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Christmas Appeal
Gift joy, choice and more opportunities for people with disability this Christmas!

I live in a share house in Panorama, so it’s really close for me to walk to work in the morning. That’s good because I have some mobility issues from when I suffered a brain injury at eight years of age.

My start time in the cafe is 8:30am and when I arrive, I’ll usually call out to Beni or one of the workers “Hello, how are you going?” and then I might be asked to jump on biscuit-making duties, or help stock the fridges.

We currently have some new trainees and high school interns, and I’m really enjoying teaching them how everything works.

What I love about the job, in a word, is people. Having people around me and having a conversation and, also, I have silly jokes like “Am I all right?’ ‘No, I’m a little bit left’. I could go on, but I won’t.

I like to lift people’s spirits with my lame jokes but sometimes I get a bit carried away and someone might say “Oh better get back to work, Jake.”

I do love cooking though and trying out new recipes. I think it’s because I was born on Anzac Day and my gran always made the best Anzac biscuits for me. My gran has been a great supporter and helped me in my life a lot.

I’ve been at Bedford for one year and three months now and if I didn’t find this job I honestly don’t know what I would’ve been doing, probably just moping around at my mum’s house. I absolutely love working at Bedford.

My next challenge is to go travelling one day. I’ve been to Bali and, fun fact, I was there when the volcano erupted, and the travel insurance company let us stay on for an extra week for free.

I’ve been at Bedford for one year and three months now and if I didn’t find this job I honestly don’t know what I would’ve been doing, probably just moping around at my mum’s house. I absolutely love working at Bedford.

— Jake