Dear Friends and Family,
Please forgive my typos and
disorganized writing style. Also, when I use emoticons please ignore it. It is
just the effects of a disease that I picked up while living in Asia. I can’t
stop.
Before I begin, let me just say
that while most travelers always gush that they love traveling by themselves,
personally, I disagree. Maybe it comes from being a naturally kind of spacey
person who is bound to climb aboard the wrong train or miss an important
announcement or misread my tickets, but I find that when I travel, I am almost
constantly relying on the kindness of complete strangers. For that, I would
like to say thank you to: the German man who helped me roll my three suitcases
around Frankfurt airport, after watching me slowly (though I bet amusingly)
roll three pieces of luggage by myself, the tall Australian-- let's just say
the many tall people--who helped me place or retrieve my overweight stuff from
overhead compartments, the Turkish man in the internet café who let me use his
computers after they were closed to print out my Ryanair boarding ticket, and the
friendly old Italian man who smiled and escorted me to the right bus pickup on
random sides of the street. I'll add you to the list of others to whom I owe
thanks, many of whom are Chinese taxi drivers.
So I have arrived in Europe, and
really, I feel so comfortable here already. The first day I spent in Frankfurt,
my friend picked me up at the airport and helped me lug
all my bags for Bologna to store while I travel. That day as the sun set we
went on a run along the river Main which runs through the city. The sky was
pink with clouds behind the cityscape across the river, and our side of the river
was lined with a number of outdoor bars and and picnic areas where people were
enjoying the view and drinking beer. I am trying to think of a comparable urban
atmosphere to some place in the US, but I can’t. Please remind me if you think
of one.
Now on to the “Italian pot farm,”
as another friend called it. “I always knew working on an Italian pot farm
would play to your strengths,” he wrote me. He is joking and they don’t actually grow pot here. I have been
working here for just over a week, and I have to say, I think agree with him. Life
here as a WWOOF (Worldwide Organization of Organic Farming) volunteer, or WOOFer,
is unbelievably relaxed.
For those whom I may not have
told, last year I paid about 30 dollars or so to become a member of the Italian
WWOOF. For that price, not only do I get an updated online list of WWOOF member
farms, but I also get Italian (I believe catastrophic) insurance while I
volunteer on an organic farm/vineyard while in Italy. I found Cascina Degli
Ulivi through this listing, and they said they had an opening for two weeks at
the time I requested. So I volunteer
helping with work on the farm, and in return they feed me and give me a place
to sleep for free. Ever since I found out about WOOFing I have wanted to try. I
think the main reason is I am obsessed with food. I also like to occasionally
test my dirt and physical endurance limits (though maybe my only prior example
is the Tough Mudder I completed last year). So, I thought I would try WOOFing
for two weeks during my travels this summer.
Anyway, the farm itself is
relatively small. Its largest building is a kitchen, kind of informal but
warmly-decorated dining room, and a few bed and breakfast-type rooms, which is
the “agritourism” side of the farm. Four other buildings house different staff
of the farm. The oldest and most rustic of which is the guys’ house, where most
of the male workers and volunteers stay. The nicest house is where Bianca, the
owner’s mother, lives with her helper. A third building has two apartments. The
owner’s ex-wife stays in one and the head of the farm office in another with
her son. A few trailers are set up on the farm and on the main vineyard where a
few other workers live. I think one of the most remarkable aspects of life here
is how the core staff of the farm lives here, eats here, and in addition their
social life also revolves around the farm.
My accommodations are
hostel-quality, but I am completely happy with it because it is free! I share a
small room with two other girls, but we have our own cots with real mattresses
and clean sheets and blankets. My roommates are Amber from LA and Teresa from
Milan. We leave on the light for each other at night, don’t mind the five or
six daddy-long legs spiders hanging around on the ceiling, and enjoy our daily girl-talk.
We have a fairly clean bathroom all to ourselves.
The rest of the farm family is a warm,
diverse group of people. Sonia, a very talkative woman in probably her early
forties, runs the office and has great English and an adorable son named Manuel.
Manuel helps with all things around the farm kitchen in between playing
imaginary war games around the gardens. Mitch is an older Italian man in his fifties
(but strangely looks much older, must be the farm life) who is in charge of making
the cheese, the yogurt, and seems to be in general charge of the cows and the
one horse, Pioggia. Mitch is tall with a mischievous smile and is always making
jokes. He is also a celebrated cook on the staff. Luca is a quiet guy in his
early thirties who I swear looks exactly like a hippie version of Orlando
Bloom. Amber agrees. He drives the tractor. Leo is a muscular Italian guy
covered in tattoos who is funny and loud. Last week I watched him ride a horse
bareback and then later attempt to ride a cow. He taught us WOOFers how to yell
and chase cows. He has a tough-guy attitude but is very serious and
self-critical of his own cooking. Actually yesterday he made lunch for me but I
misunderstood him and he asked me “where the f*ck” I was through Teresa that
night. I felt really bad and apologized, but he laughed it off. Stefano, the
owner, also looks like he is much older but is only in his mid-fifties. He can
come off as cranky one moment but very generous and semi-raucous the next. He
looks like a farmer with a tall, skinny but strong build, wispy hair, and
fairly unkept facial hair. He sometimes yells and rants about things, slamming
on the table in a comical way at dinner, and I am guessing it is about
politics. Apparently he is a pioneer and "inspiration" in Italian organic wine. See the illuminating extended interview with him here (which makes me despair even more that I don't speak Italian, because he seems really cool):
http://louisdressner.com/producers/Ulivi/
Another important character is
Paco the farm dog. He is a huge sheepdog-looking (and I may be totally wrong
because I know nothing about breeds) bear of a dog that is very sweet to all staff
but protective of Stefano. I am glad he has never once barked at me. Paco is
not allowed in the houses but he often disobeys this rule. He also enjoys
barking and chasing the cars that come in and out of the farm. Both violations
cause everyone on the farm to throw their hands up in the air and yell “Paco,
basta!” which means “Paco, enough!” It seems every evening Paco can be found
looking out over the fields, contemplating his life and keeping watch for
intruders.
Other animals on the farm include
chickens and a rooster, about twenty cows (each with their own names from
Dumbolina to “Old one”) and three calves, ducks and many ducklings, aggressive
geese who hiss at everyone, two adorable white and brown-spotted cats (one of
which has blue eyes that are crossed), one large and boisterous brown goat with
flapping ears, and two adorable small black and white spotted goats.
Produce on the farm, besides the
grapes in the vineyard, include plum, apple, peach and apricot trees;
watermelon; zucchini; asparagus; strawberries; tomatoes; leeks; onions;
carrots; spinach; lettuce; and eggplant.
As for the work on the farm, it is
incredibly relaxing. As WOOFers we only have to work 6 hours a day, 5 days a
week, and really no one is paying much attention. We are all trusted to get our
hours done and in actuality we all do a bit more. As far as the type of work, I
have been lucky it has been so varied. I have organized crates, picked
strawberries, weeded around carrots and asparagus, brought water to the
pasture, herded cows, chased cows, intimidated and yelled at cows, hoed garden
soil, chopped and grated carrots in the kitchen, washed the cheese-making
instruments, and washed dinnertime plates and pans. I have also helped with organic
methods of keeping the insects off the plants, such as building nests of hay
around some of them, or placing bunches of mint around the field. In addition I
have learned about the cheese-making and the yogurt-making, which was as simple
as I remember it from watching something about it on Sesame Street.
Eating and drinking on the farm is
magnificent for it being free! We three girls are responsible for kind of
foraging for our own breakfasts from the bread, cheese, and eggs available from
the guy’s house where the worker food is distributed. Our kitchen also has
butter, various pastas, olive oil, assorted spices, and other necessary things
for cooking. A large fridge behind the main kitchen holds the yogurt and the
stores of jams and sometimes vegetable which we are free to take within reason.
We are also free to take plums from the trees and some things from the small
garden, again within reason.
Every workday lunch is provided by
the main kitchen, which has mostly been some kind of salad (often simply
shredded cucumbers and lettuce on which we drizzle olive oil, vinegar, and
salt) with pasta of often a different kind each day but has also included
beans, couscous, lasagna, and barley with vegetables. Bread is always served
and, if we are lucky, cheese. To drink, we have big bottles of fizzy mineral
water from the restaurant machine, regular water, and huge glass containers of
red or white table wine. Especially refreshing is red wine added to the mineral
water. After lunch we are always given espressos. Lunch is not only with the
core farm family, but also with the other office staff, construction workers,
kitchen staff, and other workers from the fields. I look forward to everyone
coming together at the same time every day, and to my espresso.
Dinner is where the core farm
family always gathers. Someone different is in charge of dinner every night.
WOOFers are not expected to cook, but we almost always take care of the dishes
and cleaning afterward in return. Special meals besides pasta have been chicken
curry (the supreme treat!) and lasagna with meat. Wine is always served with
dinner, and sometimes, we have the nice bottled wine from the vineyard or from
the owner’s cellar. I do not know much about wine, but I immensely enjoy the
wine here. The labels say they are “Triple A” certified by the Italian organic
wine organization, and they use no sulfates as often found in wines in the US. The
first night I tasted their “Merle Bianca” wine, and it was incredibly fragrant
with both fruit and flowers and was just the right amount of sweet. It is the
best wine I have had so far while in Italy, and later I checked the price
listing and it is the Cascina’s most expensive. I have to find out where they
sell this in the United States! Apparently their main importer is LDM Wines in
NYC, but they distribute it to other places.
So that sums up the main details
of the farm, but as I said, the experience as a whole has been relaxing. It is
of course more than that. Stacy asked me if I found the work to be boring, but
I find that it isn’t. Maybe this is the hippie in me that my friend suggested, but there
is something about sitting in the sun, in the dirt, weeding around plants for
hours that feels, as one new Italian friend put it, “zen.” My mind feels very
clear and relaxed. After working for three years at a desk, often hardly aware of
the weather and any animals outside, it is a pleasurable change. I am enjoying
every moment. I mean, I don’t feel like weeding alone is something that I could
do for more than a month or two. Ideally, if I were to stay here longer, I
would want to continue doing a variety of tasks, as well as help more in the
kitchen and maybe bake American pies for the tourists. :)
The culture here, what I have
witnessed in a very short amount of time, has also been wonderful to
accommodate to. Italians seem to be very laid back in general and not easily
offended, which is good for someone who doesn’t speak the language. Farm family
life leads to grabbing food with your hands and own utensils out of the
communal dishes, lightly joking and nagging each other, friendly “ciaos” at
every passing, and helping each other with all aspects of work here from
cleaning to serving coffee. Another great aspect of farm and WOOFing life is
that often on weekends farms will have big parties where workers from
neighboring farms come to hang out, meet other workers and volunteers, eat,
drink, and dance. We went to a big vineyard with a lot of WOOFers a few weeks
ago, and we danced Italian folk dances and hung out with other volunteers until
the early morning. The crowd was quite
decked out in their hemp and piercings, dreadlocks, and drapey, earth-toned
clothing. Amber and I definitely stuck out in our dark skinny jeans and tank
tops. Despite this, we were welcomed and quickly made friends with any of the people
we ventured to introduce ourselves to. The party scene here is something I did
not expect. I did not expect to be dancing in a circle with about forty people
around an Italian folk band, in the middle of a farm, surrounded by vineyards,
at two o’clock in the morning.
In conclusion for this post, my travels continue and
hopefully I can write an entry every few weeks. Miss you and thanks for taking
the time to read. :)
Ciao Ciao!
Adrienne
Paris, France: I met up with the lovely Sam and Micha, as well as
fellow William and Mary and DC bud Dave in Paris. The afternoon I arrived I
was completely sleep-deprived, but couldn’t help but gush over everything I saw
to the confused taxi driver as he drove me to meet up with everyone near the Champ de
Mars. Along the Seine, every landmark was practically glowing in this hot,
summer afternoon light. I think I might have overwhelmed (umm annoyed?) my
three friends with my enthusiasm in light of their collective jet lag. That early evening, we ate duck fat and so forth at a nearby bistrot and then lay in
the grass below the Eiffel tower until it began to sparkle.
Sainte-Preuve, France: Dave and I had a joyful reunion with W&M
friend Helen and her husband Jesse at a rental car place in Paris. Not only did
we stop at a truly sketch truck stop side-road hot dog stand in the countryside (who knew the French even had things like that?)
for perhaps the most greasy what they called “American” sandwich, but while
driving through some tiny villages, Helen and I performed the
opening to Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. The part where the villagers are all popping their heads out of windows to say "Bonjour" to Belle.
Istanbul, Turkey: Micha and I spent a whole week exploring this
spectacular city at a leisurely pace. Our first night we had dinner with Helen
and Jesse at Mikla Restaurant. The view was something I will remember
for the rest of my life. It was a hot summer evening, and while Micha and I had
drinks on the rooftop bar prior to dinner, we watched the ships sailing
around the Golden Horn and out into the Bosphorus. The sky was bright blue with
a few fluffy clouds, which eventually faded into pink and orange sunset. We
happened to be visiting during Ramadan, and as we sat down to our table for
dinner (with practically a 270 degree view of the city), the sun set and the
mosques all over the city lit, and we could hear the calls to prayer across
the city. 
Oslo, Norway: I visited Oslo in for a glorious reunion with my
friends from Shanghai 2007 and Saya from DC, as well as attend the Øya music festival. Saya and
I went on a run, oh you know, just a few miles down a wooded path around a
beautiful lake complete with tree-lined island in the middle. After the run
Saya fed me my all-time favorite everyday cheese: Norvegia complete with knakebrod (spelling?). With the entire
group, besides laughing ourselves to death in Kevin’s apartment and day
drinking cider in Oslo’s main park, we danced like crazy (often by ourselves, I think
a lot of Norwegians avoid activities that have the potential to make them look
uncool) to Dam Funk, Metronomy, the Black Keys, and Florence + the Machine. For
the Black Keys concert, the ladies wore fake mustaches provided by Sanna and
Steve, causing a stir and reporter briefly interviewing us.
