So three ½ months have elapsed and there’s been very little news from me. Why may you ask? Have I forgotten about this blog altogether? Have I gotten bored of relating my fascinating experiences and captivating thoughts that engross you so much!? Ha Ha! Don’t you worry... I have not tired of this. What’s happened is that I’ve been living on a rural ranch (www.ranchomastatal.com) in the tropical rainforest of Costa Rica working as a campesino and learning lots of new and useful skills such as carpentry, natural building, mosaicing, gardening and farming, baking, fermenting foods and much much more!
So what exactly did I do everyday at this ranch?
Well the day normally started at 6.45am to be in time for breakfast at 7.00am. On saying that, a couple of times a week we would get up at 5.30 am
to cook breakfast for somewhere between 15 – 40 people. This would normally involve making some sort of eggs (egg toasties on occasion which is where you cut out a hole in a slice of bread and toast it with an egg in the middle…mmmm! So good!), kefir (a type of yoghurt that’s meant to be much healthier for you), fruit, pinto (which is typical Costa Rican food consisting of rice and beans) and perhaps pancakes or muffins or another delicious breakfast food like French toast. Meals were buffet style and were always plentiful. Everyone had the tendency to over eat and go back for seconds and thirds just in case that the meal would not appear again or out of pure gluttony.
After breakfast the 7.30 meeting would happen (Agustin making a habit of loudly reminding everyone with his Argentinean accent that it was 7.30 and time for meeting; people would sleepily finish off their breakfasts looking a little flabbergasted at the sudden need for movement). Meeting involved going over the daily tasks and people putting themselves forward to do them. This might involve turning the bokashi (a Japanese fermented fertiliser that gets used in the garden), baking sourdough bread and bagels, planting fruit trees, working on a carpentry project
such as making a table, feeding the bio-digester with a bag of manure (a toilet which creates methane out of peoples ‘deposits’ and feeds this gas into a gas stove that is used to cook off), making ginger beer, making candles, making soap, cutting bottles to make glasses, daub dancing (mixing sand, manure, clay and straw to build walls out of), feeding the goats and chickens, cooking, etc, etc, etc. So once you had chosen the tasks you were interested in and meeting was over, you would go about starting your work day (which really didn’t feel like work most of the time, being such a great opportunity to learn something new everyday). You worked till lunch which was called with a conk shell (at about 12:30) and once again, you stuffed yourself stupid with amazing, delicious foods such as pumpkin tart and sauerkraut (a fermented cabbage), yucca burgers, burritos, or empanadas, all coated with a heavy layer of homemade garlic or chilli mayonnaise.
Once you fell into your food coma, a couple times a week the chocolate man Jorge would come with his temptations and everyone would gorge themselves on the indulgence while sitting about and waiting for the afternoon to start. The rains would normally accompany the afternoon work which prevented from most outdoor activity and kept people busy inside (the rainy season taking place between the months of May – November). Mammoth storms would at times take place with lightning strikes and thunderous thunder causing landslides and road cuts. .
Sometimes you may have a lunch or dinner cooking shift which involved cooking with two local girls (normally Katia and Roxy) for approximately 3 hours (this is the time it takes to cook for so many people!).
The girls would chatter about town and ranch gossip while they would skilfully and quickly prepare meals and you assisted in the matter. The work day finished at the time that you wished, depending a lot on what you were doing and how committed you were to finishing the task but normally around 5.00pm. People would either have a shower (once every three or four days is what most of us became use to showering – dirty buggers!) or having a beer and appreciating the sunset hours. Dinner would be served at around 7.00pm but would be preceded by circle time which involved everyone getting together around the long dinner table and maybe saying thank you to someone for something that they had done that day or saying goodbye to someone who was leaving the next. At first I hated circle time and always felt uncomfortable but after a while I saw the value in doing this exercise and enjoyed listening to peoples thanks and comments that were made. A nice way to finish the day even if a little hippy!
Bedtime would be shortly after dinner as you struggled to stay awake maybe due to the work that you had accomplished or the early hour that you had woken up. Everyone would retreat back to their respective accommodation scattered around the ranch, set amongst the jungle with the noises of the many frogs chirping away. On some nights the full moon would be shinning down and lighting the beautiful landscape, making it easy to walk the paths back to our houses, other nights it would be pouring down in gallons and you would try and not slip over the muddy paths on your way back home.
The wildlife was in close contact with living spaces, everything being open with mostly no doors and few windows.
As I lied in bed, I often could hear huge insects buzzing around in my room, attacking the mosquito bed or flying in circles until they found their way out again. Spiders would establish their space and became pets that we greeted hello to on a daily basis. Scorpions would find their way into dark little corners, especially under clothes, or in and around wood. Toads would be hopping in and out of the main house and sometimes frogs would also make their way in. On rare occasions, snakes were seen around living quarters. The rule was if they were poisonous they had to be killed in the name of our protection.The working week was between Monday to Saturday and Sunday was a day off. Brunch was held on Sunday allowing people to sleep in if they wished and then scatter off to an entire day of community football games or go for a hike to one of the many waterfalls or rivers surrounding the ranch.
So what did I accomplish during my time there?
I made (in conjunction with others!):
- A table in the shape of an anchor for the house that I lived in which was named after a song called starship cork
- A gate for the Choza (Tim and Robyn’s house)
- Cubbies for the main house
- A mosaic sink for the bio-digester bathroom
- A daub floor for the Cork
- Lime washed (an alternative to paint) the Chozer house and bathroom
- Planted lots of trees!
- Lots more that I’m not going to bore you with anymore…!
Some of the happenings in the 3 ½ months at the ranch:
- Agustin cutting his finger on a table saw in the first couple of weeks of arriving at the ranch and managing to cut his tendon leaving behind a nice big scar and a bent finger
- Warren acquiring an allergic reaction to mosquito and ant bites mainly obtained on the goat slope and covered with a very nasty rash
- Chepo proudly killing a poisonous snake and posing for pictures with his collared shirt unbuttoned, his signature style
- The permaculture design certificate course taking place half way through the internship, being a challenging 15 days of back-to-back classes (being use to manual work by this point and finding it hard sitting down in class all day long). We presented our extravagant permaculture designs for a porn client and ninja centre and passed. I am now a permaculture designer!
- Holding down the fort while the owners (Tim and Robyn) and most other interns went to the beach for a holiday and seeing first hand what it’s like being in Tim and Robyn’s shoes, showing around and answering the numerous questions from the new volunteers
- Tim having a bot fly squeezed of his back while a team of us squirmed and squealed at the sight of this alien tadpole looking animal popping out of his skin
- Sole’s favourite words (the daughter of the owners of the ranch Tim and Robyn): “No hay paso!” “Pupuya” “Caca de vaca!” “No importa!” “No hay campo!” “Vaya” “Yo quiero” “Poquito” “Adonde?”. A very smart two and a half year old who knew everything that went on at the ranch, where everyone was and when to speak English or Spanish depending on who the person she was addressing
- Making enough gnocchies to feed all of Mastatal to celebrate gnocchi day in Argentina (the 29th of each month)
- Warren dressing up as a goat for superhero pizza night
- One of the goats dying on us upsetting many
- Agustin falling out of the ute on the way back from harvesting mangoes, being flung off by the force of the harvesting pole getting stuck in some trees
- Michelle’s excitement whenever Michael Jackson was played and her very good dancing impersonations that she entertained everyone with
- Lina being my housemate at the cork and sharing chats on random afternoons
- Mary’s dry and sarcastic humour that took everyone by surprise at first and entertained people for the rest of our time together, especially when she impersonated Chris, our permaculture teacher’s class habits on pizza night
- Eileen playing with Sole and attentively looking after her on most days with much joy and eagerness
- Kassi falling head over heels in love with an eccentric and quirky permaculture translator, mini Chris, who’s exactly that, very mini but also loud and entertaining
- Andrea running off to live with her Costa Rican boyfriend in a village up the road from the ranch
- Vikky recounting numerous stories of her life back home in the UK, her family and her time at the ranch before we all arrived, especially her numerous encounters with jungle insects
- Robyn and her incessant care of Sole even while she is sick, addressing her every need, speaking to her like every parent should: with patience, attentively and as an intelligent human being
- Tim and his ceaseless dedication that he gives to the ranch, always willing to help anyone who needs help with great attention and care
- Eileen breaking her toe while playing soccer and being in constant pain and limping for weeks
- Tim and Robyn’s dedication to the ranch and their ceaseless hospitality, friendliness, humbleness and sharing of their home with everyone who comes through
- Amy and her very high work ethic and dedication to the task, always keen to do the shitty jobs and… “anyone want to plant vetiver?!”
- Rachel committed to the task of planting the entire ranch out to fruit trees and being an endless source of knowledge on gardening
- Bert and his cheeky smile and raised eyebrow stating that he’s finally finished building the kakhut shit shack
- Agustin coming up with a word of the day in Spanish to encourage people to learn Spanish in a primarily English environment
- Bea and I wearing matching clothes on several days and having chats about the future
- John, otherwise known as Mr. Musclos, strutting his stuff around the ranch while the numerous girls oohed and ahhed at him flexing his muscles while doing ‘manly’ work
- Mario known as the strongest man on this earth climbing up 20 metre high trees to cut down branches and harvest food at the age of 50
- Hana farting and burping her way around the ranch and sharing her bountiful knowledge on plant and animal life
- Listening to Kassi sing as if it was a professional performance at a bar, her beautiful voice affecting all of us
- Everyone tikaring themselves up for one of the two village dances occurred while we were there with the disco mobil!
- Junior and his many flings with many gringas and his amazing skills at carpentry
- Katia, the leader of the women in the village sharing her amazing cooking skills with us at the ranch
- Roxy checking out the new meat (volunteers) that kept on coming into the ranch
- Ty working tirelessly and silently on the new community library
- Agustin playing basketball and twisting his ankle and crowned accident man during his time at the ranch
- Finishing the Choza gate on the day before leaving the ranch, just in time!
- Jason hospitalised for 5 days after being stung by a strange insect and getting infected, his leg swelling twice its size
- Tiburon talking peoples ear off while at dinnertime as they slowly tried to get away
- Playing in cow poo on a regular basis in the name of natural construction!
- Eating a lot of pejibaye in all kinds of different ways… till we were truly sick of it!
- Candice coming to visit me in my second last week at the ranch! So nice to see a friend again!
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