My First Bar Job: Room680

My first real bar job was at Room680 on Glenferrie Rd, Hawthorn.

I'd been to Room before as a punter and I sorta understood what I was getting into. Plus I had a girl that I was serious about (For the first time.) and I thought that I needed to do something to earn some pocket money so that I could show her a good time.

Room is and always has been a magnet for private school slackers. You know the ones I mean. Youths whose parents have the money or are stupid enough to be tricked into believing that they need to send their kids to private schools to give them the education that they need to become doctors or lawyers or whatever....

Aside:
No matter the amount of money parents throw at a child an idiot is still an idiot. I guess the parents get points for trying but they are aiming in the wrong direction I think. (We'll get onto what I think about the education system in Australia later.)

Back to the Review:
Anyhoo most of the rich kids in the immediate neighbourhood of Hawthorn kicked it somewhere near Glenfrerrie Rd. Room680 was the most intense. Open three or four days a week it would knockout uni-kids and "of-age" year 12 students on Tuesdays and Thursdays until 5am and then pretend it was mature on Fridays and Saturdays with the twenty somethings kicking until 7am. The music was always House and RnB of various flavours and the drinks were straight club.

Lots of flair bartending going on; mostly because when you're making drinks that boring you need something creative to do to distract yourself from going crazy. (It also makes daft 18-19yo women want to sleep with you, but anyway.)

Anyhoo, I turned up to clear tables and unblock toilets and suchlike. Not the most glamourous job but I didn't care. I just wanted some cash and I was an insomniac who liked electronic music anyway so why the 'f' not?

Fun though the place was it did have, down sides: Late starts. Late morning finishes. Filthy taskwork. Easy access to booze and easy access to drugs. (The second night I was ther I was invited into the toilets by the Saturday night promoters to smash some coke... I wasn't shy.)

The place has its problems. Apart from its propensity to get teenagers too drunk and the fact that the male toilets are the most disgusting and spartan that I have ever experienced (No seats? This blogger needs to bog badly.) it all felt kind of shallow and cheap. Nothing there seemed built to last, it smelt like an ashtray and there were too many drugs.

But it's still fun. It's like a bag of goon. You know that you shouldn't but then some idiot will suggest it just for the irony value. And then you end up having a good time. Fucked up. But a good time.

Unless you get kicked out and end up vomiting in the gutter.

Two and a half shots of whiskey. Because sometimes dirty cheapness is what you want... Or all you can afford.