We worked with a group of four Romanian girls, only one of whom spoke English or Italian.
It is not a difficult job, but somewhat boring. We used scissors that looked sort of like wire cutters to clip the bunches of grapes and pile them into crates, which we later gathered with the tractor.
In the end, we had a pile of crates filled with grapes. Here are the fruits of our labor.
Today, we went to a place where the grapes get processed.We dumped the grapes into a big contraption that turned them into juice.
It spit out the stems into a giant pile.
Rowan worked cleaning the empty crates.
Afterwards, the men stood around discussing the sugar content of the wine, which partly determines the alcohol content.
After we finished with the grapes, we went home and cut up fruit for the mostarda d'uva.
The name means "mustard of grapes," even though it is nothing like mustard. Rowan didn't know this and called me crazy when she saw me eating it for breakfast. I informed her that it was just fruit and hazelnuts, and then she also ate it for breakfast. Yes, we are some wacky Americans in Italy!Tonight, we cook and jar the stuff. (Pictures will follow in the next blog.)
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Some random notes:
This is Mauro, one of the farm owners. Rowan started calling him Mario by accident, and then I started doing it. We think it is partly because of this red jumpsuit, which makes him look like a certain video game hero.
By day, he is actually a high level dude at Sun Microsystems, so he was talking to other business folk on his Blackberry while he did farm stuff.Rowan saw this house. I think she wants me to build one like it for her.
Lastly, this is for Marion. Rowan says, "Hi, Mumzie!"
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