Having studied the environment for the past decade, I had yet to experience hands-on farming practice. Last summer, with my graduation looming in early July, I started to think about how I wanted to celebrate, so I made a thorough check list:
- travel
- travel to Italy
- travel to Rome
- eat delicious Italian food
- practice Italian
- stay for the rest of summer
- spend little to no money
A seemingly impossible task thanks to the final bullet point, but I had heard whispers of WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) from friends and classmates about working on an organic farm in almost any country around the world for free and in return, meals and accommodation were provided by your host. Many of the WWOOF stories I heard sounded like Stephen King novels: hosts not providing enough food for the woofers so they were constantly hungry, hosts treating woofers like slaves, hosts shoving all the woofers into one small tent to share, no running water…you get the gist.
Of course, it wasn’t all bad stories, and I trusted my years of experience identifying psycho/socio-paths in online platforms (looking at you myspace) to not lead me astray..or murdered, chopped up and buried in an Italian farm or in a cellar:
I started my search a month or so before my graduation and of course only looked in Italy because 1) no one knows cibo buono (great food) like Italiani, 2) after studying abroad in Rome in my undergrad (enough digging into my blog’s past will show you those incredible times), I have a spot in my heart for Roma that will never disappear, and 3) Duolingo is not enough to keep mio Italiano up to snuff.
After paying the €35 annual membership fee with WWOOF Italia, I began searching throughout all different regions and messaging hosts that could provide accommodation, vegetarian food, and were somewhat near a major city.
Things to include in your message to hosts:
- Short Bio — let hosts get to know you! Anything from your nationality, your age, your school experience if it’s related, languages spoken, favorite hobbies/activities, and dietary restrictions are all things hosts want to know.
- Why you want to WWOOF — Are you hoping to farm yourself? Have your own garden? Teach about farming/gardening in a school/camp/etc.? Or do you just want a month to get your hands dirty? Whatever the reasoning, let them know so they can best accommodate you and your expectations.
- How long you would like to stay — For many hosts, if it’s less than two weeks, there’s no point. They are not a free place for you to crash in between partying in cities and it’s not worth them teaching you the ropes one week and then you’re gone the next.
- Describe your date availability — If you are very strict on what days you can work, make sure to add that in the message. If you’re very flexible and can work whenever they are free, let them know.
After messaging about 20 different hosts, over half never responded, 5 were booked up, and 3 would happily have me (contingent on their dates). Good thing since I had already booked the flight after graduation to Milano! #risktaker
Funnily enough, the first farm I would be staying at would be in Roma, meaning I had to catch a night bus from Milano to Roma. I traveled with FlixBus which was cheap, convenient, and had extra amenities like WiFi and a toilet. I almost had a panic attack when I was waiting for over an hour for the night bus, alone, at the Milano airport late at night. When the bus finally pulled up, I asked the driver in Italian why he was late, he responded by speedily shouting Italian sprinkled with curse words. Welcome to Italy.
After spending the day touring around Roma and enjoying all my favorite spots (Parco del Gianicolo, Piazza Santa Maria, Piazza Trilussa, gelato, gelato, and more gelato).
I walked back to the train station and hopped the train to meet my host, Filippo, who runs an organic, macrobiotic farm with his family in Velletri (about an hour train ride from Termini train station in Roma), accompanied by Jim-Bo aka JB aka Jelly Bean who was another woofer from France who had been there for a year. Oh and of course, lest I forget, the furry friends.
I won’t go into the gritty details, but the schedule was very consistent: every morning starting work at 8 a.m., working until before noon, family lunch, nap/siesta/adventure time in the afternoon (also the hottest time of day), evening work from 5 – 9 pm, family dinner and if we were feeling rambunctious, some late night outings/parties with gli Italiani:
Every host is different and I found that many of them are willing to let you have a day off once every week or two, or will even offer to drive you to the nearest station if you wanted to go on an outing to a nearby town. Don’t forget to document the excursions!
Necessary Precautions:
- I was told this advice too late in the game, but I highly recommend avoiding any WWOOF host that mentions a Bed & Breakfast. The work ends up being entirely revolved around the B&B (i.e. – preparing for breakfast, cleaning up the breakfast area, stripping beds, cleaning rooms, etc.) and little to no work on a farm. Unfortunately, this happened to me and every day I thought, “I don’t want to be doing this.” Learn from my mistakes, do the research, and ask your host the necessary questions before committing to WWOOF.
- Going off tip #1, have a back-up plan. If you don’t get along with your host, the work is too much to handle or is not what you wanted, have an e̶s̶c̶a̶p̶e̶ fallback: whether that be a mini-vacation, couch-surfing in a nearby city, staying with a friend of a friend of friend, whatever it is, make sure you have it as a safety net (along with extra cash in case you need to pay for travel/accommodation).
- Ask in advance. Many hosts get requests at least 4-5 months before the season (spring/summer/fall being the most necessary times for help and summer being the busiest). Many hosts also have WWOOF-ers come back annually so get to searching and messaging during the winter.
- Be prepared to work. It’s not called back-breaking labor for nothing: tilling the soil, planting each seed, harvesting the produce, lifting and carrying the produce baskets is just the basics of the hourly work. Shape up or ship out.
- La dolce vita! Life is sweet, enjoy it! (And don’t forget to pack bug spray..!)
This was my first time traveling alone, and my first time traveling anywhere for an extended period of time and what an incredible journey of self-growth it was. Take my advice to heart since I did have a negative experience staying at one of the ‘farms’ (it was a B&B), and luckily I was able to get out early, thanks to sheer luck and great timing. Overall though, I don’t think I can quite articulate how at peace I felt during my WWOOF experience. It was a detox from social media, unnecessary worries that plague us during work and stressful situations, and from the constant noise of city-life. It was also a way to reconnect with the land and finding meaning and gratitude in our food, and all of the tireless work it takes to produce the food for us to then consume (and enjoy) it. I am not a devout person, but there was something so simple and spiritual about being surrounded by life in all of its cycles. I have so much gratitude to the families and farmers that host us wandering travelers, inviting us into their homes, joining them for family meals, and teaching us about their culture and way of life.
WWOOF is all over the world, so don’t feel the need to only experience Italy. In fact, don’t feel the need to WWOOF at all if it doesn’t sound right for you, but do push yourself to try something new and experience new adventures.
X,
B
Special shout outs: Grazie mille Filippo e la tua famiglia! Josh, you literally saved me from that B&B and I will forever take pictures of you for your Instagram as a thank you for the rescue mission.
Brianna Sommer 