Wiggles World Tour

Our Short Vacation from our Vacation

We’ve spent our post-Mama Roja time sight-seeing and hanging on the beach. Tomorrow we are residency-bound, but before we get tied up with art, here’s a few photos of the last two weeks. More photos are on our flickr site, which can be found here: www.flickr.com/photos/akushner/

Also, there are some great photos on the Mama Roja blog that show the house being built. Check them out here: http://www.mamaroja.blogspot.com/

Goodbye Tent…

…hello Iguazu Falls!

Floating downstream on a river raft

Close encounters of the bird kind

The beach…minutes away from our apartment

Haircuts, Homemade Bagels, and Roosters

Our time at Mama Roja is coming to an end. Tommorrow we are having a big “Giving Thanks” celebration, which will include traditional empanadas, deviled eggs, as well as thanksgiving favorites like mashed potatoes and stuffing. We are also going to be making mulled wine and mimosas, and there has been an overwhelming request from the group for another round of Adam’s famous sourdough bread.

We’ve been very productive in the last week. We learned how to make BAGELS, a welcomed taste of NYC. They were so delicious, and we can’t wait to bring the recipe back with us—although we have to perfect our “everything bagel” seasoning.

Rachel learned how to crochett from Tim, one of the other volunteers here who has crochetted himself a big floppy wizard hat. Adam has also been trying his hand at crochetting, but is having a little trouble getting off the ground with his ‘quilt,’ which is currently just a bunch of haphazard knots. 

Adam’s out-of-control beard, mustache, and hair were getting to be too much, so Rachel took up hair dressing.

  

Adam’s new haircut and beard trim. Not bad for Rachel’s first time cutting hair!

Homemade bagels! Trust us, they are really good.

Adam “harvested” one of the roosters for a big pot of rooster soup. It was a solomn moment that put us face to face with life and death, the food we eat, and the choices behind the food. Because we do not have the technique to break the neck of the chicken swiftly and painlessly (this takes years of practice, we’ve been told), we were instructed to cut the neck with a sharp knife to sever the head from the body. Adam, focused on the task at hand, did a swift job, but the 20 seconds or so before the rooster bled out—where the eyes and tounge on its detached head were still functioning, and its throat still clucking, its wings still flapping—was a significant, life-changing moment. Killing the rooster and then yanking the feathers off its warm body was an intense experience, one that we aren’t so sure was justified by the delicious soup for which it sacrificed its life.

On the earthen building project, we have moved onto plastering from a mixture comprised of sifted dirt, sand, water, and cow poop. The plastering is fun, and with the plaster and other types of mud techniques (“meatballs”), we are building little nitches into the walls of the house which will serve as small shelves, for example, places to hold soap / shampoo in the bathroom. Kim, the founder and director at Mama Roja (and future tenent of the house we are building) has transformed a column in the house into an artful tree, the branches designed to hold small, decorative objects.

The experience of living a self-sufficient life, connecting with nature, as well as the building project have inspired us. We’ve begun discussing how we want our residency / farm to function as well as sketching building designs for writers’ cabins. Adam has been reading books on composting and humanure (composting with human manure!), wild fermentation, and self-sufficent homes. Rachel has been researching small projects for the farm such as root cellers and livestock care. We have decided on keeping chickens (great for eggs), pigs (great for fertilizing soil and plowing land before planting—and sadly, delicious), and of course, our cats will learn how to catch mice. Also, we’re hoping to have a dog to help with wranggling the fowl. We hear that ducks and geese mostly eat  food that would otherwise be unfruitful for us to harvest (aqautic life of little nutritional value to humans) and they are also good for stuffing comforters, ect. But one thing at a time. It is hard not to get carried away with all of the possibilites of a sustainable life. Part of us justs wants to come back to the USA and get started! But there is still so much to learn and see. 

 

Jungle Pants!  (pre-haircut and shave)

Rachel and Justin in the Kitchen

 

Lulu, one of the dogs at Mama Roja.

A giant caterpillar (they will give you a nasty sting)

A rooster on the farm.  Don’t worry - it is not the one we ate.

Our time in the tent is thankfully also coming to an end; we leave for Iguazu falls at the end of the month and then we’re off to Brazil, where we have rented a home on the beach for two weeks. We are really looking forward to a little R&R and that beachy honeymoon we’ve been prolonging.

Mama Roja, Part II

We are more than half-way through our internship at Mama Roja, and already we have learned so much. Just this past week, we finished laying the bricks on the house we have been building, and we are gearing up to plaster the facade and learn natural painting techniques. Yesterday, we spent the morning in a cow pasture collecting dung (apparently a good, fibrous material for plaster) and then lounged in the river, took a pickling workshop, and then made some hot toddies to drink around a bonfire.

The house we are building out of mud:

Everyone in the group making Hot Toddies.  We also drank some home-made alcohol and lemoncello:

We are preparing ourselves to slaughter a rooster for Thanksgiving, an event which we are half dreading, half anticipating with curiuosity. We feel that if we are going to have a farm, we must learn about these less-than-appealing techniques and practices. The rooster-in-waiting happens to be a pretty plucky fowl, caged now because of his aggression, a small fact that slightly ameliorates our feelings on his impending sentence. There is also a baby pig on the farm—so cute and smelly—who is ‘due’ for Christmas. While we are not caring directly for the animals on the farm, sharing a living space and seeing these beings each and every day is arising complicated feelings on being an omnivore.

Some of the recent workshops we’ve had are candle-making, balm-making, head-massage therapy, and reiki. Also, Adam made a delicious sourdough bread for the group, and he even made his own starter by catching the yeast in the air! Our heads are filled with so many ideas for our farm/residency, and while we are so excited for the future, we are trying to remember to enjoy our present—moments filled with learning and loving.

An elephant garlic plant:

 

Update from Obera, Misiones, Argentina

We´ve made it to a sketchy internet cafe (in Obera, Argentina) populated by teenage boys obsessed with video games to tell you all:

We spent a little over a week in Buenos Aires where we hung out with our friend Facundo, a scultptor who makes amazing metal art. Facundo and his wife Feli took us out on the town to a great Parilla (a popular Argentinian grill), to a tango show in some out-of-the-way bar where we indulged in wine and cheese, and then to Feli´s beach house 5 hours outside of the city for the weekend. We couldn´t have asked for a better host! Buenos Aires felt to us like a little taste of home—a cultural haven with tons of art and music and good food.  

Some of Facundo´s sculptures:

Live tango music at the bar:

Our favorite Cafe in Buenos Aires, which was right by our hostel in the Palermo neighborhood. It reminded us of Brooklyn:

After B.A. we took a 14 hour overnight bus ride north to Obera, a farming community in the sub-tropics. When we first got on the bus, we were served candy and whiskey, and shortly thereafter, champagne…not your typical bus. The seats were as big as beds, and after two violent, subtitled action movies, we fell asleep, and before we knew it, we had arrived at Mama Roja: a learning center for earthen building and sustainable living. It is gorgeous here. There are butterflies abound, and so far we have learned the basics of building mud-brick houses, soap-making, effective microorgansims, composting, and more.

We bathe in the river (one of Rachel´s favorite activies on hot days), and there is hardly any garbage or waste that comes through the farm. It is a simple way of life here, and it is so peaceful to be surrounded by chickens, dogs, a cat, and a pig, as well as other like-minded young people interested in alternative lifestyles. We are feeling very possible, and very inspired!

We must admit, the bug situation is not ideal. We are bitten from head to toe, and the other day we watched a girl pull a botfly out of her leg. (For those who haven´t had the pleasure of seeing a botfly, it is a flesh-eating worm that lays eggs in your skin!) Rachel is terrified of becoming a victim, constantly convinced that her mosquito bites don´t feel quite right…Adam reassures her that she is fine, and momentarily, he can calm her down. We´ve also seen spiders as big as our fists, and there are catapillars here with spikes on them that burn and blister your skin if you happen to touch them, which Rachel has. There are lots of things to be afraid of here, but Adam says that we (humans) are probably the scariest thing in the jungle.

Our tent-home is cozy and comfy, and we´ve even decorated it by hanging our hand-made dream-catcher right in the middle. We are looking forward to spending the month here and learning as much as we can about the garden and building.

The bathing river by Mama Roja:

The buildings at Mama Roja are all made out of mud:

Peru In Review

Hey!  We know…we have been gone for almost a month, and you were expecting more than a picture of blister and Rachel doing her laundry.  We promise that we were trying to update the blog in Peru but the internet was crappy and we were having some issues.  So here is Peru in review…

Our first stop was in Lima, in the Miraflores district.  Miraflores is supposedly the nicest part of Lima, but in reality, it isn´t very nice. The city is a little depressing, and there isn´t much to see or do there.  We wandered around Lima for 2 days wondering what we should be doing. Rachel drew a picture of a church with lots of stray cats. Adam studied some maps and wondered if this trip was such a good idea…

Next we flew to Cusco, Peru which was a beautiful trip over the Andes mountains.  Many travellers we met took the 24hr bus ride, but we opted for the 1hr flight, which we learned was a really smart indulgence—we heard horror stories of the bus stopping periodically to empty the bathroom and let people off to vomit. Based on the 4 hour car ride we took from Cusco to Santa Maria (picture long, winding roads on deadly cliffsides) we were happy with our decision.

Upon arrival in Cusco we went straight to the Eco-Yoga retreat which was an hour long bus ride outside of Cusco.  This bus ride is an amazing experience (we joked we’d have paid to take it as a tourist trip!) and it takes you through the start of the Sacred Valley. All the other people on the bus are locals who live in mud- brick huts on the mountain side. When we got on, the drivers knew exactly where we were going—the only place where white people ever go on that route! We even started to run into local friends on the bus near the end of our stay—we saw Miguel, a 14-year-old boy, on his way home from school one day and felt like typical Peruvians!

There was no electricity or running water at Eco-Yoga.  To get water, we had to grab water with a bucket from a well by the river and boil it for 5 minutes. Also, our first night there was a little strange. After flying into Cusco and taking this bus ride to the middle of no where, when we showed up, the house was empty. We decided to cook some lentils and set up camp and figure out what we would do in the morning. We made ourselves right at home and put our sleeping bags in the lofted area of the main house. It got dark around 6:30 and we were reading aloud to each other from a surprisingly scary Murakami story about a man’s fear of dying inside a refridgerator. We were at the scariest part of the story, Adam reading alound, “Cold, dead hands reaching out!” when we heard a knocking at the door followed by some “Hola”s. It was Rama, the man who runs the retreat. This was not the biggest surprise we had in store…turns out the place is a Hare Krishna Temple! We skipped out on the chanting, but did yoga with the group, and cooked vegetarian meals for the whole house as part of our volunteer ‘service.’ It was a great place to begin our trip; relaxing, inspiring, and a great way to feel a part of the traditional peruvian culture.

Here’s a few photos of our stay at Eco-Yoga:

We also went on an amazing hike with Rama and the group where we scaled the mountain side, clutching onto wheat and hoisting ourselves up to some ancient Inka ruins. Caroline, a new friend, even got stuck in a cactus patch!

And during the full moon, Caroline fire-danced while the others (some Hare Krishnas who showed up that evening) played drums and chanted…Adam and I stood by, taking photos and feeling like we’d landed in a surreal world.

After 9 days, we were sad to leave Eco-Yoga, but we were glad to get back into a city that promised the finer things in life, like a shower and a flushable toilet! In Cusco, we connected with this Peruvian hippie/tour-guide named Pepe, and through him, we met a whole slew of people—all really fun and interesting travelers. With a group of 8, we hiked for 5 days and got into lots of trouble!

While we learned about the Inkas and the jungle, we tested our fears walking narrow trails carved high up in the mountains. We scaled some rocks, and met some local farmers who served us hot chocolate made straight from the coca bean—very bitter, but with some honey, very delicious. We came across bananna trees, avocado and mango trees, and a fiesty monkey!

After walking for hours on the first day of the trek, it got dark and we were informed we still had a lot more walking to do. And not only that—we had a bridge with missing planks to cross and we needed to zipline in an open boxcar from mountain to mountain to make our way over the rushing, wild river. It did not comfort us that our tour guide said that he ‘never did this at night’ and that he prayed to god for 10 minutes before we crossed. Pepe!!! Luckily, we made it to our final destination safely that night, even though the last leg of our walk that night was walking through the river in all our clothes, our shoes soping wet when we arrived at the hot springs. And you thought our wedding was crazy!

The hot springs were beautiful, and very relaxing, although we quickly learned that the tent that Pepe gave us was a tent meant for a 6 year old child. We had asked, again and again, if we should bring our own tent, and he had assured us that he would provide one. It was a hysterical ending to an absurd day, and we ended up sleeping in Pepe’s tent—a really old, filthy, smelly tent that wasn’t waterproof—and guess what? It rained hard that night. We’ll never forget to bring our tent again, and we’ll never sign up for a trip without asking what’s in store! The next few days were spent dining in local Peruvian restaurants, walking along the railroad toward the base of Machu Piccu, and then hiking an incredible amount of stairs to the top of Machu Piccu, where our camera died! Can you believe it? We got a few photos though…

An ancient Inka sacrifice

 

Chris and the monkey

 

Our crazy tour-guide Pepe is to the right, sticking his head out of a cave

On top of Huayna Picchu looking over Machu Picchu

Adam enjoying a hot chocolate

Now we’re in Buenos Aires for a few days, recuperating and getting ready for our month-long stay on a farm in the north of Argentina. To see more of our photos, check out our flickr page at: www.flickr.com/photos/akushner/

AND NOW WE ARE READY!

On October 1st, we take off on a year-long adventure to backpack the world. Our dream is to marry art and agriculture by developing an artists’ residency on a working farm, so we’re spending the next 365 days on a mission to visit artists’ colonies and sustainable farms in order to learn from their models and practices…and hey, if we drink a few beers along the way, so be it.