Adios Valparaiso

Just like when the clock strikes midnight, Cinderella must go home, when the calendar hits two weeks on our trip, it is time for Reed and I to move to a new location. It had been 14 days in Vina del Mar and Valparaiso, so it was time to pack our bags and say goodbye. However, I had always been ready to go to the next farm after two weeks, so I was surprised when I did not want to leave. I liked Valparaiso. I really liked Valparaiso. Valparaiso is beautiful, quirky and best of all, unique. The colorful houses that clung the hills, the art that decorated seemingly every winding street and even the way the crates were stacked in the port made me fall in love with Valparaiso.
We lived, went to school and spent most of our time in Vina del Mar. This popular vacation spot for Chileans and foreigners prides itself on its beautiful beaches (although not too beautiful when the weather warrants long sleeves and pants), a clock made out of flowers and its safe streets. Although I enjoyed my time in Vina and some of the northern beaches, my fondest memories came after the 30 minute bus ride* south into Valparaiso.
       So I think that I have mentioned my fondness Chile’s largest port city too many times without a developed explanation of why. Although I do not have Pablo Neruda’s poetic powers that describe Valparaiso so well they seem to teleport you there, I do have a camera which can kind of do the same thing.






This picture displays what I think makes Valparaiso so cool. Not only can does it show the colorful houses that cover that cover the hills and the large crates in the port, but it also shows how the port really is integrated into the city and not in a remote, uninhabited neighborhood. I think the bright colors really define this city.










As you can see in the picture above, there really is no planned layout to the city. What you cannot see in the picture above is how the streets twist and turn and they climb the hills at impossibly steep angles. The lower portion of this mural depicts a rather subdoed, steep and winding Valparaiso street.

The streets are covered with art. We have graffiti in the United States which is predominantly just colorful, bubble letter "tags". But the streets here have elaborate and detailed murals that display the artistic genius of many unknown artists. Just a walk through a Valparaiso neighborhood is like a walk through an art museum.










Valparaiso could not be the star it is without its surrounding cast. The towns along the coast near Valparaiso provide a necessary escape away from the rushed, crazy lifestyle of a larger city. In my last blog, I had a picture of Renaca, a beautiful beach to the north, that is part of the surrounding cast. But even just a bit more to the north are the Dunes - mountains of sand, from which you can see Vina and Valparaiso. It is also possible to sand board at the Dunes. The Dunes rock.

       In retrospect, maybe I liked Valparaiso so much because it embraces one quality that I hold in extremely high regard: goofyness. The utter uniqueness of the houses that on its hillsides, the way the streets twist and climb like the scribbles of a toddler's first drawings, and the way that Valparaiso has grown up completely uninhibited by if the other cities might judge it for being different screams with a goofyness as strong as we did at Field. But my clock was striking two weeks and it was time to say goodbye to this wonderfully goofy city. On the our last morning, I went to wish Valparaiso goodbye by way of a harbour tour, on which a little boat took us in the middle of the bay. Maybe it was just Valparaiso's ampitheater like shape, but I could have sworn it was hugging me goodbye.

*We would also pass this when heading in Valparaiso.

Fun Blog!

So As I sat down to write a blog about fun I thought "hmmmm, I could write mundane, text filled, blog about fun or, OR, I could write a super, awesome blog that will grab your attention with the force of a WWE wrestler's headlock and stubbornly never let go of your attention like a toddler with its blanky." I opted for the latter.

Here is the story of my extracurricular activities...

Most days after class, there is some sort of activity. So far, these activities have ranged from a tour of Valparaiso (which I referenced in the last blog) to a class on cooking sopaipillas - frieds disc of floury, pumkiny goodness. Ours were topped with some tasty salsa. Mmmmmm sopaipillas.

Here we our frying our sopaipillas. Again, mmmmmm sopaipillas.

Some days when there aren't  planned activities, Reed and I do our own thing. On this day we decided to go to Renaca, a some, beautiful beach town about 15 minutes north of Vina del Mar.

Here is the view of the Renaca beach in the other direction. I really like the whole "houses in the hill right up to the ocean" thing that they have going on in Chile.

But I'm going to focus on my most recent weekend (Saturday 11/10 and Sunday 11/11). On Saturday, Ecela arranged for a tour to a local organic vineyard, Emiliana Organic Vineyards. I guess the magnetism of organic agriculture was too strong for Reed and I to escape.

Apparently, some of the best wine in the world comes from Chile. A fact that I knew little of in the United States, where the drinking age is 21, but that I have learned more about in Chile, where the drinking age is 18.

What's that you say? The whole WWOOFing thing wasn't enough and you want to hear more about organic agriculture? Well here you go! Pictured here is the alternating cover crop method. This method balances the beneficial effects of a cover crop (adding powerful Nitrogen and other nutrients to the soil) and the ability to travel throughout and harvest the couple hundred hectacre vineyard by machine.

Selfie with the alternating cover crops

This vineyard is either famous enough, or beautiful enough, to host some sort of a film shoot. The details of which are still a mystery to me.

These are wine grapes early in their lives. Fun fact: wine grapes are not tasty.

They also have animals (chickens, cats, horses and alpacas) on their vineyards to reduce the harmful insect population, as well as produce compostable material. Well, ditching the subtly, the poop a lot and poop is great compostable material.

THEY HAVE ALPACAS!!!!!

They also use a biodyamic calendar - a planting and harvesting schedule that factors in the Earth's energy to maximize efficiency. The only tangible practice that our tour guide mentioned was filling a sheep's horn with horse poop, burying said horn for three months, then adding two grams of now powerful fertilizer to a ton of compost. And Walla! You got yourself some real nice compost.

After the tour, came the wine tasting.

We tried four different types of wine: two white, two red and four with more specific names that I don't remember. I definitely enjoyed searching for the notes of grape fruit or butter in the whites, and tones of smoke or oak in the reds. It is fair to say that even my thoroughly developed palette could not detect such blatant tastes. If someone can find those flavors in wine, I'm impressed. I only tasted grossness.

Selfie with the wine tasting.

Selfie with the crew at the wine tasting. Take notice of Pablo in this picture. Pablo is a teacher at Ecela during the day, student during the night, vineyard tour leader on the weekends and awesome all the time. 

Adios Emiliana!

The next day, Reed and I woke up early, in an attempt to conquer this beast: Cerra La Campana. An hour and a half outside of Vina, this 9 mile hike was an all day excursion. This picture was taken about an hour into the hike, but trust me, that summit you see is far.

Cerra la Campana is known for it's gorgeous views, but also for the fact that Charles Darwin passed through here one time. I guess that is supposed to add some sort of historical edge to this hike.

Translation: Carlos Darwin was here.

The hike was a pretty solid incline, and then we reached this sign... This marked the beginning of the hardest hiking of my life.

The terrain transformed from forest to super steep, loose rock field almost instantaneously. The last mile took about an hour and a half. 

BUT IT WAS WORTH IT!! The summit had, art of  its previous conquerors in the foreground and the Pacific in the background. It's hard to see the Ocean from this photo, but be rest assured, it's there.

Just look at that gorgeous thing! The view I mean.

We could see the snow capped Andes in the distance.

And by zooming we can see them a little closer.

There were a surprising number of people at the summit.

Like this guapo hombre.

And this Red Hot Chili Peppers fan.

Now, enjoy this 360 view.

Hola Chile

Exactly one week ago today*, I was a couple thousand feet in the air, anxiously awaiting my arrival in a foreign, mysterious land. Well, at least I thought that Chile was going to be a foreign, mysterious land. I thought that all foreign countries would have a Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory esque feel to them, where everything is so new and different (and hopefully delicious), and I simply walk wide-eyed in the streets absorbing all of my new surroundings. But, partly because Chile is a familiar, westernized country and partly because my concept of other countries was completely absurd, Chile has not been the Wonka Factory. It has been different. But, it has surpassed my expectations.

The view from our balcony at night

After arriving in Santiago early Sunday morning, Reed and I somehow made our way across the country** and to the doorstep of our host family, with only our undeveloped Spanish abilities and an address. But that’s another story. Arriving without any prior contact, our host mother accepted us with open arms and a kiss on the cheek. After settling into our new rooms, we were treated to a lunch of stewed beef and mashed potatoes. Initially, I thought that this wonderful meal was a special welcoming feast, but every dinner here has been delicious, ranging from chicken and rice to completos (hot dogs with cabbage, tomato, avocado and mayo). Our host mother is pretty awesome.
However, it did not take long for me to realize one very important fact: my host family speaks no English. The language barrier was in full force at that first lunch, and Reed and I often shared looks that said “You understand?” “Nope.” “Well, these next five weeks are gonna be hard.” Maybe I had just been in denial, but after that lunch it fully hit me that my Spanish abilities needed to catch up fast if this trip was going to enjoyable. And that’s where Ecela comes in.

The amazing little shop that produces
amazing emanadas

Ecela is a school designed for tourists to learn Spanish while traveling, which has locations in six South American cities. Every weekday, we have two, 1.5 hour long, classes: a conversation class at 11, followed by a grammar class. But we cannot forget about lunch between the classes, which has been one of the best parts of our time in Chile. Reed and I have gotten empanadas for literally every lunch. Holy Shmoly, empanadas are so unbelievably, amazingly, out-of-this-world-ly delicious.
We are fortunate that our classes have on average .5 other people in them, so we are able to get a lot of personal attention and improve. I use the conversations at dinner every night with our host mother to evaluate how much our Spanish is progressing: the first dinner was filled with many of the same looks that we had during lunch, the second night we were able to actually have a conversation, the third night the conversation got better and faster and every night since then has gotten incrementally better and richer. Last night, we were even able to have an in depth conversation about our hosts mother’s experience during the Pinochet dictatorship of the 70s and 80s. It feels awesome to be able to see and feel my progress every day as I get more and more comfortable conversing in Spanish.

The view of Valparaiso hillside during our tour.
Valparaiso is known for views like this, with colorful
houses covering the hill.

This first week has been one of extraordinary growth for me. It is still a challenge (and I think it will be throughout my time in Chile), to understand the average Chilean***. But that has not stopped real and I from enjoying Chile. We have kept busy going on tours in Valparaiso, to beaches in Renaca or even to an Organic vineyard (but more on that in the next blog). Chile certainly is not the Wonka Factory, but it has been so much more.

*“today” being when I wrote this first sentence, not necessarily when I end up posting this blog - which could be in a couple days because these blogs take a while!

**although this phrase sounds impressive, it really doesn’t have to same grandeur as in the United States because of Chile’s unique shape. The cross country trek was about 2 hours by bus.

***Chileans have a very strong accent where they often do not pronounce “S” or the end of words. Except I have noticed that many people here are very friendly towards us and will try to abandon their accent to help up. But the keyword there is “try.”

Mmmmmm empanadas.
This one with shrimp and cheese.

Let's Do This

After 45 days of farming, traveling and peeing outside, I was finally home. Home, sweet home. And after 10 hours at home, I was on an airplane once again. Airplane, sweet airplane. Except this time I was flying up to Ithaca, New York to visit the wonderful, amazing, lovely Sonya Boltansky, and where better to go before Hurricane Sandy than New York? Needless to say, the two days I planned to spend in New York became five. After three days in Washington D.C., I was on yet another airplane, this time to Chile. But before I move into part two of my trip and leave part one behind, it’s important to reflect on what I took away from my time WWOOFing.

To put it simply, I learned. A lot. Obviously, I learned a lot about organic farming while actually in the fields, which was not only a new form of learning for me, but also a super rewarding one. However, what I learned about organic farming is not the greatest takeaway, partly because I doubt that I will ever become a farmer and implement those lessons, but mostly because there are some much greater lessons that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.

I learned about myself. Throughout my entire life, I found myself, like many of my friends, wanting days of leisure more than anything. I would count down the days until summer break and rejoice on nights without homework. However, I realized that I am happiest when I am pushing myself. Days at Cloudplay, when we would work four hours a day and then lounge throughout the afternoon were not as rewarding and did not make me as happy as the days at Rainshadow, when we would work almost 10 hour days. Takeaway: I am happiest when I work hard.

I learned about privilege. Throughout the trip, Reed and I talked about how privileged we are to have the background that we do. Just experiencing other lifestyles within the United States, made me realize how fortunate I am to have gotten a great education from Field, have the means to travel and just have lived the lifestyle that I have*. Takeaway: I am privileged.

Just look at how adorable that dog is!!!!!

I learned about home. Although this trip reinforced my love of traveling and seeing other parts of the world, I realized how much I appreciate my home. There were days when we would sleep in cold, wet tents and wake up to a breakfast of oats without sugar, syrup or raisins, and I would want nothing more than to be home. Knowing that I have a place where I can always return to loving parents, a warm bed and an adorable dog is something I will never take for granted again. Takeaway: travel is fun, but a home is more important.

I hope that part two of my trip is filled with as many life lessons as part one. In Chile, I will take two weeks of Spanish classes in both Vina del Mar, an affluent city just north of Valparaiso, the cultural capital of Chile, and in the capital city of Santiago. Hopefully with the newfound ability to communicate and function in a Spanish speaking environment, I will travel to the Patagonia, the southern tip of Chile, for a week long expedition in Torres del Paine National Park.

My last view of the United States....

Although I write this having been in Chile for a couple days, I want to give you a touch of how I was feeling before I left. This is a never before seen, insider’s view of Matt’s journal on the airplane to Chile: “It‘s hard to tell if my sweaty palms are due to my clenched writing style or my nerves. I am incredibly nervous about the language barrier in Chile. Like butterflies in my stomach, pre track race nervous… Even though my gut feels tied like headphones in my pocket, my brain knows that this is going to be a great experience. It will be awesome to not only see, but live in a different culture and language…Let’s do this.”

*After attending the White Privilege Conference last spring with a couple of my friends through Field, I became conscious of my sense of privilege, especially with relation to race. On this trip, I focused less on my racial privileges and more on my socio economic and educational privileges.

Fourth Quarter - Put Da Team on yo Back

To all of my loyal and adoring fans out there*, sorry for the lengthy delay between posts. After returning to D.C., I fully planned on blogging about the fourth farm, but I was just really busy. I mean, I had not watched SportsCenter in two months and I had even forgot how amazing it feels waking up late in a real bed. But more on that in a minute, now it’s time to turn our attention to farm number four: Sweet River Farm.

Just look at that tasty, Sweet River green bean!

As was the case with our first two stops, “farm” might be a little bit of a misnomer. Sweet River is more of a very large, family garden that provides organic food for the family of eight - a grandmother, two parents and kids ranging from sixteen to two - throughout the summer, fall and, through careful food preservation skills, winter months. Located along the Trinity River in the Hoopa Reservation in northern California**, the garden produces a variety of vegetables, many of which we had seen on our previous farm (kale, tomatoes, carrots, chard, beans, etc.), as well as a range of fruits. I never realized the true awesomeness of having fruit trees; whenever we were hungry, we would just walk outside and pick an apple off the tree (except it was hard to find apples without wormholes), or pick a couple figs (however, picking figs requires climbing into the fig tree canopy, which is really fun and one of the most exciting jobs that I did on the whole trip, but not really easy) or pick a pomegranate (there is nothing difficult with picking pomegranates - they are incredibly tasty). We ate a lot of pomegranates.

Our humble abode - note
the tarp which effectively
kept us dry

We ate a lot of pomegranates partly because they were really ripe and sweet, and partly because they taste good without salt. I did not try a pomegranate with salt, for that is impossible at Sweet River. Time for some back story: a couple years ago Rachel was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer at 35***. From my understanding, it initially required an aggressive surgery, but instead of using pharmaceutical drugs in her recovery, Rachel went to a clinic in Mexico to get started on Gerson Therapy. This form of therapy is a super, incredible, unbelievable diet that consists only of juices - not tasty,  Juicy Juice type juices, but instead vegetable puree type juices - and supposedly detoxes one’s body of all the nasty, potentially cancerous toxins that accumulate after years of eating processed food. Upon returning from Mexico, Rachel incorporated the Gerson principles into her diet, eliminating processed foods, cooked oil and salt, despite how tasty they might be. Fun fact: food tastes better with salt. Second fun fact: Reed and I really missed salt.

AT&T Park
Game 2

Although we came past the prime of the growing and harvesting season, as with all farms, there was always work to be done at Sweet River. Some days we spent splitting fire wood, other days we spent picking dry beans. But on all days we tackled the mountain of dishes that a family of 11 (the eight I mentioned earlier, plus the three WWOOFers) produces, regardless of the lack of soap. Despite sleeping in a tent, our fourth farm was the closest resemblance to my home from our trip, and thus caused my first bout of homesickness. I found myself missing everything from my dog and parents, to toilet paper, my toaster and competition^. I never thought that I was the type to get homesick, but man was I homesick. Although this trip has taken me all over the west coast and deepened my appreciation of travel, one of the biggest takeaways for me is the importance of home.
Before flying out of San Francisco, Reed and I made a pit stop at the World Series, then spent a wonderful night playing ping pong, eating burgers and catching up with Daniel Allen at Stanford. I spent the whole next day giddy with excitement to finally see my parents and sleep in my own bed.
After 45 days of farming, traveling and peeing outside, I was finally home. Home, sweet home.

Bye Bye WWOOFing

* Mom and Dad
** More specifically, Sweet River is located Humbolt County: (unbeknownst to Reed and I when we made arrangements with this farm) pot capital of the US. Although the title might self-proclaimed, marijuana certainly is a big thing around those parts. The Humboolt County College mascot is the Buds. When we first arrived, obviously dressed as travelers, we were mistaken by a fellow at the bus stop to be helpers for the “harvest.” It commonplace to smoke on the side of the road with no fear of police interference; a couple behind Reed and I even smoked on the moving greyhound bus. Good ol Humbolt County.
*** Rachel is not her real name.
^Reed and I found ourselves getting really invested in the only source of competition: the children's star chart. We would get stars whenever we did something good.

The competitive stage

Close up of the winner's tallies