allyson and bryan

Allyson, Bryan, and the Composting Toilets /



One of the most incongruous things that Bryan and I are planning to do on our trip is volunteer at an organic farm. In New Zealand. There's this organization called WWOOF that coordinates such things, and the general concept is that you trade a few hours of work each day in exchange for room and board. I'm sure there are a million weird ways such an arrangement could go wrong, but hell, how can we pass up a chance to use a composting toilet?

Of course, the last place you probably can imagine me is kneeling in a organic tomato garden pulling weeds. (Above photo was taken once, under duress, during a corporate volunteer day at Microsoft years ago.) Really, the bigger catch is: We're so totally not hippies. Oh and let me tell you, these organic farmers are so very, very hippie.

Oddly, I kind of can't wait. I guess that's the whole point of this thing anyway.

I thought you might be interested in some jobs we could do:

* Weed, mulch, and "train grapes" (I have no idea what this is) at an organic vineyard.
* Feed, prune, and maintain 700 organic olive trees.
* Milk 400 organic cows.
* Garden, cook and do office work at a mountaintop yoga retreat.
* Help run a Mediterranen-style guesthouse.
* Tend bar (more likely, wash dishes) at a pub in Blackball, NZ.
* Tame a herd of 20 lovely llamas.

The description of the perks are pretty entertaining, ranging from hand-drum making to free chanting classes to simply, "hilarity." We're mostly stuck between the yoga, the pub, or maybe just a straight-up tomato farm.

What would you do?

stars, they're just like allyson @ 7:18 PM  

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