We get there eventually

Frederiks looking all fluffy. He looks like he is going to be a
good fleece producer, at least in quantity.

Well here I am again posting a late blog. The reasons for yesterdays non-post was an unplanned journey to the outskirts of Riga, but I need to back up a bit to explain how that came about. We had offered to take in a refugee family for a few days sometime over the summer, only time was ticking on and nothing had got organised. Finally I was given a contact and arrangements made. A friend of ours was in Riga and she kindly agreed to bring them, since she had a seven seater car. The refugee family came on the Sunday evening and I cooked an evening meal and we tried to chat as much as we were able, with their limited English and our non-existent Arabic. Still we managed, thanks to  some laughter and gestures and in part to the wonderful world of the internet and Google voice recognition Only in part though, how Google translate arrived at "Batman wallpaper" for one attempt, we have no idea.

Feeding dandelion leaves to Brencis

I had agreed to borrow our friend's car for a couple of days to ferry the family about and then she agreed to take them back on the Tuesday evening; so the next day I picked the family up from our apartment where they were staying and brought them out to see our alpacas. The family from Syria consisted of a man, his wife, their seven year old son, their six year old daughter with cerebral palsy and their little ten month old baby girl born in Turkey. The wife was a little nervous of the animals, even the cat and so was her son at first, but gradually he became bolder and was hunting for dandelion leaves to feed the alpacas. Our alpaca love the dandelions and they are far too abundant, so that works well.

It's a bit worrying as all the alpacas are eating all day, that
is usually a sign that autumnal weather is on its way. They
don't really need to eat all day, well the boys don't, they are
getting podgy

It was a bit tricky to know what to do when it was hard to chat with them, but we were managing. After lunch I got the young lad to help me dig potatoes and he counted them in English as he found them. He then helped me pick beans and carrots. The next job was to wash the carrots and potatoes. We had a bucketful of potatoes but I only asked him to wash six of them, he didn't stop there though he carried on. In the end I had to get a stool for him to sit down on, so he could finish them off. A good little worker anyway and I won't have to wash any potatoes for a week. We still had a few hours to kill and so I rang to see if we could go to the nearby camp because I knew they had some playground equipment there. The folks at the camp have adopted a little chap and very soon he and the young Syrian boy were playing around with each other like good friends.

Even the youngsters seem to sense the changing season,
when they are not dealing with irritating itches

The six year old girl was getting rather tired and started crying. She loved the trampoline earlier when her brother and the little local lad were bouncing around on it, so I took her back on. She calmed down and seemed to enjoy the bouncing and then eventually fell asleep in the middle of the trampoline. I covered her up and let her sleep, especially as the sun had finally made an appearance and it had now warmed up enough to snooze in the sun. Her mum joined us at one point and once the little girl had woken up, mum started bouncing. She loved it and she joined in with her son and his young friend. I was just getting ready to gather everyone together to go back to the farm to eat when the father tried to explain they had to go back because they had forgotten to pack one of the medications for the little six year old. The explanation was not quite clear and I wasn't sure what they intended so we had to ring to get an Arabic translator. The refugee centre must have a rota for translators and so they organised a translator to phone me.

The mulch on the roadway into the barn has built up over
the years and was creating a problem in heavy rain with
water running into the barn. The ditch was not working either,
so Ian did a little remodelling and scraped away the hump

Firstly the translator thanked me on behalf of the family as they had really appreciated our hospitality but then explained they had to go back for this medication, otherwise they feared that she would get more and more upset without it. They also explained they had a doctor's appointment the next day - something had obviously not been explained when we agreed to take them. Something to be expected when there is a communication problem. Anyway it meant that instead of going back to eat, I had to drive them back into Riga to the refugee centre. They have an invitation to come back again if they want to and we shall see if they do. I think they genuinely enjoyed the time here and certainly the little boy did. Both he and the Latvian lad were nearly in tears when it was time to go. At least I was able to tell the young chap what a super friend he had been and could thank him in Latvian.

A more level roadway with a depression before it gets to the
barn to lead the water away into the forest

Mr. P has still been to see his ladies this week, but came back
a little green. A good sign for us, but Chanel went back to
being compliant, so may not be pregnant after all

So how about the rest of the week? As I mentioned last week we got two new cockerels and last Monday night we put each one in a separate ark with his own bunch of females. When we let them out in the morning, one immediately stamped his authority and got his ladies in order. The second one turned out to be too timid and the girls spotted his weakness and picked on him. Eventually we decided that we had to put him in with the chicks, despite being three times their size. He seems a lot more content there, but he hasn't got the hang of going away by himself yet. I have had to catch him each night to put him in the box. The other one just follows his ladies inside, thank goodness.

Slowly filling up again

Other fairly mundane jobs were also done, such as trying to catch up with the weeding, sorting out peas and beans after the storms, cutting alpaca toe nails (a job long overdue), strimming and flail mowing grass (Ian's job not mine, I can't handle that sort of equipment, I'm too small and not strong enough). Ian also sorted out the well again, this time he was able to pump the water out without stirring up the mud. It is a relief to see the well filling up at a much better rate of around 80 litres a day and certainly enough to keep the animals watered and much better than the 7 litres a day we were getting, so that is progress.

George also looks cuddly, just not as much fleece as
Frederiks

We were also showing visitors around, but like buses, you don't see any for a while and then they all turn up at once. Two cars drove on with a family group. Apparently some of them had been before, but not when I have been around. As they were standing around a car drove past and then reversed back. The visitors who turned up earlier had a short discussion with new group and we ended up taking the groups around together. It worked and everyone seemed happy enough.

Chanel is also munching a lot

Not our first visit to Gančauskas because the tent and the
climbing tower hadn't been built in those days

One of the highlights of the week though was re-visting our past. In 2000 we made our first visit to Latvia to teach English in a camp near Sigulda and within a couple of years really felt like God was calling us here, but the timing was not right. It wasn't until 2008 we actually moved to Latvia, but the roots of that move were definitely in those camps. This year the camp celebrated its 20th anniversary and held a party for those connected to the camps over the years, so we decided to join in. It was well organised with plenty of time to meet others and reconnect, it was just a shame we couldn't really spend longer there but had to return to put the animals away. One of our favourite moments was sitting in the chapel that had been revamped over the years, but they still had space for the swallows to fly in and out. Somethings change and somethings don't.

Gančauskas in the early days

Gančauskas today. Compare the cars here to the ones below

The barn with the chapel entrance

The chapel entrance today

The campfire then

and now! It was good to see the lady in charge again, she always
wore a white sunhat

We met up with this young lass again, she
now lives in Spain

And reconnected with this young lady
too, all the way from Canada. It was
her family that started off the camps
and have put a lot of hard physical work
into it too.

Also the young chaps in the blue t-shirt and front row red t-shirt
were also there. A little older now of course, but so are we. 

Good times

Our attempt at a Latvian style hay rick. Not too bad for our
first time

It has been a busy week this week, still hot and humid with lots of thunderstorms too which has added to the mix making planning work on the garden interesting. My young helper left on Tuesday and we had great fun chatting about faith and gardens, squishing caterpillars and building our first hay rick on Latvian style wood supports. There is so much that can be learnt from the garden which relates to faith, such as the necessity to remove those things which maybe good in themselves and yet inhibit the growth of other things which could be developed, a useful lesson to learn in a busy life. Anyway she did not leave empty handed and took with her bags of carrots, lettuces, beetroot and beans and pots of marjoram, sage, mint, lemon balm and chives to start her own indoor garden. My young helper is very concerned about the way tea plantation workers are treated in many places and since fair trade tea is not readily available here in Latvia she decided that growing her own herbs to make teas in the winter would be a better option. I love it when the younger generation get passionate about justice and she is hoping to get a website up and running soon to voice her passion, so as soon as it is set up I shall pass on the website address.

Gančauskas 2002. This building was originally a KGB
place, can't remember if it was for training or for holidays

This week was an important milestone for us as it is 10 years since we first visited Latvia. This was the start of our journey that took us to Denmark, America and finally to live in Latvia. Our Latvian experience started at Gančauskas camp where we travelled to this last Thursday to meet some friends of ours from our old church in the UK. They had come to help out at an English camp for young Latvians wanting to improve their English, just as we had done all those years ago. Normally when we visit our friends in camp we only manage to snatch some conversations as they travel between activities and so it was great to be able to sit around in the staff kitchen drinking tea and chatting away during some free time. It was also an important milestone for some of our friends who have lead the teams to Gancauskas for many years as it was their last year, time for them to move on too!

Our indoor mini forest of sweetcorn. It
is now around 3m high, only another
metre to hit the roof!

We had a visit from Simon Bell who I first contacted after finding papers he had written for a PhD on how Latvians feel about their countryside. Very few academic papers are written on Latvia in English, I found out whilst doing my studies, and to find a paper written by someone with an English sounding name was very exciting and I wondered what connection he had to Latvia. An internet search lead to his website and I contacted him. I was surprised to get a response and we met up last year at his holiday home in Latvia and chatted about forestry which is his main area of expertise, PhD's and life in Latvia. This week he and his wife paid us a visit and we went for a walk in the forest, or rather Ian and Simon went for a brisk hike through and his wife and I wandered through at a more sedate pace. What we did glean from the walk though was an outline management plan and it confirmed to us the trees we need to keep and those that need to go, we also found out the most common tree in our forest, alder a pioneer species, does not live very long before getting diseased and dying and so it wasn't a problem to get rid of it and let in some light to other more valuable species like spruces, oaks, maples and birches. At least we feel much more confident with our approach to managing the forest. By the way getting rid of many of the alders is not a major problem as there are still lots of the other trees too.

A ginormous mushroom, possibly a cep and edible but we
didn't try it.

I still managed to keep up with some of the internet feeds that I keep an eye on for the sake of my studies and it was great to read that in Brazil they managed to pass a major anti-corruption bill that bans anyone convicted of a serious crime from standing for office for 8 years. I have been to Brazil three times and I have sat in one of the states government buildings and I know from those times the way corruption weaves itself into the life of Brazil and so this is a major major breakthrough. Even more amazing is that 1.5 million people signed a petition to get the bill through the governmental processes despite the fact that 147 out of 513 members of the lower house and 21 of the 81 senators will be affected by this law and not able to stand at the next election. This is a huge victory for democracy and for people power and I really pray that Brazil can go from strength to strength as they clean up not just their governance but also their society at large.

Meet Fred! I found him (or her) in the cabbage patch and
thought I would keep him as he is huge, rather than squish
him like his numerous cousins. I was wondering though
if he is edible!

Another article was the way that Haiti's peasant farmers have said no to Monsanto "aid" and yes to local native seeds. Monsanto have seemingly generously offered 400 tonnes of seeds of which 60 tonnes have already been delivered. The Haitian farmers though have realised that this will then lock them into future purchases of seed as the local native seed will be ousted and not grown. Reduction in native varieties of seeds puts farmers in greater danger of pests and diseases. Greater variability of seeds developed for the various environments is the ideal situation for a healthy vibrant seed bank, and not reliance on expensive herbicide dependant seeds from a major international conglomerate.

The oddest cucumber we have ever grown, looks rather like
a duck we think

The Latvian fireservice have had a major boost this last week too with news that the US army corps of engineers are to fund developments in many fire stations. Amazingly they will actually pay for local companies to be employed to do the work so that they are not only improving the safety of communities but boosting the local economy too. Wish many missionary organisations would take note too, instead of well meaning goods being shipped from long distances which are not always useful if the goods need repairs which cannot be accessed locally and sending folks to work on projects when people here need jobs to boost much deflated wages. The funds are being made available to fit roll top doors to fit the new larger fire engines which have been funded by the EU, so many of the fire engines in service at the moment are ancient looking beasts that look like they came out of the ark, rugged four wheeled drive but ancient looking nonetheless (must get a picture of our local fire engine). Our own local village fire station was offered a newer engine by a German twin town and it makes me wonder if it will be too big for the little place, I guess I will have to wait and see.

Our neighbours are rather generous, these are the second
gift of zucchini we have had this week. The first lot there
were three of them. Good job we have a freezer and a
food drier

These strange contraptions are the internal structures of
the Latvian hay ricks that Ian made ready for the grass he
cut the other day.

Ian is on a roll with the two-wheeled tractor and spent a
whole day cutting this steep, pig roughened, bank 

And while Ian was making hay ricks I was carting stones to
build up this bank. Our second pond is still emptying fast
which gave me a chance to get lower down to add more rock.
Good job as that night it absolutely lashed it down and now
the pond is full again and staying full for the time being.