Jetting Educated

My welcome not yet wizening with one week gone, I would willingly work on, waking wearily at dawn  Garden Life The food on the commuity farm was great as the vast majority had come straight form the garden. We did eat a lot of vegetarian dishes as having meat meant they would have to slaughter one of their own animals, but I got used to a lack of meat quickly. The women in the community cooked for 30+ people three times a day, cleaned and did laundry. I don't think they did much else so I was pleased to be doing other things. I did aid them by collecting the vegetables they needed for the day, going around the vegetable gardens and greenhouse. I got used to picking fresh red peppers, perfectly juicy tomatoes and delicious apples and snacking as I went. "Tears streaming, ears steaming" One day when harvesting a large amount of chillies for sale at the market, I chanced to try one. They were bound to be hot, but I thought I'd be able to handle it,

A tell-all tome of the tenuous testaments and troubling trials in the tribe Early rising I was awoken by noise outside somewhere. It was one of those instances where you wake up completely clueless as to where you are. I blinked blearily and opened my eyes to near darkness, my watch reading 0515. What the damn hell!? After those initial seconds of confusion had passed, I remembered where I was. Ah yes: in a trailer, 50 miles west of Prague, at a farm I just moved to the day before. Nevertheless I was not expecting to be woken up by a man singing at the top of his voice:  "... so lucky to have each other, we are bonded together.." or something.  His words were not helping to me feel particularly grateful. Instead I was thinking "What have I done to deserve this?" and "Why, why, why?" Well actually I had come willingly to volunteer on the farm. I didn't get paid during my stay, but I got food and a bed, so I was set. Befo

I've just been on a trip, and what a fine journey it has been. I'm in the mood to start with the last place I visited, which was Munich.            In Italy last year I made friends with a lovely German called Mel who I then got fake-engaged to. A year later, we needed an engagement party. By no coincidence, when I visited her in Munich it was the time of the Oktoberfest. What could I expect? I had heard it was the largest beer festival in the world, and that, in all likelihood, it would get out of hand. It sounded great, so I slipped into some Lederhosen and we headed to Theresienwiese to find out. Like a pair of happy Bavarians As we entered, I could see that the rumours about the size are true- the area that holds the festival is 420,000 sq. meters.         The Hacker Brewery tent we were headed for could contain 6,900 people inside and 2,400 outside. Needless to say that tent was just one of many huge placed to hang out at the Oktoberfest. There were peopl