Road trippin 2.0

Written to FELA In Concert Starring Fela Anikulapo Kuti

“Like life, basketball is messy and unpredictable. It has its way with you, no matter how hard you try to control it. The trick is to experience each moment with a clear mind and open heart. When you do that, the game -- and life -- will take care of itself.”

- Phil Jackson

A week after breaking my collar bone and a rib, my abuser, aka Esben, and I set off at 21:30 in our Mitsubishi L200 Triton HPE 3.2 Diesel pickup from São Paulo for Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, a 1,011 km trip, to visit Toshio Hisaeda's hog farm. We drove through the night, taking turns behind the wheel, emerging from the darkness into an endless savannah, sprinkled with an out of place feed lot, a handful of sugar cane fields and a lot of roadworks, finally checking into our room at Vânia Hotel e Lanchonete in Campo Grande at around 11:00.

We chillaxed for the remainder of Monday, only leaving our humble abode to eat at a local diner for the princely sum of R$14.00 (€6.25 or $8.16).

On Tuesday, we visited Toshio at his office, Sementes Boi Gordo, an impressive seed business employing approx. 200 people. Toshio, the iconoclast that he is, has established a garden and a chicken yard on the premises, and we spent most of the afternoon meeting with Toshio and his employees.

That evening we met Toshio and a job candidate at Toshio's restaurant, where we dined on a sumptuous array of Japanese dishes. Truly yummy!

The following morning, Wednesday, we awoke at 05:00, packed, checked out of the hotel and headed off on the first of two farm visits. Stop 1: Toshio's 900 hectare hog farm, where he raises more than 1,000 hogs. The farm is run by only two employees, who are responsible for every aspect of raising the Sorocaba and Monteiro breeds that dominate Toshio's herd.

At any given time, Toshio's hogs and their offspring can be found in one of three main areas:

1. A maternity ward that features individual pens with drip-water systems and a retractable roof. The pregnant sows are typically brought into the maternity ward 15-30 before birthing and are released into...
2. the weaning area, mother sow together with her piglets, a couple of months after birthing. From the post-maternity weaning area, the animals are placed in...
3. a common pen, where all of the adult hogs and weaners live. The hog pens, which with the exception of one, monster 30-hectare pen, are approx. two hectares in size, have been seeded with Estilosantes Campo Grande, a protein-rich legume that comprises the majority of the hogs diet together with cassava and sugar cane. Once a week the hogs receive two kg of corn, though this is more of a behavioral modification tool that the workers use to train the hogs to gather at the entry gate, thus facilitating their move when required. There are no houses in these hog pens, i.e. the hogs sleep under open sky.

It is worth noting that while in the maternity ward, the pregnant sows receive a feed consisting of corn flour, soy and ash, approx. 15% of the latter to combat parasites.

After wrapping up our visit at Toshio's hog farm, we travelled a few km down the road to visit his 2,000 hectare cattle farm, where he raises 2,500 head of Wagyu beef cattle. After the tour, we enjoyed another fabulous lunch consisting of comida mineira, topped off with the most exquisitely delicious lemon mousse, the recipe for which I asked and was given.

After thanking our host profusely for his hospitality, we jumped into our bucket of bolts and headed back to São Paulo, where I had a full schedule of meetings on Thursday and Friday.

And while Esben and I were playing Thelma and Louise, Lone, Megan (Megan's parents please see the mini Megan photo gallery here: 1, 2, 3, 4) and Rosana were busy back at Fazenda Alfheim preparing Esben's apartment, among other tasks.

Painting aside, the week's biggest news in the Vale da Paraiba, was the announcement from beekeeper Lone that she will indeed harvest honey this year, more than 100 liters in November! Amazing! We got a little taste from a small sample, and as a lifelong honey connoisseur I can assure all of my readers that I have never tasted anything quite so delicious. Book your jar today because it will be sold out in less time than it takes to count Sara Palin's IQ. Parabéns, beekeeper Lone!

Finally,

• Jennifer Chatman, of the University of California, Berkeley, conducted experiments in which she tried to find a point at which flattery became ineffective. It turned out there wasn’t one.
• And next time you feel like your style is being cramped, think of this group of brothers and sisters!