Last weekend I had the amazing opportunity to get out of the city, really out of the city, and into the country. A friend at school, a westerner, has a farm with his wife and her family, one hour outside of Ubon city, about twenty miles from Cambodia. Although not too far from the city, the village of a few hundred people is a world away. The village is a Catholic village, founded by my friend’s grandfather in-law. He is in his mid-80s. Just nine years ago the village got electricity. The homes are not modern and the village has one tiny shop that closes shortly after dark. On windy nights the people fly kites high up in the sky with tubes surrounding the extended string. This produces a soothing, bouncing noise that helps people sleep.
It is a farming village and I spent one day on the farm. The rice fields are roughly four miles from the home. Starting early, we tossed the long strands of rice stalk (sorry, being a Connecticut suburban boy I have no clue as to the proper terminology) into a machine. The machine then took off the stalk, which produced a large pile of hay, and spat out the rice. We collected this in grain bags. This job requires many people. You have a few people standing atop the bundles of rice, throwing the bundles into the top of the machine, you have one person holding the grain bag as it fills up, you have the person lifting the bag and putting them in rows, returning with another empty bag, and you have the person tying the bags closed. Heavy lifting. The farmers do not own the machine. There are only a few around, and its owner goes to the different farms that have signed up for its services. The machine owner gets ten percent of the rice that comes out of the machine.
After having a breakfast, which included a tasty raw beef dish, we collected, rice stalks that had already been cut and tied together. Taking a tractor into several of the paddies, we bumped along, hopping off to collect the bundles of rice. Then we brought them back, piling them up to be ready for the machine.
Most impressive was what my friend was doing with his land. In the couple years that he has been going there, he has planted a wide variety of fruit trees and vegetables, while using clay vats to store fish. He is diversifying the crops on his property making self sustainable living, all within the surroundings his home.
Although only for one day, I am incredibly grateful to have had this experience. I have grown up and lived a very sheltered life, to a large extent, from the streets of New Canaan to Burlington. My hands have never gotten dirty. Despite spending time in rural Vermont, I was not part of that Vermont. This upbringing and lifestyle was and is vastly different to that of the village. I am not debating the merits of either, just marveling at the incredibly different lives people live. For a long time I believed, and still do to a certain extent, that all people are basically the same. But the longer I stay here the more I observe how different the thinking and lives are. Experiencing this difference in the village, if only for 2 nights, was absolutely extraordinary. I have never spent time in someone’s home in such a tranquil, rural setting, with a refreshing absence of modernity, and had the chance (even though short) to see, with my own eyes, life in this way.
Most impressive was what my friend was doing with his land. In the couple years that he has been going there, he has planted a wide variety of fruit trees and vegetables, while using clay vats to store fish. He is diversifying the crops on his property making self sustainable living, all within the surroundings his home.
Although only for one day, I am incredibly grateful to have had this experience. I have grown up and lived a very sheltered life, to a large extent, from the streets of New Canaan to Burlington. My hands have never gotten dirty. Despite spending time in rural Vermont, I was not part of that Vermont. This upbringing and lifestyle was and is vastly different to that of the village. I am not debating the merits of either, just marveling at the incredibly different lives people live. For a long time I believed, and still do to a certain extent, that all people are basically the same. But the longer I stay here the more I observe how different the thinking and lives are. Experiencing this difference in the village, if only for 2 nights, was absolutely extraordinary. I have never spent time in someone’s home in such a tranquil, rural setting, with a refreshing absence of modernity, and had the chance (even though short) to see, with my own eyes, life in this way.