A first trip ‘round the world, part 49

Money was not the key motivating factor for us to teach down-under, far from it! Remember, we were paid AUS$60 ($50) per week, it was not a lot, but it included complete room and board and a paid round-trip from Europe. 

In fact, after paying taxes and insurance, it was about the same as what I was making as a low-level instructor in France and $20 better per week than the French minimum wage! At that rate I would have needed to work 29 weeks straight to purchase myself a brand new Citroën 2cv, not counting my contribution to health insurance and income tax! 

Still we needed every dollar we could earn because we all had big plans to visit exotic places at the end of season, so having some extra money was important to us. Sure, we sold the free gear we got from Dynamic, Dynastar, Rossignol and Kerma, but that might have amounted to little more than a week working at the ski school. 

Just like in America, Australia used a dollar denomination for its currency that, at the time, was worth about 83% of the US dollar (1 AUS$ = 4.55 French Francs). Until 1966, there was no dollar but an Australian pound just like England.

On February 14 of that year, it was replaced by the Australian dollar. When we came, it was a bit surprising to see Queen Elizabeth’s face still adorning the one dollar bill and I couldn’t quite understand why a country like Australia that prided itself on its egalitarianism and entrepreneurship would still be under the British monarchy and a member of the Commonwealth. 

In fact, Australia was still a constitutional monarchy, in which the Queen was the head of state. After a while, I couldn’t care less and was reasonably happy when I collected my weekly salary. I’ve always wondered if John Hilton-Wood would pay us for the extra time we were held up on the ship, but I still was filled with illusions in those days, and he evidently did not. 

Yet, he and Alexis let JP and I stay a bit longer to make up for the money we couldn’t earn while we were having so much fun on the Galileo-Galilei. I had never realized that kind gesture until now, but better late than never!