Free Labor
23 April 2006
Late winter and early spring time is a great time to visit Hawaii.
Winter on the mainland is usually starting to get a little tedious, the
perfect time to go visit the beach in Hawaii. There is definitely
a surge in the local population this time of year. We've had
plenty of visitors this spring too. Since February, we've had
more days with visitors than without. It's been great. We
love all the company. That's one of the benefits of living in a place
like Hawaii, people are usually happy to come visit.
If you plan to visit the Big Island, please come on by for a
visit. We're always happy to make time for a quick farm tour if
nothing else. But be warned, we definitely have a habit of trying
to get our visitors to help out around the farm. Even if it's not
harvest season, there is still always plenty of work that needs to get
done.
I felt like Tom Sawyer when I convinced Tom, Silvia, Emily and Matthew
to help pick up rocks. We managed to finish the two worst rows
before the rain got too heavy. It may seem like a menial work but
it was actually quite helpful. The rocks are really rough on my
mower so removing them helps reduce the amount of mower repair
required. Additionally, having a ready supply of loose rocks
comes in very handy when doing things like filling sink holes, fixing
driveway pot holes or building rock walls.
Another favorite trick of ours is to get visitors to help stir the
drying coffee. After pulping, the wet coffee is put out in the
sun to dry. It's important to stir the coffee continuously so it
dries evenly and doesn't get moldy. Compared to stirring all that
coffee alone, having a group of people to help stir makes the chore
relatively painless.
Fertilizing is one of the messier chores that requires some serious
physical exertion. So far I've only managed to convince my
brother and father to help with the fertilizing. If I hired out
the job, it would cost me a couple hundred dollars. But shhhh,
don't tell them, they did it for free.
My Uncle Les actually volunteered to come out for two weeks just to help
with the barn construction. Building the barn has been taking a
lot of my time recently. Not many people enjoy digging foundations
or pouring concrete but building a
rock wall turns out to be not so bad, at least for the first hour or
so. The barn wall facing the driveway is actually built out of
concrete block but it has a rock wall veneer. I used the tractor
to make a pile of rocks (the same ones that had been previously pulled
out of the field) and I mixed the cement but I actually built very
little of that wall. Somehow, between all our visitors, the rock
wall seems to have built itself. Thanks everyone! It looks great!
So remember, if you're ever on the Big Island you should feel free to
schedule a farm visit into your itinerary. We promise we won't
work you too hard.
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