Foreign workers reflect on life at Auski Roadhouse in WA's Pilbara

Australia Broadcast Center

5 days ago

Auski Roadhouse is not the kind of place featured in Australia's multi-million-dollar tourism campaigns.
Temperatures at the remote fuel stop, 1,368 kilometres north of Perth along the Great Northern Highway, routinely hit the mid-40s in summer.
Flies swarm anything moving and the nearest town is more than 150km away.
For its mostly foreign workforce, it can be a daunting gig.
Something acknowledged by its manager, Lee Beaton, who shared the story of one Italian worker's first day.
"She said, 'It's isolated. There's no shops. Where can I buy things? Where can I get coffee?'
"And she ended up staying for 14 months and just loved it."
The roadhouse's 22 foreign staff enable it to stay open 16 hours a day, keeping valuable trucks and road trains on the move.
Auski has the only fuel between Newman and Port Hedland, a stretch of road linking some of the country's most valuable iron ore mines with its largest export terminal.
Vietnamese-born cashier and barista Han Nguyen described her first summer at the roadhouse as like entering an inferno.
"It's hot like hell," she said.
Like many of her peers, working here wasn't a dream, but a necessity.
Ms Nguyen was living in Sydney on a one-year working holiday visa, and was keen to stay in the country longer.
That meant working somewhere remote to help the federal government's efforts to address labour shortages.
"So I just posted on a Facebook group chat that I was looking for a job," she said.
"And the HR manager [for the roadhouse] saw my post and contacted me."
Five months on, the 32-year-old, dubbed "Han Superdry" by the Australian staff, said she had no regrets.
"I take it as a moment for me to reflect and go back to myself," she said.
"I need some time to think further for my plan."
For others, the predictable patterns of roadhouse life were a blessing and a curse.
"Every day is kind of the same and not much changes," Slovakian receptionist Katarina Virgovicova said.
"It forces you to confront things because you have that time to yourself, I guess. Maybe too much time."
Some of that time is spent reflecting on the lives of the truck drivers who pass through every day.
"Sometimes I would compare the truck drivers to pirates," she said.
"Like Pirates of the Caribbean. They're kind of travelling everywhere and they have no home.
French cashier Celia Guzman was well aware there were more glamorous work options for travellers in Australia, having lived in Queensland and the Northern Territory.
But the gig at Auski was a chance to earn more and burn less.
"In Australia, you can earn a lot of money, but you can spend also a lot of money," Ms Guzman said.
Staff at Auski pay only a modest weekly rent for their rooms and are provided with all their meals.
"I think it's a good time for us to make money," Ms Guzman said.
And at times, the 28-year-old saw being confined to the roadhouse as an escape from her responsibilities back home.
"Now I have this time only for me and I don't have a choice to stay here. So [my attitude is] let's do it," she said.
"I have no excuse to do everything I have to do, like thinking of my future or even something on my computer [that is stressful]."
When asked whether she would recommend the roadhouse experience to others, Ms Virgovicova said it depended on one's appetite for adventure.
"The environment is so special and so strange that you can't really compare this to anywhere else in the world. Maybe only somewhere like Antarctica," she said
"If you want to experience something cool and something that not everyone does, then you should try it.
Mr Beaton is just glad there are enough people game enough to try.
"They do a wonderful job for us, a wonderful job," he said.
"I'm very pleased to have them."