Venice & Austria

Hey all,

Quick message here to let everyone know I am alive.....Right now I am in Purbach, Austria after spending a day in Venice on June 24th. I got to Austria on the 25th and everything has been great so far. My host is Tascha, she is 23 and right now in the process of restoring her house that was given to her when her grandmother passed away. There is another helper, David, here and also another guy, Tom, living here.

Internet is limited and slow so not many updates or pictures until I move on to my next place. I´m actually not even on my computer because it does not work with the internet. In a week or two when I go to my next place I´ll post an update with pictures and about Austria. Hope everyone is doing fine, take care!

And Happy Birthday Dad!

Arrivederci Italia!

I'm happy to say that I can now drive a car with a stick shift! Throughout my time here I have been slowly learning how to drive Elisabeth's Fiat Panda. It's a 5-speed and Elisabeth took me out once to show me how it works and after that she's sent me off on my own the rest of the times. Since I started I've gone to pick up the new helpers and also just run errands around town. It's something I've always wanted to learn and I did it! Since my last update on Wednesday I've gone to see a movie in Rome with Elisabeth, Catherine and two other people, had two other helpers come here, went to visit Perugia, and cleaned out a well.



We went to Rome to go see "Total Denial". It's a film about the conflict in Burma between the people of Burma and Total/Unocal Oil companies. Very interesting film made by one of Elisabeth's good friends, Milena Kaneva. The theatre was in Campo di Fiori and afterwards we all ate dinner in the middle of the square, it was a ton of fun.





Two other helpers also came here Thursday night, and I'm happy to say that they are still here and doing just fine, unlike Camilla. Their names are Katie and Emi, and they both go to school at Bennington College in Vermont. Katie is from Boston and Emi from Washington D.C. Very nice girls who should fit in just fine here I think.

The three of us went to Perugia yesterday (Sunday). Perugia is a international university city in the middle of Italy. All four of Elisabeth's children went to high school there and Timothèe, her son (17 y/o), is there now. After visiting there for a day, it makes me wish I studied there. Perugia is a awesome city with quite a few international students and just seems like a great place overall. Emi's cousin is currently there and we met up with her from the train and she showed us all around the city. If anyone reading this is thinking of studying abroad, check out Perugia!



Today Timothèe and I cleaned the well that filters the water from the river. It was about a meter deep and filled with dirty water and rocks about 1.5 meters high. Quite a job but it ended up being somewhat fun for some reason, not really sure why. I also learned today how to siphon from a hose. Pretty simple, but I'd never done it before (dirty/sandy water does not taste good by the way). We got it all done by 11am in about 4 hours.




Finally, as some of you may know, tomorrow is my last day here in Orte! I'm happy and sad at the same time. I've had quite a bit of fun here, but I am excited for my next place.......Purbach, Austria! In Purbach I am staying with a woman, Tascha. I'm not sure how old she is but she was a former HelpXer, and now she is trying it out as a host. I think for most of my stay I will be helping to restore a house that she has. Different than here at the farm, but should be fun nonetheless. She also lives right near an awesome lake!

The rest of my trip is planned out like this for those who are curious......June 24/25 - July 10th in Purbach, Austria.....July 10th - July 27th NOTHING.....July 27th - August 10th in Tutzing, Germany...August 13th - August 31st in Almeria, Spain.....August 31st - September 17th in Vila do Bispo, Portugal....and finally September 17th - October 5th in Castlehaven, Ireland!!!

That's it, if anyone has any good ideas or suggestions for countries to visit between July 10th and July 27th I'm open to visiting anywhere and checking if there is a help exchange. Let me hear your ideas! Have a great nice everyone, talk to you next from Austria!!!











Oh, and today we also made bread, plum marmalade, and nocino liquer. Here are the plums before the marmalade...

Planes, Helpers, The Beach, Water Bottles, & Parties!!!

Well this update is way overdue, especially since I said I would update more often. Starting NOW I will! The problem with not updating is that I don't even know where I left off. I usually have to go back and look at the picture to remember. The few days after my last update I hadn't really done much besides regular work around the house, but on Friday is when a bunch of stuff started happening.

Friday morning (the 12th) Elisabeth's friend Renato (we call him "The Plane Man") took me up in his single engine airplane and flew me around Orte and the surrounding towns, it was so awesome! I didn't know I was going to go until the day before, but we got up early and drive over to the "airport", which was really just a small hanger for 6 planes and a grass runway. You can see in the pictures what I mean. But it was so cool to fly up in a small plane like that. As far as I can remember I only had been in a helicopter once before,

and never a small plane. It was much quieter and much more relaxing than I had thought it would be, almost made me want to take lessons! Renato used to be a pilot for Alitalia airlines and now he just flies once a week. But I got great views of Orte, the surrounding towns, and even Elisabeth's house! The pictures are of the airplane, Renato and me, the runway, Elisabeth's house from the air, and Orte from the air. We were up in the air for about 15 minutes total and I saw quite a few things though. I think Renato has taken

everyone in Elisabeth's family up in the airplane at one point or another. He lives about 20 minutes away and has a farm of his own that he takes care of. He usually comes over for lunch or dinner once or twice a week, so I've gotten to chat with him before. Very nice of him to take me up in the plane though and definitely an exp erience I never would have had in Italy if I had just stayed in hostels in the big cities the entire time!



That was Friday, and on Thursday night we had another helper come here, the one I said was cute in the picture Elisabeth showed me. And while she was cute, she was definitely not cut out for working on a farm. Notice how I said "was"....we'll get to that later. Anyway though, she got here Thursday night and didn't wake up for breakfast until AFTER I got back from my plane ride, which was like 10:30-11:00. Not a good start, which she compounded by making excuses for it. Usually we work from 8-11 or 12, then rest and work a little in the afternoon. And yes I knew she didn't know anything about the house right away, but Catherine was there to give her some simple jobs if she would have woken up. It was all pretty much downhill from there. Camilla and Elisabeth are just different people and everytime Camilla wanted to help she would do it her own way and act like she was in her own house. I figure that going to someone's house to work is like a recipe....at first you follow the recipe and how it's done, then after you're used to it you make changes to do it your own way. Camilla didn't realize that and whenever she would do something wrong she would just make excuses and not admit she was wrong. On the other hand, Elisabeth didn't treat her very well and didn't give her much of a chance to let her learn. It was just a bad situation that didn't work out. She ended up leaving on Sunday....I can explain more at home if anyone wants to hear it all.

Sunday though, Camilla left with a friend of Elisabeth's son, Simone, and he had to drop her off at the beach on the Mediterranean Coast at Santa Marinella. I went with to check it out and it ended up being pretty cool. We ended up being there 5 hours while Simone was sailing. The water was great and the beach was pretty good.





Monday/Tuesday were simply work in the morning and then sit by the pool in the afternoon, pretty relaxing. Today Catherine had a party for the end of her school year with 8-10 of her friends over. They are all about 7-8 years younger than me and all only seemed to speak Italian, so I just hung out helping cook and sitting by the pool. I also had an interesting conversation with Elisabeth about water bottles. I'm against bottled water, it's simply bad for the environment. I've got one of those unbreakable Nalgene bottle that you just refill from the tap or a water fountain. I kept it in my bag until today since it was really hot outside so I filled it up and put it in the freezer. Two things wrong with this apparently: 1) Cold water is bad for your health and 2) Any type of plastic container is not allowed in the house, even if it's reusable....

Correct me if I'm wrong, but how in the hell is cold water bad for your health? Water is naturally cold in the mountains and from spring where people drink it. Sticking it in the refrigerator uses energy to make it cold, but there's no way it could be bad for your health. But please, someone correct me if I'm wrong. And secondly, I find it ridiculous that I can't use my own container that will never be thrown away. I use it to drink water simply because I have a lot at a time to drink that way. It's not really a big deal to live with at the house, we just have discussions about it all, but that's just an example of life here. Some stuff seriously just doesn't make sense.

I'm still having fun though, despite some different views and beliefs Elisabeth and I have, and there are two girls coming tomorrow from Boston. It will be nice to have some company, hopefully they are actually prepared to work and end up staying longer than 3 days.

This time I'll REALLY start to update more often. Thanks again for all of your comments and e-mails everyone! Ciao!

P.S. To make any of the photos bigger just drag them into your address bar at the top of the screen.

Life Lessons

It's been a week since my last update, and I'm happy to say that I'm still enjoying everything there is here in Orte! Last week I visited a few different towns around Orte, learned a few new skills around the farm, and just enjoyed being in Italy.

On Wednesday I went into lower Orte (there are two parts, upper and lower) with Elisabeth's friend Patricia into town. Patricia drove me around to some of the surrounding towns just to get a feel for everything that is here. We did kind of a loop to the north and saw places like Montecampano and Amelia, just driving through so I could see. Life is definitely much different out here, but not really comparable to back home. There are pros and cons with both styles of living. Elisabeth also has a beautiful apartment in upper Orte. Most towns in Italy are built into the highest point of a hill/mountain so they can overlook everything. Her apartment is just wonderful and has a great view of the countryside, if I ever came back here on a vacation I would definitely think of renting it out from her!


Thursday I went with Elisabeth on her way to work and she dropped me off in Tarquinia, a few miles from the Mediterranean coast. Tarquinia is an ancient city that used to be the main home of the Etruscan people, who live around 500-300 BC. It's a UNESCO World Heritage Site and most famous for the Etruscan Necropolises. The Necropolis is a site where many ancient Etruscan tombs were discovered. There are over 6,000 tombs scattered throughout Tarquinia and many of them are pretty sophisticated and built into the ground with staircases and such. They also have paintings and artwork on the walls of the tombs, of which only 20 are open to the public. It was definitely pretty neat to see. There is also a museum that I went to in town that had quite a few artifacts. I like that type of history so it was pretty interesting to me, I just wish I knew more about it. The pictures are of shelters that were built to protect the tombs (they are all over the place) and also of inside one of the tombs underground.


There were a few guests at the house this weekend so I spent a lot of time making sure everyone had everything for meals and such and didn't do too much yard work, just kinda hangin' out and doing a few hours work per day. A new helper comes on the 11th and two more on the 15th, so it'll be fun to have some change in the house, especially since all three of them are girls....

Anyway though, I am learning quite a bit here in Orte, about simple things and about life in general. I've learned to drive a stick shift, or I should say learning. I drove once with Elisabeth so she could teach me and after that she sent me off on my own...talk about throwing me into the ocean! I've also learned how to make a great salad, bake loaves of bread from scratch, that olio (olive oil) is good on everything, and that alternative medicine can discover foods that are bad for my body. I'll have to go into that last one in more detail later.

But I suppose I should describe life around the house for everyone that's curious. I should start off by saying that it's extremely different and words aren't enough to describe it, you really have to live it to experience it. As I said before, Elisabeth is very in touch with nature and believes that nothing should be wasted if possible. Energy, water, food, materials, anything and everything gets put back into use in one way or another. The water is solar powered so it's best to take showers in the afternoon when the sun has been out. There's no garbage disposal, food scraps go to the chickens. Every meal is finished or turned into something else for later. The only scraps are from preparation. Milk from cereal and spoiled milk goes to the cats, water from washing the salad goes to the plants. Paper cartons are into the fireplace to start a fire. There are no plastic water bottles here, no big bags of garbage. Clothes hang to dry outside, no dryer. Everything we eat is either grown here or bought organically. The overall rule is that because everything comes from nature, we should try to return everything to nature without destroying it by burning or burying our garbage.

It's really hard to describe without experiencing it, but all in all I completely agree with her. Even after only being here at the house for two weeks, my whole way of viewing the world has been thrown upside-down. I hope that when I get home I can start to implement some of the things I have learned here into my own life, not only personally but also in a way where I can help spread the word about trying to protect nature.

I'm going to try to post updates more frequently so they're somewhat shorter. I hope everything is going well for everyone at home, keep the great comments and e-mails coming, I love to hear from people! Buona sera!

Two Weeks

I can't believe that I've already been in Italy for two weeks! The time has just flown by! I've got a little bit of down-time right now so I'll give a short little update. Right now I am still in Orte and everything is still wonderful. People are always coming and going, though I'm sad to say that the two other helpers that were here have both left. But Elisabeth always has friends and people she knows stopping by and there is another helper, a girl from England, coming on the 11th. Elisabeth showed me a picture and she's pretty cute too! I plan on staying here until near the end of June, but then moving around a little after that.

My routine here is pretty simple and somewhat relaxing. I wouldn't even call it work, just helping out. The "farm" is very small, only a few acres, and mainly used to sustain food for the family and guests. There really isn't enough to sell to others, and so it's hard to call it a farm. One of the best ways to describe it was my first day here when we were preparing lunch. One of Elisabeth's friends was preparing lunch and told another helper to get some basil. She asked where, and right outside the house is an herb garden with the basil. Amazing! Elisabeth is a big advocate of self-sufficiency, growing organically and not being wasteful. It's amazing to see all of the ideas come from her head about how to re-use things and not waste anything. Everything gets put back into the environment or used in a way that isn't harmful to the Earth. Living here less than a week has already been a life-changing experience and is most definitely going to change the way I live when I get back home. I am learning so much about many different things.

Sunday I went into Rome to see the finale of the Giro d'Italia. We went a little bit late and so I just got there when they had started the presentation of the awards. However, I was able to make my way through the crowd to the front of the fence where many of the racers were waiting after the race. I'm not sure why they were there, but many of them were just hanging out. I got to take a ton of great photographs and even shook hands with Yaroslav Popovych and Jani Brajkovic!!! They are two riders from Lance Armstrong's team called Astana. I was so close I could talk to these guys and touch the $10,000 bikes that they ride!!! The pictures are of the winner, Denis Menchov, being congratulated after receiving his final "maglia rosa" and the trophy, and of how close I got to the bikes leaning against the fence. Cool stuff.

It's been a rainy past few days, but still fun. There was a German family that came to stay here for two days and today I went with them to Viterbo to the hot springs. There are natural hot springs that have been formed over thousands of years. Just like a hot tub in the open, but there is definitely a sulfur smell that comes up from the ground. Still very enjoyable though to relax in the naturally hot water!

Today is also Italy's independence day and everyone has off school and no one is working. It is called the Anniversary of the Republic that marked the fall of Fascism on June 2nd, 1946. After WWII on this day Italy abolished the monarchy and became a republic.

My plan now is to stay here for a few more weeks and then travel all over Europe using help exchange. I hope to visit Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain, and Ireland, all by working on farms and helping people out! I already have my one in Cork, Ireland all set up, but I am still working on the ones in-between. Then I will fly home from Dublin at the beginning of October. I hope everything is going well with everyone back home! I miss everyone and hope to hear from you all. Thanks for the comments people have been writing, I changed the settings so that I think now anyone can post a comment, even if you don't have an account. Also you can e-mail me at matthew.harris12@gmail.com. Take care! Arrivederci!