Off again!

I´m off again! I am leaving tomorrow at noon for the Iguazu Falls! It is a 21 hour bus ride, how crazy is that??? I am booked at a hostel for seven days and then, we shall see!
I should have internet there, so I will put up more pictures and news as soon as I can.
Also, most exciting thing ever--Flor had her baby, his name is Octavio, and he is the cutest!!!!

Un Abrazo,
Esther!

DON´T SEND ME MAIL

I should have written this post a month ago but NO MORE MAIL. Its not because I dont love it, I do. And thank you so much toeveryone who sent me letters! I have left the farm and I now have NO permanent address. Send me an email. Look for me on skype. Facebook. Whatever. But NO MORE MAIL.

Lots of Love,
Esther

Changes

Hello All!
Sorry I havent written for so long, the internet situation has been a little crazy.
I am still enjoying Huerta Inambu, although I am starting to be ready for a change. I want to see more of the country and make some more friends, its pretty isolated here!!! So next week I am leaving the farm and I will spend New Years in Cordoba and then its looks like I will be heading up North to a farm or natural reserve.

Hannukah on the farm was nice. I little candles and sung in my room every night and the last day we had latkahs for lunch with our own eggs, flour, zuccini, potatos, and storebought onions. I will put up pictures when I can.

Renewing my visa was a complete and total fiasco but now I can legally be in the country for three more months!!!!

My birthday was also fun, Nuria had all my favorite foods including, peanut butter, her pear and ginger jam. meat for lunch, mint lassi, eggs, and a fabulous chocolate and dulce de leche cake made by Mayra!!! Oh and icecream!!! And the day after mangos!!! And then I went to Cordoba the next week to renew the visa and Flro and Carlos took me to La Falda and we had cake in this precious little place called El Bosque in the middle of an artist colony with homemade cake and earl gray!!!!

We now have a huge amount of veggies on the farm including zuccini, tomatos, beans, beets (which I now love) and much much more!!! On Sundays, if the weather is nice we take a picnic to one of the many gorgoeous rivers in the area. And I am almost finsihed with Harry Potter Five and have started another knitting project. And my Spanish is getting pretty good, especially because most of my initial shyness is gone.

Thats about it, I will try to update next week.
Love and happy holidays!!!!!
Esther

Animals!!!!

These are the animals we have at the farm!!!

Iguanas. I called them monstruos once by accident. They are four feet long and terrifying.


Negrita, the leader of the cows, and the most fun to milk.

 Luna, the baby, a total sweetie. Still doesnt have milk, but she has not one but TWO pefect hearts on herself!

 Canela. Canela is preggers right now, she always sleeps on her own poop which is not fun to clean in the morning.

 Durazno, Razy for short. He fell asleep sitting up. I love him.

 Cornelia, because I promised my sister I would name a kitten Cornelius but I couln´t because Durazno was too peach colored to resist.

 The mama. I actually dont know her name and the kitten names I made up, they aren´t official. But I call her snuggle in English because she is a snuggler.

 Nita!!! She loves to go swimming with you in the stream and chase dragon flies.

 :) Now you are starting to see that the purpose of this post is kitten photos.

 A rooster. I am not a big fan, but they are pretty from a distance.

Sorry I know these posts are not exactly full of juicy information!!!! If you want to know the deets send me an email or letter. So far I received two letters!!!! If you want to make me happy on my birthday, mail is the way to go!!!!!

Proyectos

Hello friends and family!
I have around 4 hours free everyday and an afternoon and Sunday off every week. What do I do with this time? Here is a list!

I read, a lot. So far I am up to the 4th Harry Potter in Spanish, I read The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe in Spanish (and it had completely lost its charm because of my age), I listened to the audio book of The Help which is fantastic, and next up is La Isla Bajo el Mar by Isabel Allende.

I knit a sleeping bag for Lambie.

I made slippers out of a sweater that shrunk in the wash,

I built a milking bench.

We fixed tools one day.

And I play with the kittens and puppy!

It is too hard to move these pictures around, so think of it as a matching game!!!!
And remember, my address is on the blog now, so send me a letter!!!!

Pictures speak louder than words, I hope.

La Cumbrecita  (the outskirts)

Rainy day at the river. 

The little fair where we sell our veggies. (thats Nuria)

Milking!

Picnic at the river with crumble, salad, spanish omlette, and bread. 

(Those are Pablo and Maria Paz, my fellow workers.) 

Pablo crashed the car.

La Cumbrecita again.

Huerta Inambu

Hello friends and family!

I have been living on the farm for two weeks now and so far really love it. There are two other volunteers here, a couple that is half Chilean half Spanish, and they are so great! The family is very nice as well, and the two teen-aged kids are nice and really funny. Every morning I milk the cows with the other volunteers and some member of the family. Then we clean the stalls, put the dirty straw into the compost, and go to breakfast which is bread with toppings. Afterwards we work in the field until lunch which is the big hot meal and it is followed by a siesta. Then more field work until 6 when we go on a hike in the mountains to fetch the cows which have been grazing all day. Then we milk again and have dinner. The food is really good, mostly stuff we grow and make ourselves like cheese, yogurt, jams, and peanut butter, but we don´t eat much eggs or meat so I feel a little protein deprived. The area is absolutely gorgeous, so here are some pics.

Oh and they have a mailbox in town so you can send me a letter!
Esther Rose-Wilen
c/o Nuria Soler
c.c. 64
5194-Villa General Belgrano (CBA)
Argentina