Wanderlust

(near) Gospic, Croatia (the birthplace of Nikola Tesla).

What a week! We have survived our first week working on a farm in the Croatian winter. And so far it’s been really good. Today is our first day off, and it’s a true day off since we’re planning on doing absolutely nothing and Silja (pronounced Celia), the other WWOOFer here is graciously taking care of the horses (we’re going to rotate Sunday horse duty–letting them outside, cleaning their stalls, and letting them back in at night and giving them food, tea (!) and their medicines).

We took the bus from Zadar to Gospic on Saturday after spending Friday wandering around Zadar. We had a nice day Friday enjoying the beautiful city. The sea organ was absolutely amazing. Whoever thought them up is a genius. The one in Zadar is very subtle. There are steps at the ocean and you can sit on them and listen to the waves and the organ sounds that the waves make as they hit the underwater stuff that makes it work. (I have no idea how they work and the internet here is too slow and temperamental to try to look it up right now.) But it was beautiful. Very relaxing and pretty. We had a delicious dinner of meats and gravy and potatoes. And we went to bed early to escape the cold and to get a good night’s sleep before getting up at 6 again the next morning to get to the bus station on time. I was really surprised at how expensive Zadar was. I don’t know if it’s going to be true for all of Croatia, but the public bus that we took to the long distance bus station cost just under $2 each! And it only took us maybe a mile. If the bus wasn’t so early in the morning, we would’ve walked and saved ourselves the cash. Getting the long distance bus was fairly straightforward. I was so sleepy and the bus was so warm that I couldn’t stay awake during the ride. It started to rain as we went, but we could still see the neat, craggly mountains that separated the coast from inland. The coast of Croatia is pretty neat, with islands just offshore along it. When looking from Zadar out to sea, it looked more like you were on a bay because of all of the islands out there.

When we got to Gospic it was raining pretty hard but we had to try to find a phone to call Bozidar and let him know we were there and ready to be picked up. After asking for a phone at a bank, we were directed to the main post office where they had a free phone inside for local calls (nice). We were picked up by Silja, a 22-year-old girl from Finland who has been on the farm for some time (and will stay until a little while after we leave). She showed us to the house where we all live, which is a short walk from the farm where we work during the day. After putting down our bags and getting cleaned up a bit we went to the farm to meet Bozidar, the animals, and see what we’d gotten ourselves into.

Bozidar is a Croatian man who grew up near the city of Split (where his family still lives). He went to the States to get a PhD and ended up staying there, working and traveling for 15 years. He is a professor of environmental science and water management and is trying to create a environmentally friendly farm which he hopes will be self-sufficient within the next year (including getting some things from other people in the village). He has been back in Croatia for a year building up the farm and retreat. There are four horses. Two mares and two stallions. Manche is the youngest and Silja is working on getting him trained (she’s very experienced with horses). Manche Mama (or just Mama) is Manche’s mother and is sweet but she has a bit of an attitude. They’re both pretty short (I’m 5’7˝ and taller than them both) but they make up for it with stubbornness. Dona is the oldest and is a beautiful tall mare with white fur that’s speckled with brown. She’s the equally tall and beautiful Atilla’s mother. At first I was very intimidated by the two of them since I was afraid of horses in general and they’re much bigger than me, but I’ve become very fond of them both, especially Atilla who seems to like me the most (he comes over and licks my face when I go out to them and gets jealous if I’m petting Manche). The other animals on the farm are Maydo, the giant bear of a dog who is incredibly intimidating to strangers and protective of us all, but is just the sweetest big baby of a dog. The two cats who Stephen has named Tigger and Christopher Robin. They eat absolutely everything and are very sweet and cuddly (especially Christopher Robin who likes to sit on my shoulder and purr and look around, then realize that I’m right there and he’ll rub my face with his, then start all over again). There are 5 rabbits who live in the horse barn and will eventually be food (sad). There used to be goats, but they were eaten by a wolf. Poor goats.

Our days start with getting up around 7:30 and having breakfast and talking about the tasks for that day. I’ve taken over horse duties, so for me when we get down to the farm I lead the horses out to their temporary pen (we’re building them a new fence around the property so they can run around and forage more without getting into the neighbor’s wheat field) and then clean out their stalls. I’ve found that I don’t mind shoveling poo so much. It was exhausting and took me a long time the first morning, but I’m getting better at it and stronger, so it’s much easier now. Then I put down fresh straw and lay out their hay for the night (and for the bunnies to munch on during the day). The horses and Maydo are getting over ringworm right now, so I rub some medicinal cream on Maydo and feed him and put the horses medicinal tea on the stove inside the farmhouse to boil. The farmhouse is an old house that we’re remodeling. Bozidar wants to have it done by June for when he’ll start taking guests again at the retreat. So there’s lots of carpentry stuff to be done and lifting heavy stuff. Steve is more interested in learning about carpentry and building houses and I’m more interested in the horses, so we’ve sort of paired up boys building and girls taking care of horses. Yesterday afternoon was my first horse riding lesson. It was pretty short since it was getting dark and freezing cold, but Silja is a good teacher and she made me feel very comfortable sitting way up high on Dona.

Last week Bozidar was gone most of the time. He has meetings and classes and other things that take him away. And on Wednesday Steve and I were on our own for the day when Bozidar took Silja into town with him for a break. It was a good way to really learn what needed to be done without having people around to ask. I think we did pretty well.

Things are going pretty well, though. We’re enjoying the work and learning a lot.It’s very cold here, but in a way that’s good. The first few days we were here it rained and the farm become a mud pit. We both have rubber boots to wear which are fun because you can walk through anything without worrying about it. It’s amazing how dirty I’m getting and how little I care. When I take a shower the water runs black, and every night when I get home I have to wash my hands two or three times and scrub them with a brush before they’re clean. They’re already starting to getter rougher and feel more like working hands. Which is novel, but I hope doesn’t last forever once I stop working on a farm. I liked my soft, lazy lady hands.

The village we’re living in is very cute. There are 40 smokes in it. They call the households ‘smokes’ instead of houses because of the importance of keeping fires going here. During the day our neighbor, Mate, usually keeps are fire going for us. It’s so nice to come home from the cold and have a warm living room. The village people don’t speak English, but they still try to chat with us and we’re always being offered shots of homemade schnapps and whiskey. Some of it is really good (the cherry schnapps especially) but some if it is real strong. I’ve started letting Steve take one first and let me know if it’s safe for me. Last night on our way home we stopped over at someone’s house to pick something up and they invited us in for cookies and tea. The family was just what I’d imagine an Eastern European family to look like. It was an older couple and the man had a weathered face with a warm wool sweater and strong hands. The woman wore a scarf over her head and a dress with a cardigan and had the strongest looking forearms I’ve ever seen. They were so sweet.

It’s difficult living with the people you work with all day. Steve and I have our own room, which is great, but it doesn’t get any heat so we don’t go in there until we’re ready for bed and then we’re taking heated breaks wrapped in towels with us to warm up the bed. We’ve started judging how cold it is based on the number of bricks we need (last night was a two brick night, the night before was three). Things are good and getting pretty comfortable with us and Silja, but Bozidar is obviously the boss and doesn’t help out with household things which gets on my nerves. It’s his house and his farm, so he is obviously in charge, but it’s hard to live with your boss. Especially when he tries to be your friend. There’s some obvious tension coming from Silja towards him which is difficult to come into, too. But it’s not too big of a problem and I’m sure it’ll work itself out. It’s just stressful after a long, hard day working in the cold to come home and not have it be a comfortable, relaxed place. But it has been nice to cook again. And even doing dishes hasn’t been too bad. We haven’t spent a penny the past 7 days, and that’s nice too. We have internet at the house and a laptop when Bozidar is here, but I’m usually so tired in the evening that I just can’t face it. I’m going to try to give weekly, Sunday updates when I have a day to relax and sleep in!

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 15th, 2009 at 7:02 am and is filed under croatia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.