On turning 26...farm-style.

As many of you were aware, I turned 26 last week on October 5th. Now if you were to ask me 5 years ago where I would be on my 26th birthday (or frankly, asked me last year) I'm pretty sure I would have NEVER guessed that I would be on a farm in New South Wales, Australia surrounded by chickens....yet there I was.

On the morning of my birthday I got up at the regular time (7:30am) and wandered out to eat my breakfast before Farmer Mark gave us the daily jobs. As I sat there, on my 26th birthday, eating my vegemite on toast (for my unknowing Canadian friends, vegemite is a lovely salty yeast paste), I honestly did not think that my day would be too hard. It's my freakin birthday! That must earn me some chill-axing time.

Well I was very, very wrong. That morning Farmer Mark gave us the one job that I was so sure I would not have to do during my stay at the farm. This job always kinda existed as a possibility for a horrible day sometime in the future, but I did not think it was in my future.

Not only was it apparently in my future...but it was on my birthday.

The job - to literally scrape and dig about a half a foot of chicken shit out of a coup that used to hold last year's baby chicks. And this was no small chicken coup.

Remember how cute these chicks were:

Well when it's your birthday and you are digging out and piling up so much chicken crap that it is creating a chicken crap mountain of smelly awfulness...those cute little chicks really lose their appeal.

About half way through the morning, Farmer Mark drove by on his quad bike.

Farmer Mark: "HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!"
Me (standing on chicken crap about to dig out more chicken crap, also beginning to get covered in chicken crap): "Thanks!"
Farmer Mark: "HA! I guess this won't be a birthday you will forget!"
Me: "No, no I don't think I'll ever forget this birthday."

It took us all morning to scrape out all that chicken crap. By lunchtime I don't think I could feel my arms and I wanted to punch a chicken in the face.



But the next evening (when it was my birthday in Canada), Farmer Mark's wife made me an amazing birthday dinner, followed by a birthday pavlova (it even had candles in it!). And on Saturday the guys gave me my birthday present...


































And (of course) a tiny chicken toy so that I may always take a chicken with me wherever I go!

(if you can't see, Johnny's t-shirt says "London, Paris, Rome, Merriwa, New York")


All in all, it was a very unique birthday, and not one I'll soon forget.


Elise