Italy...next stop Greece!

So its been awhile…my apologies.
I have been up to my smiling ears in olives…with limited internet.
I am still at the olive farm in Ceglia Messipica…near Ostuni, Italy. Because I have never fully described it…It is called Om Nama Shivaya Farm, where they have about 200 organic olive trees. Owned by Marilina, loving, warm lady who has these blue piercing eyes that doesn’t miss anything, and has been to India many times. Very spiritual and nourishing. Ishu is up in the tree and cuts some branches down for those of us on the ground to rake through the branches thoroughly…catching all the falling olives in green nets places strategically on the ground under the trees we are working on. We gather about 150 kilos of olives in a 5 or 6 hour day…and 300 kilos of olives make about 15 kilos of oil. Every few days we take about 500 kilos of olives to the press about 40 km away…and bring back freshly pressed olive oil to then put into bottles…Mariliana does that while cooking in the kitchen. The oil sitting for a month or so before it is sold so the taste settles and is not so strong. It is almost hot peppery right away.
It is eye opening, to say the least, seeing how much work goes into small farm production olive oil. . It is a lot of work for olive oil, and its sooooo good!!! The difference of taste is substantially better compared to larger commercial farms. It is like a different product all together.
When I am not gathering olives, I am deep in my bowl of food drenched with fresh olive oil…and our newly homemade bread.
BUT NEWS!!!!
So Trisha from FF was here my first week for a few days, she is the one who told me about this farm…because I am illegally wwoofing here in Italy…meaning I am not signed up here…so I contacted them through Trisha. It was wonnnnnderbar to have her here! I spoke as much English as I could…as fast as possible just on principle. So much laughter and love!!! Out of nowhere we are soul sisters. She is going on to India next month. I deeply wish we could travel together! Maybe it will happen… J
I have been definitely finished with olive harvesting this week…but with no phone working or internet to figure out where and how to go next…I have been enjoying as much as possible…in my own world…which has been interestingly a lot like Mother Divine. hahaha
Like I have said before, they do not speak much English..so when we do talk its simple jokes…or slow…which works a lot on my communication patience…which apparently is good for me…
oh, but about MD…so I am mostly in my own world, unless they are practicing Italian with me…and my own world lately has been a crazy emotional rollercoaster ride..one minute Im so angry and things are blowing up in a firey disarray all around me…and the next stoke of my olive rake I am laughing at myself for such an intense emotion…and the next I am amazingly happy over bearingly so for no reason whatsoever! Im just floating along with it as it is all changing good and bad…time goes by really fast or really slow…just like MD…and all the good and bad seem to melt away by the evening into warm contentment…wondering over the days emotions. …but it is interesting to watch how my mind works when I don’t talk much…its almost like I am in silence here. Come to think of it, it is much like an Ashram..minus long programs if you don’t count working as meditation. They have vedic chanting and Krishna Das playing most of the time in or outside while working or relaxing…it is very purifying. Its funny how I am all the way in Italy but its like I am in FF.
The people here are great. They are what keep me going and waking up with a smile every morning.
There are 2 other wwoofers here Andre and Manuella, a young vegan Italian couple my age. Andre is helpful with my Italian, and always is talking about these theories he has about how they are putting chemicles in the jet fuel engines that change the weather….whenever a plane flies overhead he runs into the house to grab his camera and take pictures. One day I found him leaning against the shady side of the house…and he said…see! amellia! from here…you can see the streaks in the side…its not normal…and its true I looked from where he was and saw these strange broad jet fuel streaks…his girlfriend is so amazingly sweet. Every morning when she sees me she says..Ciao!!! How are you? (Which started from How you is?) and I say Bene Gratzie..y tu? and then we go to the olive trees…oh the never ending olives
ohhh but Alessandro wins for my favourite character here! He is a friend who met Isho (side note: I think it is Ishu…but I always call him Isho…or it’s the other way around…I cant actually pernounce his real name…Mauritsu..I think…a lot of vowels. anyway!) in an Ashram in India and so he came here (originally from Tuscana) to help for the harvest. He does not have a home. He goes wherever God wills him to go. I know…you first say oh god..another one of these people…god talking and mood making….but he is amaaazing! Always singing random tunes, with so much energy all the time. He is always helping around the house, first to go and last the leave…or start the dishes or start sweeping…but when he is silent he is verrry silent…and then randomly he busts out with Sanskrit chanting over and over…or from the other room I hear him announce… YOGA! or… PURUSHA! I get a kick out of it. He makes me laugh about 20 times a day. He does stuff just to make me laugh…and then points at me smiling like…see! Happiness is normal…just be a happy giraffe…And for the record he has floored me 2 times….which isn’t good because then I fall over on the olives and Isho yells from the top Attentione!!! ok ok ok!
But this guy (as Eddy would say) this guy is soooo funny! Alesandro comes up to my chest, shaved bald, and every day he wears the same work out fit (which most of us do) but his is these blue pants, and this blue button up shirt…buttoned all the way to the top and the collar is buttoned down as well. he has a big black belt wrapped around his skinny waist that misses a few belt loops everyday. If he speaks it is usually a passionate revelation about divinity in Italian, and I know what he is saying because of some Sanskrit he says…or the world divine here or there…or else he is chanting random sayings…making a joke…usually about how I am a Giraffe….or repeating random English words over and over….like It is not MY dog…it is NOT your dog.
I LOVE HIM!
lets see…what else…
oh! the other night we made pizza in the fire oven connected to the house!!!! Alessandro made pizza for 6 years in a time in the pass…as well as seeing a white tiger in north india…(random tidbit) and so I go into the kitchen that night and they have everything out on the table like a cooking show…and Marilina is video taping…I am laughing quietly soooo hard!!! They make the dough and talk like they are on television…then the next night after we have cleaned out the oven and started the fire to heat it up…we have invited some people over…first it is an old couple who lives on the next piece of land…who actually sold this place to them…and the man built this room I am in all by himself…its crazy!!! the beautiful white stone dome. This man only speaks Italian so I am sadly limited in speaking with him or his wife…but watching them is so funny. She automatically owns the forno (fire oven) and is manning the door hatch, this short stocky thick Italian woman…with a dramatic scowl always on her face but eyes that are quick to smile…I cant understand what she is saying but the tone is like she is always emotionally opinionated about how her husband can be doing something different…and yes annoyed about it as she is scowling…but somehow always entertained at the same time…which seems to be the way most Italians are. Her husbands voice is just like the God Father…deep in the throat and breathy…when he saw me and fond out I was American he wanted a picture taken with me. He held me very close and pressed his cheek to mine. I was laughing really hard in the pic. (I have it) He reacts to his wife with a kind of mock startlement and a heart melting twinkle in his eye. With all the activity I have described they are very silent and don’t say much.. (unless someone is trying to touch her forno). Alessandro made 6 loaves of bread, and lots of pizza that night. 3 spinach, fresh ricotta Calzones. They also had 3 other guests…Greg (went to University of Iowa, and his mother…and his girlfriend (Italian). They just got back on their BOAT from Greece…no big deal. I only have to sit down directly after I heard this…
It was a really heart warming night. I felt like part of the family, even tho I was le Americana…because throughout the evening there would be those small moments of familiarity with Alessandro, Ishu or Marilina…the small eye smiles while someone is talking…or the kind of knowing inside joke about something in the subject of conversation.
Then the other night Ishu took me to the Dentist. Ive been having this pain which is like a cavity. oi vey! So we go..in the waiting room Im writing in my journal while he is playing with my Itouch. He is soo engrossed by it…and we were sharing the ipod listening to the music together. Out of all my music guess which he decideds on…108 names of Shiva and Krishna Das…sitting with his eyes closed in the waiting room. I was greatly entertained by this. (There was no cavity and the dentist helped me with this high gum problem ive had for years, where the tooth is really sensitive…and he didn’t charge me! Saying Puglia Hospitality..incredible)
Then we went to his apartment in the city meeting up with Andre and Manuella. Its gorgeous!!! 3 levels (the top he just added) and I went up as high as I could…I was dancing on top of the city. I could see this big dome cathedral in the near distance lit up as well as the other side had a castle jutting up. If it was day he pointed out where I would be able to see the Adriatic Sea, very near. Maybe 3 km.
That about wraps it up…except that I have also just received 2 emails of welcome from farms in GREECE!!!!!!!! my dream destination! So I am currently strategizing asap to go. It is hard to figure out travel when I do not really have internet…but I hope to go next week. (I was going to stay longer in Italy but my farm options are diminishing and I want to stop with the olives and its getting cold.) One place is in Evia…a yoga thia massage retreat…they have orange, eucalyptus, fig, almond trees…house work a garden…animals and kids that I get to take care of!!!!!! I might be living in a tent I just realized…because they said accommodations in the house in winter…but is it their winter? I have no idea. hmmm….otherwise there is this place in Paros, an Agean Island…where there is tons of new work for me to learn, laid back people, and good food. I will prolly do both, but start in Evia and go to the island in more winter….not sure tho. I am asking them for travel advice help.
So yes…wow.
A month from tomorrow I left. Sadly, I sad goodbye to Charly at the airport…and excitedly got on my plane to Dublin. It feels like sooooo long ago!
All my love!!!! Hopefully my next farm I can have better internet and actually call people!!
I love you all so much and you are with me everyday, smiling in my heart!
KISSES!
ps for my dear friend...the reason you have a right to make fun of my writing is because a) I have limited time to write to i chose to not use too much puncuation ...b)I have been writing..even in my journal...in the way I have had to speak...which is simple bad english.
ahem...Justin...
:)