friday 'flexions

spostiamo i maiali

I'm trying to keep with the theme of writing on Fridays.  I like it because it allows me to reflect on yet another week flown by.  This week definitely had its ups and downs.  As I wrote last time, we lost a cow last Saturday.  We lost of few piglets this week.  It seems like a pretty common occurance that you lose one or two from each litter, but still it feels like a kind of failure whenever you do...

Monday morning Sam and I woke up bright and early at 6 and fed all the cows before making a batch of whole wheat pancakes and some coffee.  When we got to the wall at 8, the capo di animali was quite glad to hear of our early morning accomplishments.  We wrangled some pigs and fixed some fence, brought flour to all the "feedareas" and cleaned up the Piano for a tour.  On Monday afternoon Andrea, a beekeeper extraordinaire from a local farm/community called Bagnaia, came by to teach us interns about bees!  It was super informative and helped reinforce what I also know about those diligent critters.

I was on lunch duty this week with Nina (read: dream-team).  We are both very confident in the kitchen and this week we were rather ambitious.  Monday we made Pad Thai and fried rice, Tuesday we made Papusas and refried beans, Wednesday was crepes and quiche and then on Thursday we grilled out by the pool, which resulted in about 5 kilos of slow-cooked ribs.  It was a whirlwind in the kitchen all week long and we had a blast.

On Tuesday I castrated two piglets.  Males.  I was nervous at first, but I had expressed interest and Giulio was very encouraging.  I was a little scared because I didn't want to cause the little guy too much pain, but I also felt like it was an important thing to learn to do on a farm.  After doing the second one I felt confident.  Although it wasn't a pretty thing, it's something I hope to get better at.  Plus it takes all of four minutes.

Wednesday was a casino (a mess).  We had to move the cows around from one stable to another because a bunch of them are getting sold.  I was the only person working animali since Richard was away and Sam (current WWOOFer and former intern) was working in the transformation room sottovuotoing vitello (vaccuum-sealing veal).  Two guys with a big truck came and we loaded up the cows one by one in the truck.  It's a really sucky and annoying job and it took all freakin' morning.  I'll leave it at that.  In the afternoon the vet came and we all ran around trying to get pigs into their feedareas, which again was a casino, but the vet (who greatly resembles a mad scientist but is also a big Jefferson Airplane fan) told me I was a brava ragazza.  So that was cool.

Yesterday, Thursday, 19 pigs had broken through a permanent fence and started walking up the road towards the castle.  We slowly but surely led them back to their home-base and then fixed the fence problem.  Then we fed cows and while Giulio and Richard ran around and did flour, I fixed fence on the piano and ran down every half hour to check the ribs on the grill.  It kind of felt all week like we were struggling to keep up with the demands of the animals, like we were sempre one step behind.

That's why this morning I rose early again to feed cows before the capo arrived at 8.  It's a sure-fire way to make everyone happier and more at ease in the morning--to get the feeding done early.  That way the real work can begin right at 8.  It's great to feel like you're on top of things and making progress and this week was a bit of a struggle.  In many ways, I wish this internship was 6 months in total.  Now that summer has come and the sun rises so early, I feel like I could easily get up at 5:30 and feed and then have the whole morning to do projects and make things work better.  Sadly, there are only two weeks left of the internship.  I'm almost in denial about that fact and have chosen not to address it.  Rather I will look forward to staying through June and helping Spannocchia be the best place it can be...