My new room mate

I would like to start of this post with a lyric from one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite bands because it perfectly describes my situation right now:


     "And we are far from home but we're so happy.
      Far from home, all alone, but we're so happy."

                                            -From Finner, by Of Monsters and Men

This morning, as I was pouring milk on my muesli, there was a knock at the kitchen door. Jamie was standing there with the new WWOOFer, a German girl named Hella. She sat down a joined us for breakfast and we learned that her bus from London had arrived early, so she took the train to Kinghorn and found her way to the farm. She is also taking a gap year and has been WWOOFing since November. Right away we connected over the gap year/university thing as well as the German aspect. As you may or may not know, I took German for four years in High School and did an exchange there. It was one of the greatest experiences of my life and ever since then, I have always been interested/excited by all things German.

After breakfast, we went to work with Richard, turning over the soil in six raised planting beds. As we worked, she told me about some of her travels and I told her about my German. Along the way, Harry Potter was mentioned, and for a good 15 minutes, we bonded over that. I also munitioned that I was planning to go to Edinburgh the next weekend, and as though she could read my mind, she said she would love to come with me. We both agreed that it's nice to have a companion when exploring new places.  It was totally perfect. All week I had been hoping this would be the case. And sure enough, she seemed almost relieved to hear that I was going. It was some really good synergy. 

It was another blustery day, so we came inside around 11 and made bread. Richard showed us the process and had us kneading the dough and mixing the flour. Then it was lunch time. Diana made an amazing spinach soup. It was quite delicious. Meanwhile, outside, the weather couldn't seem to make up it's mind. It was cloudy, then sunny, then rainy, then cloudy again. For over an hour we talked about university. Diana explained the Scottish system, I the American, and Hella the German. We discussed the different aspects, and both of them were absolutely floored to hear the cost of UVM. Or any American college for that matter. Hella told us about how in Germany, the government pays for it. Then if you get a job in the field, you pay it back in the form of taxes. But, if you do not get a job that relates to your degree, you do not have to pay it back. However, there are a few schools that are beginning to charge 700 euros a year. It was all very interesting, and slightly disheartening. After all, as Hella said, "Education should be free." You're damn right. 

But, I digress. So after lunch we went to split some wood and work on the fruit cage netting. The wind made it much more difficult than it typically is. It also made a few more holes than there were last week...

Look at that patch job. What a pro. :P

We worked on those things until about 3, then Rich had a few jobs for us. We swept out the floor where they keep the barrels of veg oil. It was more like scraping since all the sand was saturated with spilled oil. After we had it all scraped up and dumped in the compost, we put down new sand. Then it was 5 and we came in a had a cup of tea. Adam made us dinner, and we ate it in the downstairs kitchen (p.s. there's a kitchen in the downstairs with a living room and TV too.) It was a lot of fun. As we ate we watched the British Parliament on the BBC and laughed at all the people looking so very bored...

Anyway, it was a fun day!