Pack up, roll on

After three days Claire and I concluded that we couldn’t do it for three weeks.

The creepy manager who repeated the eerie slogan, “what happens on the farm stays on the farm”, the heat, the disgusting over all conditions and the tent, were all enough to convince us that we’d be tried it, and that we’d like to go to the original farm we had planned to work on before the owner had requested our help on the Dragon Fruit farm. We sent her an email asking to move sooner rather than later and citing our reasons, and we expected we would have about a week to tough it out on the farm and see the surrounding area. The very next day when Claire and I had biked into town, we set up in Starbucks and saw we had an email from her. She said to pack up our stuff, she was coming for us that day and we’d be gone by 5:30. It was all very fast and shocking, we got a ride back to the farm in the back of her truck, wedged in with our bikes, and just proceeded to pack up everything we owned and had just unpacked a few days before. I think I would have liked to stay on the farm a few more days just so we could explore Lahaina further in our time off and spend time at the beach, but she said we were moving and that was ultimately what we wanted.

So now we’re up in Haiku, where the other of the two farms is, the lettuce farm. It’s indoor housing here, and big, shared house with all the WOOFers. In the car she described it as a co-ed frat house. That was pretty accurate. The house itself is a mess, dirty and unorganized. But it’s not a tent, so I’m alright. There are nine of us total now, six girls and three guys. The owner (might as well give you her name: Crystal Schmidt) said we’d get a room to share if the other people had moved around like she wanted. They didn’t. We spent out first night (last night) in a large room with two other guys. Crystal didn’t have sheets for us so we slept in our bags on probably some of the dirtiest mattresses ever. We’re kind of the new kids on campus, there is definitely a seniority thing in terms of rooms and living space. I’m not sure if we’ll get our own space or not, we didn’t unpack yesterday because the room we’re sleeping in is full of old mattresses and boxes and there’s no space.

Our real hope for our WWOOfing experience was that we would become part of a community, people who live, eat and work together in a beautiful place. I think that is more possible here, the other workers are closer to us in age, and we’re sharing a house. But to be honest, day one was kind of awkward. No one seemed that juice that we had showed up, they were all a little aloof and indifferent. I think we’re kind of just more people who they have to make space for in a community that has already been established.

Hopefully this one will work out better than the last. Claire and I had a very set plan before we arrived, but we’re realizing now that we just need to do what works for us and makes these three months in Hawaii worthwhile. Even if this farm turns out to be a good thing, we’ve decided we won’t stay more than a month. Thanks to all our amazing friends and family, we’ve collected a good number of contacts and safeties here in Hawaii. All the people I talked to before this trip said WWOOFing can go very well or very poorly. We’ve seen that. So though our original plan was to farm for three months, we’re now expanding our options to include anything and everything. If we can last the month here (and hopefully enjoy it!) we’d like to move on to a new farm perhaps or even a new thing entirely. Maybe work and rent a room, maybe even go to a new island. We’re on a tight budget and will be doing a lot of hitchhiking, but we’re determined to keep moving and make the best of the time we have. It’s incredibly scary to realize you’re completely on your own, and where you go, how you get there and how you handle it is all on you. But it’s also exciting, a lot of work, but exciting non-the-less. Fingers crossed we end up in good places with good people.