When I´m not eating...

I realized that I´ve left out an important part of my life on the farm: working. While it´s true that "work" is sometimes a loosely-defined term, with afternoons spent in the kitchen making homemade veggie burgers or gooseberry-rhubarb jam, we do spend a good portion of our time doing activities that more closely resemble what one thinks of as "farm work."

Each morning, we meet Cynthia down at the house and go to the barn to feed the animals and clean their stalls. The work isn´t hard, especially with four or five of us doing it, and it is really satisfying in its routine and rhythm. When the calf is tied up outside, the bunnies are fed and watered, the stalls are shoveled out, the pig has its bucket of wheat germ slop, and the poultry are busily pecking at their corn and vegetable peel breakfasts, we let the cows in, and my favorite part of the day begins: milking. I´m at the point where I can do this on my own, though there are always at least two of us doing it together. the milking machine is very simple, and the whole process takes only about 15 minutes, but watching the milk move through the clear plastic tube into the milk can (which actually looks like what a milk can has looked like for probably more than a century!), pouring it into a bucket, and then using that same milk later in the day for cooking, or cheese making, is just a magical thing.

For the past couple of weeks, we´ve been working on an expansion of Cynthia´s larger fruit and vegetable garden. I remember when she first mentioned the project and showed us the spot, it seemed like a huge undertaking. We started by clearing a plot next to the current garden (which is about 24 ft by 34 feet, roughly). This was hard work and took a few days of pulling out thorny michay plants, and digging up extensive and stubborn roots. Next, we dug three new holes for fence posts and carried heavy trunk posts from up by the house and planting them in the holes, along with large holes and earth. Then we had to undo the chainlink fence and wires that held it taut, extend it around the new posts, attach it to a new portion of chainlink fence, stretch it, and attach it to the old fence again. After that, we started carting wheelbarrow loads of compost, making new beds, and planting potatoes, broccoli, lettuce, and chard. Finally, the new garden is pretty much complete, and it´s so satisfying to see what we´ve done! I´ve adopted Cynthia´s habit of exclaiming, "Hermoso!" (Beautiful!) every time I pass, often out loud. Unfortunately, I don´t have any pictures of it uploaded yet, but I¨ll put them up when i get them.

Cynthia´s goal in hosting WWOOF volunteers is more to teach all that she knows about self-sufficiency, which is amazing, because it´s much more like an apprenticeship than just a volunteer job, and not a day passes without learning something useful about gardening, animal care, or most fun, cooking and baking. We are just as often leaning over Cynthia´s kitchen counter as out in the garden, and so far we´ve learned how to make: two types of cheese, jam, dulce de leche, bread, veggie burgers, empanadas, canellonis, flower champagne, granola bars, yoghurt, and butter. These sessions are my favorite, and have made me realize how easy it is to make some of the things that I would only ever think to buy in the grocery store.

Below is a picture of the greenhouse at the elementary school that Sol, Cynthia´s 10-year old daughter, attends. Cynthia built this greenhouse with the help of some other parents, all but one of whom have since dropped off the project, unfortunately. The saga of the school garden project has a lot of disappointment and frustrations, but Cynthia´s resolve to provide fresh vegetables for the 200 K-7 students at the school has carried the project forward. We work there every Wednesday morning, and it´s been really amazing to watch it transform from it´s state at the beginning, when it only contained last year´s bolting chard plants, to its current status, filled with robust and happy tomato, corn, lettuce, and squash plants.

And finally, the baby pio-pio´s.

On eating, and carving out my own space

It´s the start of my fourth week here at Rincon del Sur. Anna, who was here when I arrived, left on Friday, and today two new girls arrived, and I moved into a tent. The weather has been chilly and rainy lately, but I´ve been looking forward to the move. Our days are full, and there´s a lot of togetherness. With the rain, it´s hard to go for walks, and quiet, solitary moments are scarce. The tent will be a sanctuary, and now, with five of us, I need it more than ever.

Last Monday we decided we wanted to have Thanksgiving, and when we told Cynthia, she was more than happy to help us out. We spent all day Thursday in her kitchen, and ate a huge Thanksgiving feast around 9:00 that night. We stuffed ourselves, and got to eat leftovers the next day for lunch, too, just like home. Here was our menu:

turkey and stuffing
raspberry sauce (it came out really well, and was delicious with the turkey)
grilled eggplant and squash
cornbread
potato and parsnip puree
apple crisp
butternut squash pie
homemade honey vanilla ice cream (everything but the vanilla was from the farm)

It was all amazing, but the feast was also kind of a turning point for us in our food-focused lives here. The next night, once we had finally digested, Aily, Lucy and I decided it was time for a bit of a scale-back. We went on a long, gorgeous hike on Saturday and Sunday, and are trying to take it a bit easier on all the fresh dairy and rich meals (so we used milk in our quiche tonight, instead of cream :).

Beyond just attempting to leave this place fitting into the clothes I brought with me, living with a family that makes the majority of its own food has changed the way I think about the food I eat. I know Cynthia enjoyed our Thanksgiving dinner, and happily donated whatever ingredients we needed from what she had. But as she dug in her freezer to find yet another stick of homemade butter for one of our many dishes, I couldn´t help but wonder what she really thought of our feast. Of course, it-s a holiday, and I´m sure a similar spread is prepared around here for Christmas. But I also know that in general, Cynthia and her family eat what they have--when there´s less milk because one of the cows is pregnant, they don´t drink as much milk, butter becomes a luxury, and cheese is a special treat. They eat fresh fruits and vegetables when they´re ready for harvest in the gardens, and preserved or frozen for the rest of the year, until they run out. Living like that makes you appreciate the work it takes to produce the food you eat, and makes you savor the meals you cook even more. And that´s a good thing.

Farm School and Good Eats in Patagonia

Where to begin?? My apologies for the looong hiatus. I´ve been at Chacra Rincon del Sur, a gorgeous little family farm outside of El Bolson, in northern Patagonia, for almost two weeks (holy moly, it´s been two weeks!?!?). I´m living in a small, basic cabin with three other American girls (two of whom are from brooklyn, go figure). We live up the hill about 1/4 mile from the Aguilar family home. Cynthia Aguilar, the matriarch, is our "boss" and teacher. She´s like a farmier, friendlier, Argentine Martha Stewart, and she´s amazing. We work from 10-1 and then 4-7 each day, on her family farm and one morning a week at the local elementary school, where she runs a garden to provide vegetables for the kids´meals there.

Their farm is basically a family homestead. Cynthia and her husband, Ignacio, live there with Cynthia´s 15 year-old son, Fede(rico) and their 10 year-old daughter, Sol. They don´t sell anything commercially, though with a cash-strapped, rural population, bartering is very common, and they often trade their products and produce with neighbors. They have, i think, 24 hectares, which is about 80 acres of land, most of which is forested. They grow all their own produce in two gardens and a small greenhouse, and have sheep for wool and lambs´meat, two milking cows, a handful of laying hens, a handful of ducks, two geese (all for eggs), a pig, and four rabbits.

We start our days feeding animals, cleaning the stalls, and milking the cow. Then we help in the garden, weeding or transplanting seedlings, or help collect and burn wood (to prevent rats´nests in wood piles), or help with other small projects around the farm. When the weather is bad, and sometimes, even when it´s not, we get lessons in cheese-making, or butter-making, or bread-making, or empanada-making, or beer-making. This is my favorite part. Although we, as volunteers, do help out, Cynthia´s main goal is to teach what she knows to the volunteers that come to the farm. She is incredibly hospitable and affectionate, greeting us each day with a big hug, and treating us all like family from Day 1.

As far as cooking and eating well, I´ve struck gold at this place . In addition to our "classes" with Cynthia, my fellow volunteers are all great cooks and food lovers. With the exception of grains, beans, and spices, nearly all of our food comes from the farm and is included in our $5 a day charge. Ana, an American who is traveling with her boyfriend on a research trip for the goat farm-cheesemaking-brewpub they hope to open one day, is an excellent cook, and has been a great cooking teacher as well. Aily and Lucy, two Bard grads from Brooklyn, also love food, and are great cooks as well. I´m an excellent sous chef, culinary student, and appreciator of the delicious meals they create :).

We have somewhat limited resources, what with this being the beginning of the garden season (only chard, lettuce, onions, radishes and parsnips are fresh), but it´s amazing what "we´ve" come up with so far. Here´s a list (in no particular order) of some of our recent meals:

Spanish garlic soup, squash polenta gnocchi with morel cream sauce, squash apple soup, bulghar-lentil-chard pilaf, rice-chard pilaf (pictured below), lentil-potato-parsnip soup, rhubarb-cherry-apple crisp (I made that one!), Spanish flan, rice pudding, French toast (I made that, too!), potato pancakes. Every day, it´s something new, and with all the delicious, fresh dairy and eggs, I´m definitely going to be rolling off this farm when I leave here.

I will post more, soon, and new pictures are up in my Picasa album. Sorry there´s no captions yet. Until then, Chau, and Buen provecho!

Dance, Dumbo, Dance

I've been having a great time exploring Buenos Aires this week, and having an altogether different experience than my first three weeks here. The hostel I'm staying at (El Salmón) has a great group of people staying there, and has a really communal and laid-back vibe. Plus, it's very international, with Europeans, North Americans, and Aussies as well as several folks from South America. Most of the rooms are 6- or 8-person co-ed dorms. I'm sharing a room with a Peruvian, a Colombian, a Cuban, and a French couple. Other countries represented here are Canada, Germany, Chile, Argentina, Australia, England, and Ireland. It's pretty amazing when, around 10pm, the kitchen is full of people cooking, eating, and talking, with Quiche Lorraine in the oven, a Colombian sancocho (chicken soup) on the stove, and conversations in three languages filling the air.

I've spent my days this week exploring the city on my own: setting off on foot with a vague destination, which I may or may not arrive at before I find a cute café to sit in for a while, or get distracted by a bookstore or public garden. The other day I found myself in front of the Buenos Aires Zoo, and decided on a whim to go in. I hadn't been to a zoo in probably fifteen years, and my most recent opinions and impressions had been formed by an Environmental Ethics course I took at Bates. So I expected it to be a not very pleasant experience, but I was curious to observe my reactions to and feelings about it in person.

The first thing I noticed was how empty it was. Walking in felt like walking into an amusement park, but on a gloomy weekday during the off-season. More than the lack of guests, what was striking was the absence of staff throughout the park. Aside from booths throughout selling buckets of "Animal Food" or peanuts to feed the animals, and the guides leading the two or three school group tours going on, it was nearly impossible to find anyone who worked there. For a city zoo occupying a relatively small space, it had all the expected animals, but the enclosures were sad, small, and artificial, and many of the large cats and bears had no companions and lived amidst blatantly artificial environments. The principal activities of the monkeys and large cats seemed to be pacing and sleeping. All in all, the zoo, and thus, the animals, were clearly suffering do to a shortage of funds.

The visit confirmed my belief that capturing and caging animals for entertainment and money-making purposes is cruel and inhumane. Any educational benefits are more than offset by the de-animalizing effects of captivity. With the possible exception of animals rescued and rehabilitated from even crueler circumstances, which are not able to return to their native habitats (as was the case of Mara, the Asiatic elephant, who performed tricks for peanuts at the command of a tour guide), no animal should be subjected to life in a zoo.

I'm sure my conviction was heightened by the dilapidated condition of this particular zoo; however, while better-maintained and more sensitive zoos surely exist, I think the Bs. As. zoo is unfortunately more the rule than the exception, on a global scale.

On a lighter note, I'm going to check out a cemetery today :) which is supposed to be beautiful! I'm staying in the city until Sunday. the Gay Pride parade is on Saturday, and it should be really fun. Argentina is the only South American country to have legalized same-sex civil unions (in some regions), which has made Buenos Aires pretty much the gay capital of South America. I'll definitely have some great photos to put up on Sunday!

Transitions

I´m back in Buenos Aires for a couple of days, and boy, is it a change of pace! It was sad to leave the Hare Krishna farm. I really couldn´t have asked for a better initial experience for my trip. I´m going to miss the people there a lot, but hopefully I´ll be able to carry over the sense of simplicity and mindfulness I learned while I was there.

Duke (a British volunteer who came a week or so before I left, and whom Maria nicknamed "Jaimito," because Duke is tricky to pronounce in Spanish) and I went to Maria´s again on Wednesday, and made some awesome empanadas, with a leek-tomato sauce-cheese filling.

I´ve been going back and forth with plans for my next move. Originally, I was going to hop on a bus this morning for El Bolson, to go to this cute little farm. Then I decided that I wanted to spend a week exploring Buenos Aires. But then I found out that the farm can only take me until the end of November, and after spending a day and a night in the city, I realized it´s not what I´m looking for right now. Going from 10:00 bedtime and 7:15 wake-up to 5:00am bedtime and 10:30 wake-up, living in a stuffy dorm with five other people after my luxe loft accomodations, etc. has been a bit of a shock. I´ve decided Buenos Aires can wait, so tomorrow I´m getting on a bus at 1:00 for 22 hours, and then another for 3 hours, and then another for 40 minutes :). Hopefully at the end of it I´ll find a cozy place to live for the next month!

I´ve added more photos and put captions on all of them, so check them out on the slideshow or, with captions, here. Plus, and even more exciting, I finally was able to upload a couple of videos I´ve taken. The first one is from the second night at Eco Yoga Park (I´m a little link-happy today!). It was Govinda´s 24th birthday (one of the "madres"). It´s hard to hear, but they´re singing "Hare Krishna" to the tune of "Happy Birthday." The second video is from a crazy thunderstorm one evening. The thunder was a constant rumble and the lightning flashed nearly constantly for over an hour. I can´t figure out how to imbed them in the post (if anyone knows, please share!) so here are the links. Hare Krishna Happy Birthday and Thunderstorm. Enjoy!

UPDATE: I just heard back from the owner of the farm in El Bolson and since I told her I wasn´t going to arrive until the 8th, she booked another volunteer for this week! So I´m staying in Bs. As. for the week after all! I guess I´ll have to adjust to urban living for a bit. ¡Qué locura!

Things are better than ever at the Hare Krishna farm. I´ve been here for two weeks now, and amd staying for one more, and it feels perfect. I´m feeling very comfortable with the routine and the people there. Two more volunteers have come, but one is leaving tomorrow, as is Ben, who has been here as long as I have. The only other volunteer is an older Argentine man, so I will be the only foreigner, which is perfectly fine by me. I´ve become more comfortable speaking and understanding Spanish by the day, and have begun spending more time with one of the ´madres,´or nuns, here. Gora will be 23 tomorrow, teaches us Ashtanga yoga, and has the kind of sense of humor that makes joking around in Spanish almost easier than it is in English. My days have settled into a nice routine: work in the garden in the morning, ´studying´ transcendentalist philosophy (Thoreau and the Dhammapada, a book of Buddhist verses), yoga and meditation in the afternoon. Oh, and eating a lot, in between.

I have much more to say, but unfortunately, it´s time to go back to the farm. I tried to upload more photos, and for some reason, it´s not working on this computer. I expect I´ll be back in town early next week, so hopefully, more then!

Maria, Maria

A week ago Saturday, Dagmar and I went to Maria´s house for what we thought would be lunch, but what turned out to be an afternoon of outdoor cooking and dinner with she and her family. It was an awesome afternoon. Maria is our "boss" in the garden. She´s a 32 year-old Bolivian woman who emigrated to Argentina with her four children and husband three years ago. Her sons often come with her to work, before going to school in the afternoon (I´m still not sure why they only go to school in the afternoon). Javier is 15, and loves riddles and listening to my iPod. Nelson is 8, and very smiley, despite his shyness. Nector is 9, energetic and playful. Maria´s daughter, Andrea, is 12, and until Saturday, we hadn´t met her.

We arrived around 2:30, after walking about twenty minutes using the directions Maria had given (without any street names or numbers--Maria and her husband don´t know the name of the street they live on). Knowing that Maria´s family had emigrated from Bolivia for work, and that her husband works at a nearby strawberry farm, while she works for about $15 a day at Eco Yoga Park, I had expected their home to be small and poor. which it was. What I didn´t expect, though, was the beautiful, fragrant orchards and gardens that surround her house. Maria´s family rents a house that is behind another house, owned by a man who lives in the city. He only comes by on Sundays, to check on the place. The property he owns, and that Maria´s family enjoys, is beautiful.

In addition to the fruit trees and flowers everywhere, Maria has a two vegetable gardens, plus a chicken yard with several chickens, for eggs and meat, and geese. After a tour of the property, Maria put Dagmar and I to work, cooking a feast for us to eat for dinner. One thing I love about Maria, is that she loves food. At least half of the conversations we have while working in the garden are about food. "What did you eat for breakfast this morning?" "What do you think we'll have for lunch today?" "Are there any chapatis leftover?" "What kind of cake do you like best, and how do you make it?" Since the first day I arrived, though, the dish that stood out among all others was lasagna. Dagmar and I both had described to her fifteen different ways to make lasagna, at least. I gathered that she had eaten it somewhere, or maybe just had heard of it, but had never made it before.

So, naturally, that´s what we made on Saturday at Maria´s house. Lasagna with a chicken/spinach/carrot tomato sauce and a soft cow's cheese that Andrea brought back from the neighbor´s dairy farm. Made pretty much without utensils (chicken shredded and sauce mixed by hand!) and baked, along with everything else, in the mud-and-brick outdoor oven. Along with this, pizzas with the same sauce and cheese, salad, rice, and cake. Dagmar and I left at dusk, stuffed and happy.

While visiting Maria´s home highlighted the many ways in which our lives are a world apart, it also helped me understand her a lot better. On Monday, when we saw each other again, I felt differently about her. Where I had once gotten frustrated with some of her habits, like never giving specific directions for the tasks she wanted us to do ("Go weed over there," she´d say, pointing vaguely. "Where?" I´d ask. "There! There!" she´d say, slightly more impatiently), now I would just tease her about it, and she, too, seemed much more at ease with me (Dagmar had left the previous day). Those hunger-inspiring conversations have continued, and though we may never cook lasagna together again, I can´t wait to make chicken lasagna again when I get home.

Staying in the now.

My current schedule allows a lot of time for thinking. Which is good, of course, but as I tend, like many, to think too much, I´d like to spend some of that time not thinking. One thing I´ve found myself thinking about is the time that lies ahead of me, and how I might possibly spend it. Will I find a farm I like and stay there for a few months? Will I decide to travel around the country after another month, and hop from Bariloche in Patagonia to Mendoza or Salta in the Northwest? Should I look into plane tickets to travel to other countries in South America?

Last night, Gustavo, one of the non-H.K. (Hare Krishna) residents of the finca, showed Dagmar and I a video of a speech given by Eckhart Tolle in Barcelona. The speech was in Spanish, but he spoke slowly and clearly, as he is a non-native speaker as well. I haven´t read his books, The Power of Now and A New World Now (I think), but they´ve been very popular in the US and elsewhere (both Dagmar and Gustavo had read one or both). His philosophy incorporates aspects of different religions, but much of his speech focused on living in the present, a la Buddhist philosophy. He makes it sound very simple: the past and the future don´t really exist except for in our memories and our thoughts. The only life we have is right now, this moment, so we should not obsess so much over what´s to come, and rather live each moment as it comes.

I´ve come to town today to see if I´ve gotten responses from the farms I emailed the other day. I think I know now where I´ll be headed in a couple of weeks, but I´m going to try my best not to think too much about it, and to focus instead on getting the most out of every day at Eco Yoga Park. Wish me luck.

Krishna Krishna Hare Hare

So I´m on my fourth full day at "Eco Yoga Park," basically a Hare Krishna commune that takes volunteers and tourists to work on its farm and enjoy yoga and meditation. Where to begin? I arrived during the late afternoon on Thursday, just before yoga class, which was very relaxed. I was pleasantly surprised that it was not too difficult to follow in Spanish. Interestingly, though, the teachers here say everything in the first person, as in: "I inhale deeply, I exhale deeply...I put my left foot forward and bend my knee..." Also, they don't use pose names in Sanskrit or English.

There were eight of us volunteers here the day I arrived, but four left the next day, and another left the day after. Now there are three: Dagmar (female--pronounced 'Dalma') a 26 year-old Psychology student from Denmark, and Ben, a 20-year-old Bio-chem(?) student from New Jersey.

In the mornings, we have breakfast at 7:30, work from 8:30-1:00 (Dagmar and I in the garden, Ben with two men building a straw-bale cabin), lunch at 1:30, Yoga at 4:30, Snack afterwards, Dinner at 8:30. In between, our time is our own. We spend it reading, journal writing, and sharing observations and gossip we've picked up about the state of affairs at our host farm.

There are various Hare Krishna male and female monks, as well as lay people with varying degrees of devotion to Hare Krishna, who live at the farm, which they call "Nueva Vrindavan." They have services 5 times a day, which are not mandatory and which are signalled by blowing a conch shell several times. The female monks are young--women in their early twenties. The men are older, but most are fairly young as well. They spend their days cooking, praying, and taking turns at being our yoga teacher. We're not quite sure how they support themselves.

I had thought this stay would be an opportunity to cleanse myself--there's no alcohol or drugs allowed, and the Hare Krishna don't eat meat or eggs of any kind. Overall the food has been very good'-lots of vegetables and very colorful plates with salads, squash, beets, and fruit dishes. However, they seem to be quite fond of both sugar and salt, and portions are generous at all four of our meals--I may be lucky if I don't gain weight while I'm here!

My plan was to stay here for 3 or 4 weeks and then move on to a less spiritually-focussed organic farm, but I may make my departure earlier, and leave after two or two and a half weeks. Other volunteers have said that securing spots at WWOOF farms has been trickier than expected--this early in the season it's difficult for many small farms to take on extra bodies when they don't yet have a harvest. So, I've emailed all of the farms on the WWOOF list, and will hopefully be invited to at least one of them! If not, I may be chanting (yes, they really do chant "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare.." over and over again, all the time) for a few more weeks. Don't worry, though, I'm pretty sure I won't be returning to the states wearing robes and smelling of incense.

PS I had hoped to upload a couple of videos, but it was taking forever. In the meantime, here are some photos for your viewing pleasure (sorry they´re not embedded!)

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahfbarnes/Argentina?feat=email#5392186269057936898

Por fin, Buenos Aires.

I've made it! After many, many months of anticipation, and 30+ hours of traveling, I'm finally in Buenos Aires (and trying to get the hang of the Spanish keyboard, so bear with me!). Travel included many legs, the first of which was from New Haven to Brooklyn, and was, ironically, the toughest. Actually, it was just the leaving home part that was hardest: saying goodbye to family (I was lucky enough to have my grandma, aunt, and uncle in town for lunch just before my departure) and cutting the cord from the house with the nervous hope that I hadn't forgotten anything. Turns out, I did, and I made my mom turn around and go back when we were 2 blocks away. Surprise, surprise!

Lovely dinner with my favorite girls in Brooklyn, and an early morning departure for JFK yesterday morning, and I was really off! I flew from JFK to Mexico City, hung out in the airport for 10 hours (slow, but not terrible), overnight flight from Mexico City to Santiago, and then two hours from Santiago to Buenos Aires. And finally, I'm here.

The weather is sunny and warm--it's probably in the upper 60s or low 70s. The city is tall and vibrant, at least in the Microcentro, where my hostel is located. The strangest thing about my trip so far is how incredibly calm I feel. Throughout the entire journey, and in contrast to how I'd been feeling in the weeks leading up to my departure, I've felt relaxed and at ease. My jaw didn't ache upon waking up from sleeping in awkward positions on the plane, and, despite this major abyss I've just stepped into, so far, I feel nothing but peace about it. We'll see if it lasts, but for now, I'm going to enjoy it while I can.

Nerves

So, anxiety has officially set in. I've been having strange dreams for about a week now, though they've mostly been unconnected to my trip. Just weird, unpleasant dreams from which I woke up with a sore back and a tight jaw. Not so bad once I woke up and realized I'm just anxious about this awesome thing I'm about to do. I'd say the dreams are worth it.

Hello there.

I'm leaving for Argentina in six days. Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday Monday Tuesday. It's been so far away forever, and all of a sudden, it's almost here. I feel like there should still be so much to do, but actually, I think I'm in pretty good shape...until Monday, of course, when I think of fifteen things I need to do at the last minute. Story of my life. Everything I'm taking and more is sprawled out on and around the bed behind me. I'm determined to surprise myself and actually end up with extra space in my backpack. Wish me luck.