“Okay, I admit it. I’m a city girl.”

As I heard the alarm go off at 5:50am this morning, I was struck with wonder. “What on earth am I doing here on this animal farm in Austria?” I was filled again with a sense of dread knowing that in 10 minutes I’d have to be dressed, outside, and ready to muck up the mess in the stables. Again. But let’s not forget to add the important detail of the terrible weather to this scenario. Yesterday at about noon a huge storm blew in and the raining began. It poured buckets all through the night and is expected to continue raining for the next five days straight. Yes, this is what I have to look forward to.

So now let’s think about what to wear. Travis and I have a small selection of farm clothes that we bought from 2nd hand stores in Central America to prepare for this leg of our travel. Although not rainproof and definitely not fashionable, they have been reliable up until now. Because of our sometimes limited access to laundry, we’ve gotten used to wearing the same work clothes several days in a row until they are absolutely unbearable to put on again. I have two such “outfits” that I switch in and out, depending on what’s clean. Pants that really aren’t my size (way too short!) and three layers of mismatching shirts… I am a total beauty queen when I wear them. With this rain, we are more limited with our options and this horse work requires us to go outside and get dirty 3 different times a day. The clothes don’t always dry in between so we’ve had to get very creative. Between the work, we take off the dirty wet clothes and put on the inside hang out clothes but never really feel clean in them because we just worked outside. Even these semi-clean clothes feel tainted by horse smell, as does really everything in our suitcases right now. But with this schedule, it’s pointless to take a shower until the evening because the work is spread throughout the day. Therefore, until about 8:00pm at night, I have to suffer through feeling dirty and uncomfortable. I HATE this. Even sadder is that I only have about three hours to actually enjoy being clean because before you know it it’s bedtime. This is NOT my style.

Let’s not even talk about hair or make-up. Just FYI, I’ve become about as low-maintenance as possible in this year of travel. Starting in Central America, I abandoned my hair-dryer and took to easy "up-do’s" with my hair. Occasionally now if we’re touring a city I’ll actually spend more than 3 minutes on my hair, but this feels really strange to me as I’ve become so accustomed to the other. As far as make-up, I haven’t touched the stuff since we arrived here. Although I usually don’t wear much anyway (not to mention it’s been impossible finding the products I like that I’ve run out of from America in these unfamiliar drugstores with the language challenges), we don’t really have ideal access to a mirror here so it’s not a possibility anyway.

Our living arrangements on this farm are rather bizarre, to say the least. We have a private room on the second floor of Gerda’s mom’s house, but to enter it we have to go through the room of sister Heidi and her Spanish boyfriend Jose. Being that these two are always hold-up in this bedroom hanging out and usually sleeping (we have no idea what they do with themselves all day and night), privacy is non-existent. A curtain exists between our walkway and their bed, and the sound of Jose’s snoring is enough to have contributed to at least 5 hours of sleep lost to me already this week. In “mama’s house,” we are not allowed to use the bathroom because it’s hers. The exception is if we’re desperate during the night. So instead, we have to go outside and walk to the factory building next door to use the employee’s restroom. There is no sink with these bathrooms though. As you can imagine, this is real convenient for us. There is a sink we can use in mama’s house, but it’s in the laundry room and to get to it we have to climb over piles of dirty wet clothes and the lovely smell of mildew. This is fun. Even better is the fact that when we want to take a shower we have to walk on over to the 3rd building on this property, Gerda’s house. So basically this means that our toiletries and personal belongings are spread all throughout the property. It’s such a headache to remember where our towels and toothbrushes are… and again, everything feels dirty and wet because we’re hauling it all back and forth. Adding to this is the fact that to enter any building you have to take off your wet shoes first and the wet raincoats. What a process.

So this morning, I put on as many layers as I could to protect me from the rain and told myself, “It won’t be so bad.” Yeah, right. We began by letting out the horses to graze in the wet fields so we could clean their stables in their absence. Travis grabbed the wheelbarrow and shovel and I grabbed my heavy broom and headed to Muli the mule’s stable (whom I think is the messiest animal of them all). Yuck, what a nightmare. Every time I open the gate of these horse’s homes, I think, “Oh come on… why are you so messy? I just had this perfectly clean and fresh for you yesterday and now you’ve ruined it again. Don’t you care?!” Obviously, these thoughts are complete nonsense… I am dealing with horses here.

I begin the arduous task of cleaning it up while my mind races with all the things I’d rather be doing at this moment. My back and arms surge with pain from using unfamiliar muscles that are required of me to push all the “sh*t” into piles for Travis to scoop up and take away. I really just can’t believe how much sh*t there is and how heavy it is to move. Next, I fill up buckets of sawdust and spread it out through all 11 stables so the next load of sh*t won’t stick. Walking from stable to stable in the pouring rain, my feet are covered in sh*t. My biggest fear all morning is slipping and falling on a pile of sh*t. So far, I’ve been lucky but I’ve had a few close calls. Travis just about sunk into a deep pile of it yesterday as it came up to the cusp of his boot. By the time the stables are clean, I feel pretty sh*tty, to say the least. It doesn’t make a difference though, because this is just the beginning. We haven’t even touched the camel’s stables yet or fed the animals.

To attend to the camel’s level of cleanliness, we first have to move them out of there. I’d say that when I look back on this random experience in the weeks to come, this will be the part that I laugh about the most. Let me paint the scene for you:

Travis and I move the electric fence and enter the camel pin.
Eleven large, hungry animals swarm us because they sense the smell of hay on us.
We have to be on high alert so we don’t get stepped on.
They lick the arms of my jacket with their slobbery tongues and several gnaw on my head through my rain jacket hood.
When they brush up against me they leave a handful of their fur on me since they’re loosing their winter coats.
If I don’t move fast, I swear I’ll be eaten up.
Our task is to put collars on them and tie them up.
We grab our whips to herd them together but don’t actually whip them.
Then we use our “camel voices” to shout out herding calls to get them to move.
As we attempt these calls with words like “yah! Move on out! Come on, come on!” I am hysterical and knelt over belly laughing.
Our complete naivety of handling these animals makes us sound so silly in comparison to Gerda’s skilled camel-calling technique.
If we’re lucky, they move for us.
Sometimes a camel gets way and Travis has to take off running after it.
Then I’m left alone with the other 10.
I try to appear strong so they don’t sense my fear.
I pray Travis returns soon.
Once tied, we take the buckets of feed we prepared and they attack it when we approach them.
Within moments we have to remove the buckets because they like to kick them around when they’re empty.
They’re playful little buggers.
Now we can finally clean their stables.

With our morning jobs almost finished, the last step is to distribute the hay, straw and grass. The grass is my least favorite. Although it’s covered in the barn, it’s so fresh that it’s wet and full of moist slugs and other little creatures. Like little tiny mice. I have to lift up large piles of it and bring it to each stable. I try not to think about what’s hidden inside. By the time we’re done, I’m covered in the stuff. Later it’s really exciting to find pieces of it in my hair, my socks, and my pockets.

This concludes our morning work. Now we have some free time in between brushing the camel’s hair, taking the horses out for exercise, and being dictated by Gerda’s ever-changing schedule of craziness. Amazing that it’s only 8:00am. That means we have a whole 10 hours to look forward to doing this all over again at 6:00pm… and at 8:30pm we can finally wash all the dirt away.

So, we’ve been doing farm work now since April. With all the various degrees of tasks I’ve completed, I think it’s fair to say I’ve been quite a trooper. My comfort level and tolerance levels have expanded beyond what I thought possible for me. But all in all, I’ve made two conclusions. First of all, to all you farmers out there, I commend you! Your job is incredibly difficult and the work requires dedication and skill that is remarkable. Secondly, I don’t think I’m cut out to be a farm girl after all. After this adventure it’s fair to say I’ll be leaving my work boots behind. I will continue to proudly embrace my identity as a city girl, through and through.

My latest fashion statement needs an update SOON!