Mystic Twig could not have been a better place to finish up my farming work. Though I have worked quite hard here, it has also been full of self-reflection, exploration and the start of a deeper understanding of the world and my place in it. I know, I know...it's so hippy! Peace, Love and Understanding everyone!
It is so funny that a place that can incite such personal transformation can also be the same place that I've had the most encounters with things that could kill me. Like legitimately destroy me...I'm not even over exaggerating.
1) Snakes - Those sneaky chicken-eating pythons...
The other night we waited a little too late before we locked up the chickens safely and the resident python (Let's call him Mr. Bitey) had already snuck into the chicken pen and set up shop about 1 foot away from a chicken.
Literally one foot away.
The chicken was practically being made into a club sandwich while it slept. Actually I don't even think it was asleep, I just think it was being stupid.
Anyways, Rico (the farmer) is actually quite scared of snakes so even though he has one of those giant poles that strangles the snake from afar, he still needed me to come into the chicken pen and hold the flashlight for him. Yeah...trapped in the chicken pen with a 4ft hungry python!
Everything was going just fine (well as fine as you can be standing in a dark chicken pen while trying to get a little noose around a python...) when all of a sudden another chicken just seemed to spontaneously realize there was a giant snake in its vicinity and blasted itself off of the roost and into my face. Literally, with a loud "BBRRRAAAACKK" it hit me in the face.
For a brief moment I completely lost visual on the snake (which is terrifying) and all I saw was...
Rico was so focused on the snake that he didn't even realize a chicken flew by him and hit me in the face...also I was too worried about losing my view of the snake that I didn't even flinch as a chicken bounced off of me.
All in all, we got the snake out of the chicken pen and ended up abandoning it by throwing the snake-catching pole (with the snake still all wrapped around it) into the middle of the grass and running away.
2) Leeches
You know, if someone were to ask me one of the perks of living on land my answer would be, hands down - no leeches.
Alas, leave it to Australia to develop some sort of supernatural land leeches.
This hippy farm is crawling with land leeches...or as I call them, Tube Vampires. You find them crawling half way up your leg and wonder how long they have been on your body. Rico once told me he had one "go internal" and they wanted to surgery it out. GO INTERNAL!? I'm going to pretend that means one crawled up his nose.
Anyways these are real vampires, they totally like suck you blood and stuff but I'd like to see over-sexed teenagers and under-sexed housewives run screaming for the Tube Vampire.
I guess the Tube Vampire probably couldn't kill me...unless there was like a million of them...gross.
3) Ticks
Yep, I found a tick in my underwear the second day I was here. Enough said.
I honestly cannot even think of a picture and a witty comment to accompany this point without crossing so many, many lines.
4) Spiders
Remember I wrote a posting about the biggest spider I had ever seen ever? Well, that was a complete crap post. There is a spider that lives in the window of my caravan right now that is the size of my face.
I thought I was getting over my fear of spiders. I mean there is SO MANY of them everywhere...and ever since Bastiaan left I'd had to become and man and stuff and get rid of my own spiders from the caravan. But the other day when Rico and I were cleaning out the shed he picked up a flat piece of wood with a m***er f***ing huge-ass spider and I actually screamed - causing him to freak out and launch the piece of wood across the lawn because he though there was a snake like clinging to the side of it or something...what a team! Also, I don't think snakes can just stick to stuff...like I've never seen a snake half way up a wall or anything...
5) Like every single plant
Ok the plants can't actually kill me, there are no giant venus fly traps capable of consuming an unsuspecting human, but everything in this tropical jungle will cause you some sort of pain.
What can't bite you, will spike you. And I'm not talking some pussy blackberry bush kinda thorns...
"Ouch! Woe is me, some little spike doth scraped my supple baby-soft hands as I gather some delicious blackberry fruit"
NOPE. This is more like...
"F&$%in F&#$! That evil shrub of death and destruction just used its inch long spikes to perhaps scar me for life! WHY? why do you produce such beautiful flowers to lure me in then rain barbed spikes into my body...Oh god there is so much blood....the blood is everywhere...oh wait, shit, that's a leech"
SO, Mystic Twig has definitely been an interesting time for me. Aside from the above-mentioned, this place has been an amazing experience. It was completely different from the chicken farm, but equally as rewarding and full of memories I will have forever.
I cannot believe my farming adventure is coming to a close. Time has absolutely flown by and though my body is pretty much at a state of disintegration, my mind has never been so awakened to the world around me and all of its possibilities.
I feel so lucky to have been the places I'd been and met the people I've met. My experiences will have a lasting affect on my life...and I have a feeling that this little adventure is really only the beginning.
Elise
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