Maglehammering

So our efforts to write consistently have tumbled, but less than a week before our return, there are many things to recount.

Our time in rural Sweden, where we were until the last Sunday in June, can best be characterized as improbable, hilarious and shockingly rural. Shocking, not because we were so far from urban life that our hearts stopped; rather, we became strangely implicated into a very different, but important, sort of community. Let's explain.

We stayed in a town called Maglehem, population about 60 (exponentially greater in sheep and cattle). Despite the months of hype we collaboratively generated in our minds about "the farm," we performed very little farm work. On the local road all there can be seen are rows and rows of crops -- there are probably about a dozen farms within walking distance, but we weren't at one. In fact, besides planting three herb patches and wearing work gloves our WWOOF activities were more concerned with local manicuring and chore time than agriculture. Our host Magnus is a gourmet chef, B&B co-owner, father, guitarist, accountant, and graphic designer -- so mostly our job was to keep up with him.

Our first couple of days were expectedly routinized, and (though physically intense) rather satisfying. We painted about 35 pieces of wooden furniture, weeded a giant overgrown slab of earth,and moved some sharp giant hedges from place to place. To counter the bruised fingers and sunburns, we were served four meals a day, provided with creaky little bicycles and given access to stunningly calm and silent local beaches. At first, there was some talk about a music festival, and since we weren't at all sure what a multi-genre festival in the country could mean, we just kind of went with it.

After assembling a sad little circus tent to cover the main stage and preparing about a hundred onions (among other, friendlier vegetables), it was announced that we, along with two other hilarious volunteers and amazing humans from NY, were the responsible food vendors of the event. For the next three days our food tent, which was adjacent to the main stage, was inundated with hungry swedes from breakfast till midnight. We manned as many sausages, beers, veggie stews and coffee cups as possible. There was a lot of "english, please" and "potato salad with that?" but for the most part people seemed more focused on eating than on the foreigners feeding them and were, consequently, quite friendly. (Exceptions include a couple of famously awful town drunks and some fellow obsessed with Alabama who had, well, a lot to say.)

After the event we were given two days of relaxation, which involved a very long bicycle tour of the countryside, a post-solstice trip to Ale's Stones (considered Sweden's equivalent to Stonehenge), and a walk through Malmo. The week that followed, while heavily detailed and often hilarious, was devoted to improving the site of the B&B, which is in a bit of disrepair. To sum up, imagine us wielding chainsaws, wheelbarrows, hoes and rakes all at once. Yes.

While we'll think of Magnus, his space and his 100% sausage-fed- super-volatile-wooden axe-throwing-4-year-old son, what we'll miss most about Maglehem is its rolling green loveliness.