I don't even have to start off singing to do it I can just start doing it.
*Throat Banging Noise*
I taught myself to do that.
Oh, I've just seen you going like this, what is that
And I can eat practically anything,
literally anything. I could,
well, I can't eat glass and I certainly can't eat dog shit. That's um *laughs*
I met Adam when you were 17, he's just had to turn 21.
I can case manage him until he's 21. He moved from
care out of home care
Into, uh, back to home to mom and dad's and now that's fallen down
and he's,
on the roundabout
He will be bouncing around
rooming house maybe,
refuge if there's, there's got to be a space in a refuge
But you only get a certain amount of time in a refuge. 21 days, I think
In the meantime, he just floats, um, from pillar to post.
No other family. He's got nowhere to go
than being homeless.
They're telling you nothing, this is a runner. I think this might be a runner.
These two young kids were like 20 and 22 maybe, I won't get much money
So we'll give him a real cheap deal, really cheap deal through Vincent key at the beginning
And then we're gonna pay for the last few weeks themselves, but they've been doing graffiti and smoking dope and stuff. So
Look at the heater! They dissembled the whole aircon (A/C) heater unit, it's all been taken apart.
They left basically rubbish around and underneath my shelves
We'll get a TV taken at least once a week, easy.
Which is why now I just resort to going on Gumtree or eBay getting TVs like secondhand, sort of thing.
'Cause buying three four hundred dollars not worth it.
I don't think it's nice, but at the same time I
I think it's a product of our society because these kids, their father's in jail
for how many years. They're not living with their mother, they're basically, you know,
they're out. They've really, they got nowhere to go. So, um, in many ways our society should be looking after them, in some way.
So I'm not here to judge them, you know, but, I mean, I see that one argument they should
give me some respect like I gave them, you know, OK. Maroon, I've been fair with them
they should be the same back.
Even if they can't pay, they've got to get some sorta conditions with me to organise payment, slowly. I'm happy to wait, you know.
If by tomorrow they're not here, probably have to clean their room up.
Yeah, come in, come in, come in
You're welcome to come into my room.
I walked around the corner. I'll have me sunnies (Sunglasses) on
and she was sitting out there with another girl and I took my sunnies off, when she looked up at me and
I looked at her.
I know, we just had that,
instant connection. Instant connection.
Oh only six weeks, but we're dead set, because that we know each other so fucking well now, it's unbelievable
I cannot, I have not met a girl, a woman, in my life ever that has been so compatible.
She does everything I do. She, I reckon she's female version of me.
*Woman* Yeah, I should be a boy. *Man* No, you stay a girl. *Woman* Yeah, I should be a male, I reckon
But, this is, we're so much in common, you know. She collects caps, I well
On this side of the wall. I lost my brother two years ago,
he passed away in a car accident.
My mum is passing away at this point of time, she's in hospital.
She's only got about, maybe, three weeks to go, now.
I'll tell you something, not many blokes would stick around
with what is what she's going through.
*Woman* Why is my life like this? Why?
*Man* Come on, baby.
My family, my mum, everybody's going, man.
*Man* Like I said before, a lot of blokes wouldn't stick around. They'd get
cold feet right and ride off on her.
And, uh, she thinks like dead Bella,
sex means to her, that's how she thinks
I reckon he did.
And look, what I'd like to know is, how many blokes would stick around and help a woman?
Than these help when they meet her for the first time
You have people who are sort of are in family violence domestic situations where children are in Moodle.
You know, Weiser removes people who come out of, um, rehabilitation centers, like prisoners,
refugees, sometimes. We have people that have been stuck on things like Christmas Island. Life is not as simple as everyone thinks, sometimes
Yeah, the world's getting very complex.
I mean the guy's being silly. He had a knife of sorts, but he wasn't actually going to going kill or hit someone with it, I think.
He was basically just threatening someone.
We're not really trained professionals on that level, and yet I find it challenging that they, the government, sort of puts that,
yeah, onus on to a private motel, like this, given the complexities of these people
Hey Claire, its Karen from Kovac staying. How're you going?
Good, thank you. Um, I just want to speak to someone in regards to a client that you guys booked in with us last night.
She left an exposed syringe,
in the room.
Um, but the cleaners went in there and they found it just shoved under the bed.
That's her choice doing that, but you know take it with you or dump it somewhere else.
All right. Thank you so much, Claire. Okay, bye-bye. That's okay. No worries, bye-bye.
Oh my god, we had this guy here, number seven,
we've haven't, we haven't been able to book the room out.
I swear to god, his pants, like tracksuits, they had bands. They were like that, full of shit
We used to chuck everything out. The mattress, the bed shitting, everything. He's slept in there for three days, in shit.
You can't be judgmental because everyone, you know, everyone's got a story and there's a reason behind everything that they do
We all hit rock bottom, some how.
I've wrote poems on the wall to help other people, um,
realise what life's all about, and you know, you can get back up on your feet.
Welcome to my home.
The drawings on my wall are dedicated to the same staff and the manager, manager Phill.
And Phill's always saying, you know, you haven't touched anything today.
I actually do a bit of housekeeping here, now. So, like, that's a saga, you know, they're starting somewhere that I'm getting somewhere.
I never thought that I'd end up on the street, so I'm doing drugs
Well
The drug mafia ice. My drug habit was pretty bad when I first came here, I was
Using a lot, like everyday, maybe two three times a day.
Now it's probably once every three days, four days, so
I'll probably be here for a good 12 months or more, like but it's not gonna be overnight. I am gonna get better
We've all had problems. And you know, we've all had a past and
Like I said, I've never seen a motel in my whole life like them.
We've got a lot of clients who come here, who basically, are in transit housing and they really can't afford to be
Going into permanent housing, but they can't afford to be paying motel rates. So we decided to do like a cash back situation
Say someone's doing the bins for me, right, on in the morning
That five hours, we equate to about a hundred bucks, or whatever. They can come off their rent, right?
That fifty bucks makes a big deal for someone. In a week schemes, like could be the food for the week.
You know number seven, Phil reading back yeah. I told him he had to pay but he hasn't paid yet.
Hey John! I'm gonna step back here.
Hey, John.
Have you got money for me, mate.
*John* Um yeah.
Yeah, could um, could I give you fifty now,
and um, the rest in the morning? Or not?
No, you got go pay it all today, mate.
It's got to be paid all at once
All right, thanks for that darl. I've got the room, yeah, tonight, thank-you.
Yeah, beautiful. No worries John, okay mate. Bye.
Thank-you.
No worries
Oughhh! Far out!
Number seven are? I don't know why he's let him back. That room's gonna have to be fumigated for a week.
Hey girls, can we come in?
No!
Well I'm in here, it's not your room! It's not your room.
Go in the bathroom, shut the door.
She always comes in here.
She's attached to you, Kate.
She's attached to me, yeah. We got pretty close.
She'll come in, knock on my door any time of night, you know, it could be two o'clock in the morning.
What are you doing you?
You know, like, she's good company.
She's pretty switched on to a lot of things. Yeah
She's had a tough life, I suppose, like all of us
Room 21, as you walk in the door, the whole floor is just covered in hair.
Short hair?
Is it short hair
Last night was one those nights where after I finished 11 12, um, knocked off and went to sleep.
And I was on call. I had calls all night, man.
Just
Random stuff, bro.
yeah, I'm knackered.
Get out of her room.
She wants you to hop out.
Come on.
Hey! Right that, that is enough now. That's enough now, that's enough, call me a name like that again,
there's gonna be a problem.
Don't even go there.
Yeah, don't even go there.
She just called me an effing slut
That's the abuse you cop at this joint, mate. Hey, bud. You're right?
I swear to god, if that was a male that said that, I would have gone right off.
She'll come to me in half an hour and apologize but I cannot shut my mouth with males.
If males are going mad at me. I can't shut my mouth. I know what it is, but I can't get into that.
It's to do with my past. You know. I just don't think you call anybody names like that.
I know they're just words, but
I've never called anyone a name like that in my life. I wouldn't.
You see that sign eh, half was motel and the other half was Swiss Cafe.
Now it's gonna be all motel, the whole sign will be a motel.
Taking a perv in case of any hot fireman but there aren't.
Waste of time that was.
We're not really killing it. We're not really making money in a big way.
Um, but that wasn't my main concern, it was more about at least making it
balance out. So at the moment we are under the
8000
is on my case.
Look, people need accommodation and
This is one avenue they have at the moment. I'm not saying, I didn't make the rules
I'm not saying this is the the best avenue for them, but they've gotta have somewhere to sleep and a roof over the head, right?
I've never seen Melbourne more disgusting in all my life and I've lived here for a while so.
You walk around streets in the city, and there's people sleeping there under cardboard boxes
Begging for money, in broad daylight in a first world country. I think it's shocking.
Late July we had the, um, shooting incident here.
Um, Booking.com
expressed their concerns about the place and they put us on a 12-month suspension.
Yeah reviews, look reviews
A client coming in on an international booking program. I can expect some negative reviews occasionally.
Because they'll come into us and, and and maybe come to
contact with people they'd normally wouldn't be big smooth in a motel
you mixing the two classes together. That doesn't work sometimes.
Often doesn't work. Um, people are very narrow-minded, they're very opinionated. They're very, um.
They're inside a square thing, a little white picket fence houses in the suburbs that nothing happens,
but it does happen, they just don't see it.
So when they come across with people who take drugs or prostitutes or some of that work, you know
These are these that are happening around them all the time and for them
They, it's a reality check that they often don't like to see.
Kylie left a review for staying you know, so this is Kylie says, oh my god, OMG, I
I recommend not staying here. I wouldn't give them a one-star rating
But I do you have give at least one to be able to comment, which is why I give them one
People staying here stay at their own risk, right.
And they give one again.
I wouldn't recommend this place as it's wasn't clean enough for him, right?
My room was not of sanitary.
Terrible place, police were there.
Other residents use drugs. Absolute nosedive.
There's one star that didn't write a review.
Drunks, druggies, and junkies people.
Drugs were used on a premises.
Cops were there at 1:00 in the morning
Great service, is the best on sénor road. Now that surprised me. Yep
After what was written before right?
So basically, we don't pretend you know the whole sign, so we're gonna basically have one big sign that says motel only,
parking area and
It's this side. This side is actually really faded, facing, facing north.
Well, yeah, that's really that's what the cafe was like before, at the front there.
See that, see how the garden was actually quite low and neat.
I go on job provider and I'll go on Google or I've got my certificate one two three in hospitality
I'd like to do more in social work with, you know, like helping children and youth working.
I go on Facebook um.
And I go on, um,
Google and I type their name and you know, like I can say recent photos of them.
At one stage my son, my oldest son, was reading the messages and I think he stopped reading them now and um,
It's really hard, you know, like for, for mother to, yeah.
It's really really hard that - I don't even know. I can't even comprehend on
facing them and looking in their eyes and seeing their sadness in their eyes, you know, like, I, I don't know.
I would love to meet them and I only recently found out my oldest son got married and
After my marriage failed my children wanted to stay with their dad.
After that period, I hit the drug thing and lived on the street. I was still ashamed to confront my children.
Every day I look at these photos. Oh my god, their father has done a wonderful job, and he should be proud,
I know I am. I know it's, it's right. If you are reading this, my children, please let me come
see you please. But I never heard anything