Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Order restored



Sarah Palin: I believe that I am because I have common sense and I have I believe the values that I think are reflective of so many other American values, and I believe that what Americans are seeking is not the elitism, the uhm, the ah, a kind of spineless, spinelessness that perhaps is made up for that with some kind of elite, Ivy league education and, and a fat resume that is based on anything but hard work and private sector, free enterprise principles. Americans are could be seeking something like that in positive change in their leadership, I'm not saying that that has to be me.

Enough said!

Fazenda Alfheim's testosterone war has ended (or at the very least been reduced to an uneasy cease fire), Esben has returned from a well-deserved four-day break in São Paulo and life at the fazenda is slowly rounding back to normal.

The Sorocaba/Monteiro boars and their many, many ladies have been moved to a new maximum security pen, albeit one with bountiful space and vegetation. A far cry from the Administrative Maximum (ADX) facility in Florence, Colorado. Who would have thought that so much chaos would ensue just from lowering the boar:sow ratio from approx. 1:15 to 1:10. Can't learn this stuff from books.

Farm Manager extraordinaire Esben is back, with a smile on his face and a bounce in his step.

Jamie arrived as planned, a little worse for wear, or rather she came down with a nasty flu-like illness upon arrival. Thankfully she seems better now and is back at work.

Jamie and Julie's (pictures forthcoming) arrival necessitated us moving all of the volunteers to the third house closest to the entrance to the fazenda. Good to finally put that wonderful house to proper use. And again thanks to Pierre and Sophie for furnishing our house with some of the surplus from their recent move to an apartment in Jardins.

And speaking of Sophie, our PhD-toting friend also turns out to possess a dominant sales gene. She quickly became the single largest distributor of Lone's raw, organic honey on the planet, moving several cases to the French community in São Paulo in a matter of days. We will be dropping off the last few jars of December's harvest to her this week. If any of you would like to purchase some of Lone's golden syrup, please shout oui now or forever hold your peace -at least until March, when we will harvest another 100-plus kg.

We have also started delivering samples of our inconceivably delicious free-range chickens to our São Paulo restaurant customers. These chickens have to be tasted to be believed, and even then it is hard to reconcile: tender, succulent and bursting with flavors our taste buds have not been programmed to associate with even the highest-quality store-bought chicken. Delightful, and a treat that we will happily share with any and all guests to the fazenda.

Finally, in a tragic reminder of the real, human cost of financial malfeasance and poor education (personal finance is the only subject we are not taught in school), the Wall Street Journal recently ran a data-filled article entitled Retiring Boomers Find 401(k) Plans Fall Short:
The difficulties have been worsened by the 2007-2009 financial crisis. Since the housing and financial markets began to collapse, about 39% of all Americans have been foreclosed upon, unemployed, underwater on a mortgage or behind more than two months on a mortgage, says Michael Hurd, director of the Rand Corporation's Center for the Study of Aging.

Saturday, February 12, 2011

Hog hazing gone wild!


"Pol Pot - he rounded up anybody he thought was intellectual and had them executed. And how he told someone was intellectual or not was whether they wore glasses. If they're that clever, take them off when they see him coming!"
- Ricky Gervais

The first of our 2011 volunteers, Amanda Moropoulos, departed recently after three weeks at fazenda Alfheim. She was a delight: easygoing, helpful and hard working…cannot say enough good things about her. And in a weird case of it's a small world after all, her dad's cousin, Craig Moropoulos, coaches football in Santa Barbara, California, were I spent approx. 11 of my formative years, and her mother is from Leicester England, where Johannes and Pelle live, and where my father was born.

We also added a new employee this year, Jhesebel Aline de Santana: 19-years old, drives a tractor like she has been doing it her whole life (even though I am pretty certain she hasn't), lassoes pigs one-handed while hanging from trees, climbs jussara palms like a monkey chasing a banana, is hard-working, fearless and sharp as a whip -a real find. She is so clever, in fact, that soon after joining us she won a five-year scholarship to study at the School of Veterinary Medicine at Unicamp (University of Campinas). We are, of course, thrilled for her, and we have agreed that she will continue to work at Fazenda Alfheim during school holidays etc. This was important for her as she otherwise would not be able to afford the R$45 (€19.93 or $26.99) bus trip back to Vargem Grande!

And while on the subject of new additions, Danielle Haddad (caught here displaying a piece of Lone's amazing cheesecake), who studied at the Royal Agriculture College with Esben, began a three-four-month internship with us on February 4th. Danielle will be joined by Jamie Paxton and Julie Pallozzi, two more volunteers, who will arrive sometime next week and on February 21st, respectively.

As summer wanes there is no shortage of life at Fazenda Alfheim.

An abundance of life is certainly a euphemism for describing the hog's activity over the past couple of weeks. On February 1st, we moved all of the F1 sows, the Duroc boars and, after a brief period seconded to an acclimatization pen next to but separate from the incumbents, the three new large Sorocaba/Monteiro boars to pasture 3 to harvest the corn. At first, it was nothing but love, but after a week or so the three new boars started, more or less systematically, to attack first the Duroc boars and then one another. Boars began quite literally running for their lives, escaping from pasture 3, followed by a number of the sows…chaos ensued! We have implemented martial law, detaining the two most aggressive new boars in the secure facility with the other, smaller Sorocaba/Monteiro hogs. Biggie, our prize Duroc, is recovering with a few ladies in a far-away field that will soon be planted with sugar cane, while Beta, our younger Duroc, has been moved to the pre-maternity ward while he, too, recovers from a number of serious wounds. The last Sorocaba/Monteiro boar has also been locked down, but separate from his homies as they started in on him once they had beaten down Biggie and Beta. We are not sure how all of this will end, but after two weeks of chasing hogs in and out of various pens and pastures and treating wounds, we are satisfied with a pause to think. I am pretty certain that we can file this under the heading To be continued...

Prior to hog hazing, Esben and Jhesebel prepared more bee boxes in anticipation of our expansion from 20 to 40 boxes, which should take place later this month. Once fully operational, this latest expansion will raise Fazenda Alfheim's annual production to approx. 600 liters of raw, organic honey! In that connection, we have begun working with Suzanna Jones to develop a logo for the fazenda and its products. I will report on our progress in this endeavor more or less real time. Very exciting!

Finally, Lone and I spent this past weekend in São Paulo. On Saturday we went to Shopping Vila Olímpia, where we saw The King's Speech at Kinoplex Vila Olímpia. An absolutely delightful, thoughtful and suspenseful film. I have not seen such a fine film in a long, long time. A must see.