Serrania de Ronda

I am in the oil mill. A brisk wind is blowing. This morning I've planted rows of beans and attempted a bit of cleaning. I am far away from everything.

My two hardy amigas have come here to the Serrania de Ronda with me from the Sierra de Aracena. So far we have survived slivers from chestnut shells, heavy weeding of completely overgrown onion and leek patches, lectures on "el Universo" and the Cosmos and directions on how to live our lives, according to our hostess in Cortegana, in the Sierra de Aracena. We have dealt with lost parakeets on the Triana bridge in Sevilla and failed attempts to find friends with whom to stay in the city after our hosts strong hints that we look for other WWOOFing (basically kicked us out).

Now we are high in the mountains near Ronda, with semi-tropical things growing around us despite the cold. I am in danger of losing myself to a different life, here. It is dirty, but most of that is tolerable.

Dehlia, me and her guitar shared the backseat with a sack of flour, potatoes, various large sausages that kept sliding behind my neck, jars of beans, 2 flats of beer, and other supplies that have to be stocked up on due to the remoteness.
It isn't the first time I've travelled on winding mountain roads with a driver holding an open can of beer in one hand (in the pouring rain this time, hoping the car could pass some muddy spots, and one spot where the river was nearly flowing over the "bridge"). The old white Mercedes didn't have much suspension left, and in the last few of the 50 km from Ronda, we lost the exhaust system completely; it was lying on the road behind us.

Born in Czechoslovakia, Homayoun has lived in various other countries including Afghanistan for several years, where he did medical work and converted from Catholicism to Islam. When he picked us up he was wearing his skullcap. Long hair (and more than a few wrinkles after all this time) belies his hippy years in the 70s as a tour bus operator. There was one bus that he filled with people and drove from Amsterdam to New Delhi. He is a German citizen, but has lived in Spain already for 30 years, if I remember correctly.

Homayoun told me the house was 1000 years old. I have my doubts that the actual house is, but apparently this property had Arab owners back in the days when they were still in Andalucia, which is more than 600 years ago. Probably some part of it is, and there have been very old tools found here. On the property there are peacocks, pomegranates, avocadoes, persimmons, mandarin and regular oranges, and a large crop of olives which we will be picking, and other fantastic things that I have forgotten or haven't gotten to explaining yet. He has had a grant from the government to replant trees on the property after a fire 15 years ago. He survives on very little, and uses everything carefully, though his huge table is stocked with various bowls of fruit, fresh baked bread, walnuts (from the tree, that we help crack), jars of preserves, chilli peppers in his own vinegar, all to be self-served at any time.

We don't use electricity if we can distinguish a black from a white thread. That also indicates what time we should get up in the morning. After dark there is a fire in the main house and a lantern attached to the bottle of butane. There is nothing else to do in the dark in the middle of nowhere, and when you have a mixture of guys from Germany, Italy and Scotland, with a guitar and flute and drums, what you do is hang out for hours around the table, grab a fork and tap on the various ash trays, the plates, knock walnuts together, grab a grubby salt shaker, and join in. Homayoun grows "Maria" (marijuana) which is available in what seems like unlimited supply to his very happy workers. The guys sing a lot of reggae with their own words - whatever happens to pop into their minds, it seems. Sadie joins in with background vocals. Dehlia and me do rhythm with every possible thing available.

Also here is a German woman with her baby of 9 months. She worked on the property years ago and has remained a friend of Homayoun, and has now come for a break from the rest of her family.

This morning Homayoun and Uli made bread in the wood burning oven in one of the several outbuildings. The oven fit more than 10 loaves, and was sealed with freshly mixed mud from a bucket, to keep the heat in. Dehlia helped removed the bread, spraying it with water as it came out.

The washroom is an out building which does contain toilets, of both the western and eastern kind. They flush only with a bucket of water poured down. There are some ornate metal Middle Eastern or Indian jugs for washing your left hand. There is almost no soap on the property. We have managed to find a few pieces, but in the kitchen, you just scrub things. Much of the day not a lot of light enters, though there is a skylight in the kitchen, so you can't really see the dirt. As far as oil, which gets on your hands when you cut yourself a piece of bread and paint it with olive oil using a paintbrush attached to the lid of a jar of oil (pressed on the property), and eat it without a plate... well, you can't really wash it off your hands so you just rub it in... hands, face; it's good for the skin.

The only real trouble is the bed. Dehlia (23, from Barcelona, and the only other person I have ever met who goes around singing Jose Merce songs, and is also able to do decent enough palmas for me to dance a Rondenas - I am in the area!) sleeps on the single bunk above. I share with Sadie (48, from Lyon, France, a lab technician of the type that tests your blood, and also our comic relief...with several years training in being a "clown" - more like expressing yourself with comedy, not the traditional one with a red nose). Today we gave the mattress some good beatings, and shook out the blankets which undoubtedly have not been washed for a while (this is not a hostel). Last night Sadie and I shared the bare mattress with several blankets over us. We had no pillows, and the wind came in a missing window in our door, covered by only a screen. Our room is really cute though - whitewash with bare wood - a sort of loft with a slanting wooden walkway up to it.

Here are more photos:

We are 10 km from Genalguacil.