, and use the STA travel price match, because if you find a cheap deal online with a non-budget airline, they will match it for you.

Make sure you have all your documents, i bought a handy document wallet for only £2.99, and it meant i could keep my passport, visa forms, money, and important bits of information all in one place inside my carry on luggage. In the week running up to your flight, make a list which you can keep adding to as you remember things you need to bring, because I can guarantee if you leave packing till last minute like I did, you'll remember that there are things you wanted to pack, but you wont remember what they are!

Things to make sure you've brought with you;

Nail Stamping; Moyou Pro Plate 7 XL

I have recently bought my first proper nail polish stamping plate! A Moyou #7 XL plate! I was so excited when I received it in the mail that I immediately removed the polish that I already had on, and started a new design, admiring the shiny plate.

I had already had some practice with stamping, but the plates were cheap nasty ones from Poundland and Ebay, and therefore were difficult to pick up the whole image and transfer it to my nail. On a whim, I decided to try a more expensive, much talked about brand which led me to Moyou.

The packaging was delightful, and I immediately got the hang of the stamping action, and it was so much better and easier than my cheaper knock off plates, even without special scraper, stamper or polish!. Obviously I'm not perfect, but I can practice!

I'm already looking at buying another few to add to my ever growing stash of nail products! Next time though, I wouldn't bother with the 'XL' tag on some of the products, and just get the smaller versions because I have small nails and could probably get away with it, and it also means up to 4 extra designs on each plate!

Here are a few of the first attempts at using the plate!

I've also just heard about The Clockwise Nail Polish's nail blog give away, where she is giveing away more of these fabulous plates, and other goodies such as Polishes that i cant get my hands on here in the UK, like ORLY and Essence, and two glitter polishes which I cant tell what they are, but they look beautiful!

To enter, just go HERE!

HAUL; E.L.F makeup in Cardiff

I split my time between my university city of Manchester, and my home town of Cardiff, the latter I return to maybe once a month? However, when I do, the one place that is top of my list to visit is not the historic Cardiff Castle, not the amazing delight that is my local tea and cake shop, or even the high street shopping area that is Queen Street.

Instead, I make my way down the old arcades of central Cardiff, and find Royal arcade which houses the only E.L.F in Europe! (Eyes Lips Face for those of you who don't know!) All you have to d is look up their twitter (@elfStoreCardiff) to see all the high praise from people around the Cardiff area making regular trips to the shop, and even people coming specially from England just to pop in!

The staff are helpful, and as long as its not too busy, will be more than happy to help recommend what shade of blusher you need, or what skin type you have and the best foundation to help combat it!

On my last trip, i had a bit of a splurge;

BUNAC Work America Diaries; The nitty gritty of paperwork

So because i can't tell you what to fill in on all the forms, because each one is individual to you, this will be a relatively short post!

To get to the page to see what you need to upload, just login to your BUNAC account, and then click on either 'Upload', or the 'supporting documents' with a little red 'x' next to it on the right. This takes you to a new page showing what you need to upload, what's been uploaded and is being reviewed, what's been accepted, and if you're like me and a bit silly sometimes, what's been rejected. If something says 'rejected' next to it after you upload it, there should be a reason next to it.

 Proof of student status
I emailed the 'Student Service Centre' of my university, and provided them with information such as name, student number, and registered home address, with which they were were able to prove i was a student there, I was then forwarded a scanned copy of a letter which met BUNAC's standards in a email!
You can also go in during a lecture and get a lecturer or someone high up to fill in the example letter BUNAC provide you with.

 Passport photocopy
Simple, if you have your passport with you at uni, and have access to a scanner, then just do it whenever you have the spare time. I however didn't have my passport, so had to phone home, get my dad to scan it in and email it as an attachment PDF to me. Make sure the writing is legible, they wont accept it if there is smudged food or ink across it, or if the letters and numbers are blurry or out of focus!
Also make sure it will be in date by at least 4 months from the date you are planning on returning home from the US.

 CIEE Work & Travel application
         &CIEE Application Addendum
This isn't difficult to fill out at all, it's just tedious and takes time. There is a supplement help document on the right hand side of the uploading page which will talk you through the harder questions.
The reason I had problems with this was the signature. BUNAC don't allow what's known as a 'digital signature' which I know as a technical thing that is like an fingerprint for using online. I then presumed it would be okay for me to sign a separate piece of paper, take a clear picture of it and then paste it onto the CIEE form.
This was then rejected and sent back to me with the advise 'we don't accept digital signatures'. I don't have access to a scanner at uni so had to wait until I went home the next time and do it then. I then uploaded the form again, but managed to forget to date one of the boxes, so again it was returned to me and i filled it in, and uploaded it again.
Eventually it was accepted, i let out a sigh of relief, and thought 'i wonder how much of an idiot BUNAC think i am!'
The 'Addendum' is similar, print it out, sign where it tells you, and then scan it back in and upload to the BUNAC website.

 Employer Job Form
Once I had accepted a job offer, the employer asked for my Job form, and i sent her this. She then filled it in with all the necessary details and emailed it back to me, and I just uploaded it.


EASY.