#7 You are what you eat.

While I am writing this blog post, the smell of blood still lingers on my hands. Why? How? What for? You will find out in this very long blog post - Yeah!

But first, let me tell you about Wednesday because on that day it was the last time for me: put on a hair net, disinfect hands, fill the sink with water, wash spinach and arugula, dry them, and pack them for sale. And as luck would have it, Wine Wednesday was celebrated on this farm, so the evening program was set. After dinner, the wine bottles were opened and the karaoke machine was started. It was a very beautiful farewell party with lots of laughter, dancing, and singing.

On Thursday, I was driven to Osoyoos, where the bus picked me up and took me to Castlegar. Although it picked me up five minutes earlier than planned, it still managed to be 40 minutes late. On top of that, I didn't know where my headphones (I have already lost one ☹) were and there was no wifi. A horror scenario nowadays on trains and buses. But fortunately, I didn't travel through Germany, but through Canada, where the landscape is simply WOW and beautiful! These mountains here are so beautiful in their own way! For example, the view while I am writing this blog post... simply enjoyable! :D

In Castlegar, the farmer picked me up and we drove to his property. It is a much smaller farm than my last one. Furthermore, I am also the only WWOOFer here and will remain so as the season is soon coming to an end. So I will have a completely different experience here. On the last farm, there was always the opportunity for interaction, and if you needed peace and quiet, you could find it. Here, there is peace! Really peace :D The landscape here is so beautiful in its own way that I am currently enjoying it with this peace, but I will certainly miss the many different conversations from the last farm, but as I said, I will have a completely different experience here.

So I arrived here and the property with the animals was shown to me. Different goats, sheep, two pigs, three cats and dogs + chickens. The different small fields were also shown to me, as well as the place where the herbs are dried and sold.

On my first day, after feeding the animals, we went to a neighbor's construction site. It was a super nice view! But it was also super exhausting... and not for my body, but for my head. At the last farm, people knew that I didn't speak the language very well, but the people on the construction site didn't, so they naturally spoke to each other normally. It was super exhausting to listen all the time and try to understand everything. I really noticed how my head shut down after a few hours and how tired it was. That was a bit depressing, but also okay. Not everything can always go smoothly, you also have to endure setbacks sometimes.

Today (Saturday) was a big day. There was a slaughter. I eat meat and I believe that everyone who consumes meat products should at least watch a slaughter live to see the whole process behind it and maybe realize that €3 for 1kg of ground beef at a discount store does not cover the well-being of the animals. In the morning, the butcher came.

Short insight into the slaughter process:

The process looked something like this: a goat was caught and restrained. The animals were killed that day with a gun, and the butcher placed the barrel of the gun on the back of the animal's head (shortest way to the brainstem), a quiet shot and the animal slumped down. Then the animal's throat is cut so that it can bleed out there. During bleeding, the animal still has muscle contractions, so it looks really strange when a sheep, which is obviously dead, twitches wildly and flails its legs. Afterwards, the animal was hung up, the fur, all the body parts and internal organs that were not needed were removed. Later, I was allowed to bury them so that no bear eats them. We are in a riverbed here, so I had to fight my way through stones for 20 centimeters, that was a real workout :D The animals are now hanging at the butcher's for at least five days in the cooler before they are further processed. I expected the worst reactions from my body, but it was really very interesting to see this process and when do you ever have the opportunity to take all the internal organs like heart, lungs, intestines, liver... in your hand and feel them?

So this blog post "ends" as well. Have a nice day!

Best regards

Samuel