happy days!

Hello hello!
Oh boy, much has occurred in the last couple of weeks. In the last post you found me laboring hard on the farm of the Huenchuñir family. Tht was an enriching experience, and helped me think a lot of things through and lose some weight, and really get a genuine experience of a tiny rural area in Chile, but after 3 weeks, I was missing people my age, community, abundant fruit, etc. Fortunately, I found all these things in glorious abundance at my next stop, Parcelita del Espino, a farm in Cauquenes. The climate changed a lot: it´s a much dryer, semi-desert zone with tons of wine production. The farm where I was was the rural estate of the aunt of Manu, the leader of Espino, a huge area with sheep, turkeys, a vineyard with neglected 100-year old grape vines, tons of membrillo trees (pear-apples sort of), and tunas (cactus with a spiny fruit that tastes like honeydew on the inside). The atmosphere of work was much more relaxed. I was there with Ruben, an antisocial anarchist type who specialty is dirty jokes, and Manu´s aunt Cecilia, a crazy, fun 40-something strong woman who ran the farm for years all by herself before Manu and the permaculturists starting helping.
Basically, the week consisted of harvesting endless super sweet grapes, making wine pressed by hand, and playing tons of music over the weekend because they had a get-together and invited tons of friends who play music of all sorts. It was then that I met Javier and Daniela, aka el Quiltro y Charangüilla, a young couple who have dedicated themselves to immersion in the folk traditions of Chile, singing in poetic décimas, improvising, and visiting old musicians before they die and their traditions are lost. We hit it off right away and they invited me to play banjo and Irish tunes at a folk festival they´re holding tomorrow night in their home city of Rancagua, an hour south of Santiago. So here I am now, staying in their house in downtown, playing guitar, banjo, flute, guitarrón, charango, drums, and drnking tons of maté and fine chilean wines. Needless to say, life is good. The festival should be great. I´ll update soon to let you know how it goes. For now, things are great. On to Valparaíso in a few days to meet of with Federico at a occupued anarchist house and make plans for permaculture and activism.
Hasta el próximo episodio!!