 |
| The view wasn't bad! (the dog was useless) |
Back in the summer of 2012 I had my first true taste of Czech life, when I spent 2 weeks staying with a family on a small farm in the north of Moravia, in a small town named Hanušovice. It was a memorable couple of weeks, during which I learnt a great deal about Czech life and even more about the Czech language.
What is Wwoofing?
For those who haven't heard of it before, Wwoofing is an organisation which places people on organic farms around Europe, with the farmers providing accommodation, food and the chance to explore another country, in return for some help on their farm. For me it was a great way to improve my spoken Czech after a year in France and Spain, as well as an opportunity to experience Czech life on a more intimate level.
It's fair to say that I approached the stay with a fair amount of trepidation, it is rather out of character for me to randomly set off for a farm in the middle of nowhere to stay with people I'd never met before, but with hindsight, I couldn't have been more pleased with the way it turned out, and that is mainly down to the family I stayed with. What's more, I was luckily not facing this by myself as I was accompanied on the farm with my friend and fellow Czech enthusiast, Lorna.
The Family
 |
| The family minus Dad who was taking the photo |
Four children, a pipe smoking father and a mother who once worked for US president Gerald Ford were to be our family for the two weeks, and what a brilliant family they were. At times I felt like I was living with the Waltons, as the house and their way of life was very rustic and back-to-the-earth, but it was frankly refreshing to be away from the technology obsessed, merry round go round that is normal life in the UK. Even if if I was missing the Olympics...
What really made an impression on me was the maturity of the children and their incredible knowledge of the land. The eldest, Honzík (Jan), could herd cattle and tell poisonous mushrooms from non-poisonous mushrooms. Ten years his senior, I felt completely ill equipped for life in the real countryside (I no longer consider my childhood in Lincolnshire to be a real country upbringing) and honestly slightly guilty at my lack of knowledge of even basic things, such the names of flowers or which berries you can eat.
 |
| Looking for mushrooms! |
Lack of berry knowledge aside, the family were extremely warm and welcoming making our stay very enjoyable. Marketa, the mother of the family, could speak English to us due to her time spent in the States, but as she was unfortunately taken ill the day we arrived, we spent the initial few days having to use our classroom Czech pretty much all the time. This turned out to the be the best thing that ever happened to my spoken ability, as the necessity to speak it just in order to communicate meant that I improved much more than I ever imagined.
What we did
Day to day I was generally asked to help cut the grass, as they had a fair amount of land which needed looking after. It wasn't the most exciting of jobs, and I'm not exactly a man of the land, but it was hardly a strenuous task and we had lots of free time to explore our surroundings. Sometimes for lunch we would go
u babičky and sample the always copious amounts of food grandma kindly offered us.
 |
| Dinner |
The grandparents usually employed the British tactic of shouting loudly at the foreigners in the hope that we'd understand, and generally we got by okay. During one visit, my friend Lorna was horrified to discover that the hutches of rabbits weren't just kept there to look cute, but could well have just featured in our lunch. I obviously laughed and played the '
you're in the countryside now, love' card, but I was as surprised as she was in truth.
When we weren't helping out on the farm, the family were kind enough to take us on many outings, during which we saw much of the beauty present in the Moravian region of the Czech Republic.
Jan insisted we went to to see a deserted bunker (there were collective sighs from the rest of the family, this was clearly a regular trip), and we spent a lot of time in the surrounding towns including
Šumperk which was the nearest we got to civilisation. On these trips we were considered part of the family and felt integrated within the community even though we were there for such a short time.
 |
| Jan and Marion on a day out |
What I learnt
The goal of spending time on a farm in the Czech Republic was to improve my spoken language in preparation for my final year of university, and in that respect, it was a success. But what I took from my time in Hanušovice was so much more than that.
I learnt that if you take a chance, and push yourself out of your comfort zone, really good experiences can be had. I also gained an insight into a different way of life, and whilst I would not choose to give up my wifi and 3G, I realised that we have perhaps become complacent when it comes to our natural surroundings and we could all take time to appreciate it's importance and beauty.
I would thoroughly recommend wwoofing to anybody who is thinking about giving it a shot, be it during a university summer or as a career break or holiday. It is a really interesting and different experience and what's more it's free! Visit
www.wwoof.org.uk/ for more information.
