by Anna Van Dreser, of Colby College
and Laura Pinover, of the University of Vermont
The Round River Patagonia program has a homestay component, where students learn about life on the campo and to help out on their hosts’ property. We got to experience their day to day life on a beautiful piece of land that they get to call home. Life on the campo is hard work but in the end it is extremely rewarding.
What was your favorite part?
Laura:
My favorite part of the homestay was probably preparing chickens for lunch. I’ve never seen my food alive right before I’ve eaten it so being able to learn about the process was really eye-opening for me.
Geena, Anna, and I, came in one morning from watering the flowers near the house and immediately noticed the dead chickens lying on the counter. Marisol came into the kitchen and started working right away. She started pouring boiling water over the chicken to loosen up the feathers. It almost seemed effortless to pluck them off after this. At first, I was a little nervous to join in on the plucking. To see two chickens that were running around the grounds early that morning to getting de-feathered was crazy to think about. After the plucking, Marisol poured rubbing alcohol onto a small plate and lit it on fire. She brought the chickens over to the plate and moved them quickly over the flame to loosen up the skin. Once the skin was prepped, it was time for the gutting. I have to be honest that I had to look away a little bit during this part. Marisol made the cutting look so easy and was done within two minutes. Soon, chicken was lying on a pan ready to be cooked. This preparation was such a surreal experience for me. It made me think a lot about the food I consume back home and how detached we are from our food systems. This was a daily task for Marisol and her family if she wanted meat. In the United States, I don’t see the process and just wind up with chicken breasts packaged in plastic.
Geena, Anna, and Laura plucking feathers off the chickens. Photo by Marisol
Marisol loosening the chicken skin over the flame.
Anna:
My favorite part of the homestay was learning how to make sheepskin rugs.
Marisol and Nelson run a sheep farm where Nelson butchers sheep for food and rope material, and Marisol knits with the wool and makes pelts. Our job was helping Marisol throughout the rug making process, which can take up to a week to complete. First, we scraped the skin to clean it and washed the wooly side. Scraping the skin was really hard because while you have to use a lot of force to scrape the pieces off, it is still delicate. Marisol kept yelling “más fuerza!” and “ten cuidado!” Washing the wool was fun because we used regular bar soap and laundry detergent; the bar soap is good for a general clean, and the laundry detergent helps bleach the wool white. Then we scrubbed the skin with a salt mixture to cure it and folded it up to soak for three days.
After the three days, the pelts were hung up to dry before brushing them out. To brush them, we used steel brushes because the wool is too thick and strong for a regular comb. The pelts were super dirty from being out in the field all the time. There were tons of burrs, thorns, and some ticks buried within. Marisol told us that it usually takes around two hours to brush out one pelt, which we thought was fast when we saw what we had to work with! She is a master of her craft. It took the four of us a whole afternoon to brush out four pelts. Nelson even came to help with one of them because the wool was just too thick for us. At the end of our stay with Marisol we each bought a sheepskin we had worked on!
Anna fleshes a sheepskin.
Anna washes the sheepskin.
Marisol shows off the finished product!
How did you deal with the language barrier?
Laura: After taking six years of Spanish in grade school, I still know nothing or have forgotten most of it. I was extremely nervous about going to our homestays because of this. One thing that helped ease my concerns was that Anna knew Spanish pretty well. She helped translate for Geena and I whenever we didn’t know how to communicate certain things or did not understand what the family was saying. I do have to say some of my Spanish did come back. Simple phrases got easier for me as the days went on and by the end, I could joke with my family and speak some sentences.
Anna: I was deemed the translator based on my Spanish experience, and while I definitely knew more than Laura or Geena, I still struggled a lot. Marisol and Nelson were good at speaking slowly and with lots of gestures, but the dialect is so different than what I learned in school that it was still hard to understand. Words are often cut off, and there were certain words and phrases I didn’t know because they were specific to the region or I had only learned the synonyms.
There was a lot I missed because none of us were fluent. I wish I had been good enough to ask and learn about life on a campo and how it has changed in the recent past, especially because Marisol had grown up there. Many of our conversations were kept simple and mainly consisted of joking around at lunch. While I did learn a lot about their lives based on how we spent our days and the conversations we had, I learned how powerful of a tool language can be in many situations, and I wish I had been able to utilize that more.
Did anything surprise you?
Laura: One thing that surprised me was how simple and easy Marisol made cooking seem. I have always considered myself a good cook back home but college cooking can only get you so far. Adding an egg to my instant ramen makes me feel like a Michelin star chef. After seeing Marisol whip up sopapillas, gnocchi, and traditional Chilean bean dishes so fast amazed me. I could have never imagined that bread dough could be made in five minutes. She tried all week to show us the tricks of the trade and I am hoping that back home, I can bring some of her recipes into my own cooking.
Anna: I was surprised by how sustainable their energy usage was. They used a lot of wood to fuel the wood stove, but the stove was used for heating the house, cooking, and heating the water for the shower and sinks. All of the wood came from their land, which they would periodically harvest. And, of course, they took advantage of fallen trees and branches in the yard. Their lights and TV were powered by a large solar panel behind the house. That one surprised me the most because of how little of a role technology plays in their lives. Other than those few things, there was very little energy needed to run the house, which made their energy consumption very small to begin with.
Marisol making homemade gnocchi.
How different was it from your daily life?
Laura: Life was very different on the “campo” from my home in Vermont. We woke up every morning at 8:00am and started the day right by sipping mate around the wood stove for about an hour to completely wake up. We then went into the garden every day to gather fresh veggies for our meals.
Every single meal was eaten together as a family and if someone was late from working out on the land, we waited until everyone was present. We would work until our task was done no matter how long it took. Back in Vermont, I quickly get up around 8:30am, skip breakfast, and hurry off to class. There is no time to ease into the morning. I always thought I had access to fresh food, but Marisol’s garden reached a whole new level. My house does not have a garden, and when I want fresh spinach or tomatoes, I walk to my co-op and buy what I need. I stop work whenever I get tired and sometimes even leave my work until the very last minute. At Marisol’s everything gets completed even if you have to work a little later.
Anna: At home, everything is based on a set schedule. I wake up early to get to class at 9am, eat lunch and dinner at the same time every day, work for a fixed number of hours in the evenings, and finally go to bed once everything is done. Life is stressful when it’s schedule-based. Additionally, because everyone is so busy, there is little time left to spend with others, and when there is time, it’s often in the library studying silently together.
At the campo, life was much more relaxed. We woke up at 8am to drink mate with Marisol and Nelson before breakfast, which we would eat around 9:30. After, we would work on various tasks until lunch, which might happen any time between 1 and 3pm. Lunch is the major meal of the day on the campo, and it is time to sit with family and relax. Overall, life was much more relaxed on the campo than at home.
There was more time spent with family and enjoying life. There was a much greater appreciation for all that they had on the campo, too, something that I feel is forgotten a lot in my life in the United States.
Geena, Marisol, Laura, and Anna at a viewpoint of the Baker River.
What was the most challenging part?
Laura: Leaving. Our life at Marisol and Nelson’s was so rewarding and exciting. They showered us with hospitality and love from the minute we walked into their home. Every single meal was shared around their kitchen table with everyone present. It reminded me of my own home. Once we saw the Round River cars pull up to the house, my heart sank. I tearfully hugged Marisol and thanked her for her kindness towards us. She grabbed me one last time to try and stop my tears before I waved and blew a kiss goodbye.
I will always remember my week at their home and keep it near and dear to me whenever I think of my time in Patagonia.
Anna: Realizing that we only had a week on the campo was really hard. As soon as we arrived, I fell in love with the place and knew I’d never want to leave. Every day we learned so many new things, and I loved the way we lived. By the end, I couldn’t image life off the campo and going back to my real home. It was such a special experience with a wonderful family. There was so much more to learn, too. I wish that if anything, it could have just lasted a little bit longer. Saying goodbye to Marisol and Nelson was so hard; they were so welcoming and kind to us, the work was fun, and their way of life was something I aspire to have myself. I hope we’ll see Marisol and Nelson again when they are in Cochrane for Fiesta Costumbristas.
What do you want to bring home?
Laura:
There are so many things that I want to bring home from my time on the campo.
Being intentional is probably the biggest one. Everything Marisol did was with the best intentions. From using up every bit of the chicken, to having a planned out time, also known as siesta, for rest so she didn’t overwork herself was a huge lesson for me to take back. At home, I have tons of food waste. Spinach and peppers go bad so easily with a crazy school schedule. I forget about what I have in the fridge and end up throwing out at least a fourth of what I buy. I also get extremely exhausted to the breaking point sometimes. Marisol always took at least an hour out of her day to rest. We also joined in on siesta every single day after lunch. I would reside to my room and break out my book that I was in the middle of. It was such a nice refresh in my day.
Anna: There is so much I would like to bring home with me. Most importantly, I want to adopt the lifestyle of campo living. Life is much more relaxed on the campo, and the organization of their days is much different; I want to make sure more time is set aside for family and friends. Additionally, I want to practice cooking with purpose and fresh, simple ingredients. Marisol made all of the bread and sopapillas from scratch when more was needed, and she had a specific methodology while cooking things such as soups or sauces. Only the exact ingredients that were needed were taken out, there was never half a carrot or onion leftover.