pt at large

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Splendid Beach Town - Papudo

Papudo, Chile
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Your first glimpse of Papudo’s beach is one of those, “Oh, now I see why the place is packed!” moments. The long crescent stretch of sand is a magnificent place to spend an afternoon. Hundreds of bathers stand in waist high water hoping to ride the foamy rollers onto the beach. They are not disappointed.

The squeals of kids when a big swell gets up a head of steam is the kind of quintessential beach noise that means you’re in the right place. This is the height of summer, school’s out and so are the day trippers from Valparaiso to Quillota. Beach umbrellas speckle the sand like so much confetti. From early afternoon until at least 8 PM, the sun pours it on. Why rush home?

Papudo feels a bit tonier than Maitencillo a bit farther down the coast.  A lovely church anchors the center of the town. A short walk from the beach, with a mini flea market on one edge, a well-tended grassy park with labeled specimens of trees that grow in the area. Pick your spot – shade and tranquility in the town square or the soft rumble of surf hitting the beach.  Way to go, Papudo!

 

 


 
 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Faces on Chilefarms

Faces on Chilefarms
January, 2011

These are people you're likely to meet on a visit to Susaan Straus and Ricardo Ceriani's Chilefarms...

 

Field workers Patricio and Juan Vila ham it up 
 

Caretaker Juanito brings horses from corral to barn every night,  Ricardo and mechanic Italo talk truck repair

 

Lunch on the porch overlooking the farm, Susaan can give you haircut after dessert

Master field general Don Pedro Biernay, who is a walking, talking Farmer's Almanac

Lunch at a great little empnada joint in Maitencillo

Juanito,  partner Senora Teresa, and grandson

 

The melon men from Señor Pampino's wholesale company

 

Susaan, pt, Ottonio, Lucy (the dogs have either appeared at Chilefarms or been adopted from the streets - and are immensely grateful and a source of joy to all)

Ricardo boarding his rodeo horses on the truck with Juanito
  

Juan Vila and Jose Pablo take a break from making brackets for irrigation lines. Jose Pablo asked pt if he wanted to try making the brackets - I passed the test, made a handful

Don Pedro the vigilant counter of melons that are pitched into the truck, Patricio who helped pick, sort, and pitch them into the truck

 
Mechanic Italo Apablasa makes an "assado" (barbecue), a three hour dinner with the mechanics, to celebrate pt's visit
 

 

Otonio, Ocito, Glenda...Glenda

 

 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Horse Sense

Chilefarms
January, 2011
Horsing around

Blacksmith arrives in his van fitted with drill presses and every tool he needs

 

to remove old horseshoes...

file down hooves...finish nailing in new horseshoes...

 

hammer new shoes to fit exactly

 
 Horses need daily cleaning and feeding

Ricardo's rodeo horse gets shampoo and rinse the day after his first place finish at rodeo in Papudo

 

Food from the corn field next the horse corral behind the farm 

A man and his horse... "Today I give him freedom," Ricardo says. No practice, no riding, just a well deserved rest after winning the rodeo the day before.

   

 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Maintenance and Repair

Chilefarms
January, 2011
Maintaining and repairing

An astonishing array of things in a two week period... and I didn't see everything.

 

Fix generators

Clean up the area
 

Trim bushes, clean out filters

Find the problem with the washing machine 
 

Make special saddle blankets for rodeo horses, repair the rivet in Ricardo's rodeo stirrup made of wood from orange tree

 

Replace the brakes on the truck

Water tomatoes, trim the ivy from front  porch

 

Trim foxtail bushes, and why doesn't the weed wacker start?

 

Recalibrate the computerized watering system at one of the two navel orange grove wells 

Weed control under the navel orange trees, double check the system.

2011 Dispatches from Chile: The fields

Chilefarms
January, 2011
Days in the fields

 
Fertilizing orange trees and new corn crop

Cutting down old corn, harvesting the new crop

Plowing rows for proper irrigating, stripping sheathing at bottom of new corn to promote growth and more ears of corn to grow on stalks

Picking and sorting melons into four sizes, keeping the tally

Hooking the fork lift to the tractor to hoist bins onto wholesaler's truck

Put the horse harness away until tomorrow morning

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Morning Glory in Nogales

Breathtaking. The fleeting minutes in which the earth revolves to let the sun play peek-a-boo over the Andes, first the glow of its aura, then hair, forehead, eyebrows, eyes, nose, lips, chin, and full faced gazillion-watted smile over the valley. A welcome caress of warmth now, later the wattage blazes, mediated by the onshore breeze making its way from the Pacific, thirty miles away.

Sit down, sip a cup of coffee atop this little cerillo. Dew glistens on everything. In a matter of twenty minutes, the leaves, morning glories, ivy, foxtail, grass, yucca plants do an aqueous strip tease, their dew disappearing into the atmosphere to return after sunset…the twenty minutes in which it takes the sun to yawn and lie down behind the coastal range produces the same breathtaking choreography, colors supersaturated, the valley’s plants gear up for a nocturnal ball.

You haven’t been invited, but, if you get outside early enough tomorrow morning, you will see that they’ve come back home, wet and beaming, ready to rest until evening.

Summer in Nogales, Chile, part of the breadbasket of the world, nothing like it…anywhere.

 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Chilean Rodeos - Real Cowboys

Rodeo in Papudo, Chile
Sunday, January 23, 2011

In addition to being a businessman, farm owner, painter, and very funny guy, Ricardo Ceriani, my host at Chilefarms, is an excellent horseman.  Yesterday, he participated in one of his first rodeos of the season, and WON! Primer Lugar. El Campeon.

The men that you see on horseback in movies are actors. The men who ride in Chilean rodeos are real cowboys.

I’ve learned the basics of Chilean rodeo from Ricardo and Susaan. The event has lots of moving parts, no pun intended. The best introduction I’ve found is below. The full link describes the complexity of form and scoring.

“The Chilean Rodeo is a paired team event whereby the members of the team have to take turns between driving and pinning positions. The objective of the sport is to show control in driving a steer to a given section on the half-moon arena (called “medialuna” in Spanish) wall where some part of the side of the bovine’s anatomy is pushed by the chest of the pinning horse until the steer is pinned to a standstill on the padded cushion that defines the Pinning Zone. The judged event establishes a score that is made up of points earned, minus points deducted for faults.”

The event demands stamina, endurance, and skill. We’re talking about nearly two tons of horses and riders plus one unpredictable steer in motion. One moment the pair may be at a full gallop with the steer, the next, depending on the x factor, the steer, they may be stalled and need to keep the animal between them along the edge of the media luna. In the fastest moments, the riders, horses and steer fly by in a blur.

Rodeos begin on Saturday. if you place well enough on an exacting point system (see link above), you return on Sunday for the finals.

Chilean rodeo horses have to meet certain standards of height, girth, hair, and skin. Ricardo knows the lineage of every horse in his stable. The man has loved horses since he was a kid growing up near here. He has no respect for competitors who abuse their horses if they suffer a loss in a rodeo. The ribbons pinned to the walls in his barn and farmhouse attest to the fact that you don’t have to scare your horse into performing well.

This year, Ricardo sought out a mentor, a man whose knowledge of horsemanship is well respected. Ricardo lights right up when he tells me what he's learning by watching Don Mario take his horse through his paces. Some day, a young cowboy will be asking Don Ricardo to show him how to handle his own horse.

There are weeks to go in the season. Yesterday was a good start.

The 'media luna' in Papudo, Chile, a few kilometers from the coast. (Photo top right) The steer enters the small ring in front of the grandstand through a chute and must be driven around that ring two and a half times. A gate is opened and the riders must drive the steer around the half circle (media luna) three times, maintaining contact with the steer at all times. Each time, they must pin the steer to a padded area at each end of the media luna. The fourth time they must drive the steer sucessfully through an exit gate. Teamwork and timing are essential.

Ricardo and his riding partner Fifo await their turn - and are first in the winner's procession, right behind the rodeo marshals, Los Capatazes.

After the procession, the tradition is to gallop around the media luna with the "Queens" of today's rodeo.

Photo opp with the Queens before given the prizes (Ricardo and Fifo each received a flat screen TV).

 

At the end of a long day, time to take home the awards.
 

 

 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Maitencillo, A Funky Beach Town

Maitencillo, Chile
A Seaside Beach Town
January 22, 2011

 

Maitencillo. Something for everyone here. Flea markets, upscale restaurants, great little beach bars for empanadas and a cold beer, a long sandy beach with the low rumble of surf that comes all the way from Asia. The little place is literally wedged between the steep hillside spilling down from the highway and the beach.

Chilean builders have figured out a way to erect an astonishing variety of homes on the steep hillsides that plunge straight down toward the stores on the beach. On one side of the road is the sea.  On the other is everything else.

By mid January, we’re heading for the height of summer. Chileans from as far as Santiago, 150 kilometers away, hit the beach. Families, groups of giddy teenagers, romantic pairs of every age, are getting their first taste of summer. The energy is high. The economy in Chile is hot, the middle class is growing, and they’re spending money. The restaurant patios are full, the prices jacked up (see our 13,000 CPS pizza – that’s $26!). The closer to the middle of Maitencillo, the more crowded the beaches, the more clogged the roads with new model VWs, Peugots, and KIAs. 

The flea markets are fabulous.  Hundreds of tiny stalls offer an eye-popping variety of goods. For $25, you could find a pair of earrings, necklace, scarf, and shawl for every woman on your list. The list goes on - games, toys, sandals, bathing suits, rings – this is a shopper’s paradise. The main reason men are here is because the women they’re with can’t resist the flea markets that bookend each end of town. Tagging along with my host Susaan, I am Exhibit A.

The people watching is fabulous. The views spectacular.  It’s a great tableau of Chileans at play.

  Homes cascade down from the hills to the beach below.

A tisket, a tasket, a green and yellow basket...

 
One flea market on the way into Maitencillo, another on the way out.

 
Make up for a $26 pizza by purchasing a $3 bracelet, pair of earring or a mind boggling assortment of mementoes.
 
 
A delight for photographers and volleyball players. The skinny ribbon of coastline between the coastal mountains and the sea stays shrouded in fog till the mighty sun dissipates it around 2 PM. Glorious sun follows, as do carloads of beach goers, who know that the next six hours will be full tilt sunshine.

 

Relax on the beach, or work up an appetite by shopping in a flea market...

spend a bundle, or a few bucks...no matter, you'll have a good time.

Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Cantaloupe by the Thousands

Several days in the cantaloupe field
Chilefarms, Nogales, Chile, V Region
January 20, 2011

You can almost hear the cantaloupe growing in the field at Chilefarms. Over 3800 were harvested on Tuesday. We’re a little past the halfway point of their short prolific growing season. By the time this month is over, nearly 10,000 melons might be picked. It’s hard to imagine that so many melons can sprout in this two-acre field.

What couldn’t grow around in this fertile valley? Brilliant sunshine bears down from a cobalt blue sky one cloudless day after another. A gentle offshore breeze from the Pacific hikes over the coastal range from the west every afternoon. Rich clay soil retains water efficiently. Temperatures range from the mid 80s every day to the low 60s every night after the sun sets at about 9 PM.

“It takes a long time to get to this point,” owner Ricardo Ceriani says. “The crop is planted in September. The field has to be irrigated, the furrows between rows of plants have to kept free of weeds and plowed every few days to keep it from baking so hard that water won’t seep into it when it’s irrigated.”

When I arrive on January 10, the harvesting just begun. It is labor intensive. By the time a cantaloupe is trucked off the farm, it will have been picked from the vine, stacked in small piles along the rows, picked up and loaded into wheelbarrows and carted to the edges of the field, sorted into four size categories, and packed aboard the wholesaler’s truck fire brigade style – tossed from one pair of hands to the next until deposited in the correct bin.

Don Pedro Biernay, pen and pad in his shirt pocket, keeps tally of everything that goes aboard the truck. Don Pedro lived on the land when Ricardo and Susaan Straus bought the land in 1995. He’s honest, an iron man in the fields, and could write his own farmer’s almanac.

He manages the corn, broccoli, cauliflower, alfalfa, cantaloupe and honeydew melon fields. In his late sixties, he owns the respect of Patricio and Juan Vila, men half his age, for his wisdom and tolerance for long stretches of backbreaking work. I’ve watched him make his way up and down long rows of cantaloupe, back bent, efficiently picking ripe fruit, for hours at a time. He and Patricio picked nearly 4000 melons under the hot sun on Tuesday… then helped cart them to the truck and sort them. If there were a John Henry Steel Driving Man legend in Chile, Don Pedro could match him for sheer endurance.

All the cantaloupe is trucked by Senor Pampino’s company to Vina del Mar, where it's sold. “They have the easy job,” Ricardo says. “We take the risks of the seasons and put five months into growing the fruit. It takes us months before we realize a profit, it takes Senor Pampino a few days.”

But Ricardo Ceriani has some of Don Pedro in him. Born in Quillota, 20 miles away, he has the business of farming in his blood. He knows the intricate, complex, often frustrating, orchestration with Chilean business practices. Chilefarms main crop is navel oranges for export, one of Chile’s most demandingly regulated export products. Over the past ten years, Ricardo and Susaan have learned some hard lessons about the bare knuckles business practices here.

Cantaloupe is easier to manage, a good cash crop, and as reliable a crop as you can find in this fertile valley. Up in the USA, we have no idea how much work goes into growing the beautiful artistically arranged fruits and vegetables that appear in our local supermarkets. I’ll never look at a cantaloupe again without thinking of the arduous process that started with the little seeds in Don Pedro’s hands.

 

Don Pedro and Patricio pick over 2000 cantaloupe one day...

 

Don Pedro and Juan Vila harvest nearly 4000 three days later.

 
The cantaloupe is hauled from the field, sorted, and pitched onto the truck.

The melons are sorted into four sizes: extra, primero, segundo, tercero, and cuarto - largest to smallest.

 

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Cerro Santa Lucia - Santiago's Oasis of Tranquility

Cerro Santa Lucia
Avenue Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins
Santiago, Chile
January 17, 2011

Cerro Santa Lucia is an oasis of tranquility in the midst of Santiago’s sprawling city of five million inhabitants. The buzz and snuff of traffic is replaced by the scent of greenery and baking earth as you climb the stairways carved out this rock outcropping near the center of the city.

It’s 69-meter height impressed conqueror of Chile Pedro de Valdivia enough so that it was here the founded Santiago for Spain in 1540. The native Mapuche Indians, unimpressed with its possibility to get a panoramic view they took for granted, called the place “the curse”.

In 1872, Santiago mayor Benjamin Vicuna Mackenna  used 150 slave prisoners to transform the forbidding area into a landscape retreat, carving stairways and plazas out of the unforgiving metamorphic rock. McKenna thought like an American Alfred Olmstead, using what nature gave him not as a problem but as a potential to glorify it.  McKenna’s tomb is in a small chapel within the cool confines of the hill.

Ornate arches and broad terraces grace the entrance to the retreat. Tiny lookout posts and mini terraces are sprinkled along the rocky, steep, narrow stairways that have been carved out of the rock.

Santa Lucia is a destination for families, school children, young lovers, residents, tourists, and backpackers from around the world. The view from the top is spectacular – the kind of place where a couple might hand a camera to a total stranger to shoot a photo of them smiling high above the city.

When I return to the entrance, a guard who’s noticed me taking photos and admiring the views asks me how I like Chile.

“Yo amo Chile, “ I answer.  He beckons me to another path.

“Here’s a really good place to take a photo,” he says in Spanish I understand. Then he points down the path –around the corner is the Centro de Exposición de Arte with vendors selling indigenous crafts, clothing, and jewelry from all over Chile - in a cave!

There are places in every big city where the combination of nature and human endeavor make this feel like a kinder and gentler world. Santa Lucia is one of them.

 

Admittance is free but you must sign in. You're about to ascend leafy paths and steep rocky stairways to a gorgeous viewing area.

A refreshment stand is a welcome sight at the Plaza de Pedro de Valdivia, where you can plan your climb to the very top.
 

Some people prefer the views below the summit - others click away en masse at the top. 
  
A welcome breeze and the sight of the mighty Andes is your reward. Relaxing at the bottom is fun, too.
 
 
I would never have found this cave and a great spot to photograph the founntain without the guidance of the guard in photo at the entrance.

This vendor was a virtuoso on the ocarina. I'm bringing home a few for souvenirs!

2011 Dispatches from Chile: A Blast of a Chilean Wedding

Olmue, Chile
January 15, 2011

A highlight of my annual January visit to Chile has been to witness the wedding of my host Ricardo Ceriani's son, Ricky. Ricky and his wife-to-be, CarmenGloria Diaz Allende, were determined to have a large, festive, wedding and reception. Recent college graduates working as biological researchers, with plans for future education in the works, they must each have minored in "Event Planning."

The entire wedding was a blast. The 8 PM service at the church in Olmue was presided over by, from what I could tell by the occasional roll of the eyes of the attendees, a very conservative, catechism-oriented, don't wait to have children, start your family as soon as you get home, grasp and act according to the vows and duties of marriage kind of sermon. Somewhere along the line, he didn’t dwell on the joys and rewards of a married life. No matter.

The 200 guests took it upon themselves to balance that rather dour start as soon as they reached the reception at about 9:30 PM. The Casa de Pelumpen is a terrific venue just outside of Olmue, with a wide patio, reflecting pool, and soft outdoor lighting. Servers circulated tray after tray of pisco sours with fresh strawberry, mango, and pineapple mixed with an alcoholic octane that elevated the festive mood several notches. Right behind every beverage tray came trays of tasty hors d'oeuvres, just enough to tide us over till dinner and relax us, not that that was much of a problem.

The arrival of the newlyweds an hour later ignited a round of jubilation and several million pixels of digital photography. Not long after their entrance, we were summoned to the huge dining room. A pool sized dance floor dominated the middle, the table of the wedding couple and family occupied the place of honor and was surrounded by assigned tables for the guests. A long table that could double as a runway for a small plane bordered the left side of the room. The four wedding cakes elegantly presented on four tiers as an exclamation point at the far end was a sign that this would become the dessert table.

Table 4 was one of the most fun places to be in the room. The Ceriani family loves to joke, tease and laugh. With Ricardo's sisters Uka and Erica and their husbands and his brother Nano and his wife from Montreal, there was never a dull moment. Susaan, Ricardo's nephew Cristian, and I were regaled by their joviality all night long. There is no language barrier when it comes to weddings. Toasts, greetings, hugs, applause at the right moments are universally understood. A smile crosses the language barrier with the speed of light.

The orchestration of the event was grand.  The sit down dinner began with a perfectly flavored serving of shrimp ceviche. Servers bearing white and red wine, juices, colas and carbonated water appeared and reappeared to make sure everyone's thirst was quenched. Just as the guests finished their appetizer, the disk jockey - not the annoying kind who sounds more like a sports announcer hollering 'Goaaaaaal!!!" but a guy who knows all he has to do is announce and the assembled crowd will fulfill their role - heralded the entry of the bride and groom - and another several million pixels of digital camera photos and enough camera flashes to light a Chinese New Year ensued.

The father of the bride offered a heartfelt toast to his daughter CarmenGloria and his new son-in-law, Ricardo's son Ricky. An impeccably served dinner followed - tenderloin of pork with white sauce, tenderloin of beef with brown sauce, julienned vegetables, half a red pepper filled with creamed spinach and a puff pastry filled with pureed mushroom. Wine, mineral water, coke, and mixed drinks were offered all night long.  Unseen behind a one-way mirror, the DJ played romantic 1980s music during dinner, American songs, well chosen and just the right volume for mood without drowning out conversation. The mood was in permanent festive gear – and the volume of the music…well, that would change.

Dinner plates were cleared. The dessert table, a veritable theme park for anyone with a sweet tooth, was opened. If the room were an ocean liner, it would have listed hard to starboard. A chocolate fountain anchored the center of the table. Guests bathed fresh strawberries in chocolate and piled custards, cakes, mousses onto plates. My eyes glazed over. The tempo of the evening was perfect. Just enough time to digest each section - the social hour, the dinner hour, the dessert hour - yes, if you're counting, we're already past midnight.

The guests rose as one to cheer when Ricky and CarmenGloria stepped out for the traditional wedding waltz at midnight. The couple was joined by family members who filtered onto the floor to waltz with each other. Eight beats after the stately waltz concluded, and BAM - an acoustic explosion. The lights were dimmed, the volume jacked up and the room was struck by Chilean lightning - the pulsing beat of cumbia.

It was as if the lifeguard at the beach blew a whistle that allowed everyone into the water. Splash!

Stellar sound system and the return of the disco era! One song segues seamlessly into the next. Once you're on the dance floor, you commit yourself - out there for as long as you can move. Men have long since doffed their suit jackets and loosened ties. Women have draped their elegant shawls on their chairs. Faces glisten.

Cumbia is executed with as many stylings as you can imagine. When a particularly popular song hits the airwaves, everyone who's taken a seat charges back to the dance floor. Arms pumping, perspiration dripping - aunties, uncles, teenagers, their parents, college kids, a roomful of partiers shout the choruses.

There are never fewer than 100 people on the dance floor. The tables are mostly empty, everyone is dancing except the lame and the halt. I am sweating, smiling, dancing with CarmenGloria’s grandmother,  CarmenGloria’s aunt, with CarmenGloria and women I've never seen before and may never see again... I love cumbia!

The music is still blasting at 2:30 AM when we head for the car. We’re leaving early by Chilean standards. Many of these celebrants will dance till 6 AM.

I am hoping that another of Ricardo's children get married next January.

 

RIcardo's niece Marcelita photographs entrance as we enter church.

  
Reception - Ricky and Susaan.A group of guests
 
 Ricardo jokes around with his nephew Cristian and enjoys the atmosphere at Table 4.

Marcelita, pt, and Nicole, another niece. CarmenGloria's grandmother and aunt.
 

A dessert table to die for... the wedding cakes.

A dance with CarmenGloria's grandmother and with CarmenGloria

  

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Time in a Bottle

2011 Dispatches from Chile: Time in a Bottle
ChileFarms, Nogales, Chile, Region V
January 13, 2011
When I first arrive at Chilefarms every January, it seems like I’ve entered life in the slow lane. Not true.

The concept of time is stretched out, pulled like a piece of taffy. At home, what needs to get done is usually completed within the hour or by the end of the day. Here on the farm, the jobs get done over time.

Being here is like living in a giant symphony. The four movements are the four seasons, and Mother Nature dictates the tempos. When she taps the podium with her baton, farmers pay attention. Cultivation, irrigation, fertilization, harvesting and replanting are done in cycles that seem slow to a visitor from abroad.

To a farmer who wants to succeed, they are relentless. There is no such thing as down time. Something always needs to be repaired, sharpened or maintained – tractors, trucks, wheelbarrows, hand tools, wells, and irrigation systems. Then there’s the matter of fertilizing and, in the case of the orange trees, pruning and spraying with insecticides.

There are specialists here. Don Pedro is in charge of the growing fields – the corn, alfalfa, cantaloupe, broccoli, cauliflower, and potatoes. Jose Pablo is in charge of the orange groves. Patricio and Juan Vila work with Jose Pablo and on occasion with Don Pedro. Caretakers Juanito and Senora Teresa live in a small house near the main barn.

My friends Ricardo Ceriani and his wife Susaan Straus, owners of these fifty acres called Chilefarms, live in the farmhouse atop a cerillo (little hill) that commands a view of much of their land. Dispatches from pt at large are written from my quarters in a lovely guest room with a spectacular view (photo above).

January in Boston is in the heart of winter. January in Nogales, Chile is nearing the heart of summer. Definitely a fine place for pt to be at large.

Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

 
 
A view of the farmhouse - and the driveway past orange groves to the main road.

Rubia, an exceptionally patient and strong mare, will pull the ancient iron plow through the melon fields today. The process uproots weeds,  plows fertilizer into the soil, and improves the irrigation channels that separate each row of plants.

José Pablo formulates a calcium mixture to spray on oranges that improves growth and thickens the skin of the fruit. The Chilean government rejects any fruit for export that has evidence of insects. Importers demand fruit that is without blemishes. The best an environmentally conscious farmer here can do is use chemicals with the least impact on the ecosystem.

There are no pesticides available in Chile that can kill the chonchito blanco, the bugs that infiltrate and spoil oranges, without also harming the beneficial insects, ladybugs and even possibly bees among them.

“The chemical companies keep their dangerous pesticides on the market where they can,” Susaan Straus says. Certain pesticides that are illegal in the US, might be the only alternative available in Chile.  Their agronomist, and perhaps all agronomists here, are not pro-active about introducing less toxic, more target specific pesticides.

Bottom line: if Susaan and Ricardo want to stay in business, they use the pesticides available on the market.

There are related problems in Florida:
http://www.wbur.org/npr/133048536/abandoned-orange-groves-produce-problems-in-florida

Don Pedro sharpening a blade in the barn, harvesting cantaloupe with Patricio. The wholesaler and his crew arrive later today, will truck away 1500 melons.

 

Roy Carrier Tribute: New Year's Day Bands, Opelousas, Louisiana

“A Tribute to Roy Carrier” (1947 - 2010)
A Fund Raiser To Rebuild Roy Carrier’s Offshore Lounge
At Slim’s Y Ki-Ki Lounge, Opelousas, Louisiana
Saturday, January 1, 2011

Partial List of Bands who played for free at the fund raiser. They came as an act of love for one of zydeco’s crown princes, the late Roy Carrier, who died in May 2010. Roy Carrier knew how to have a good time and he was intent on growing the zydeco community. He was a mentor and cheerleader to many aspiring musicians. He also owned Roy Carrier’s Offshore Lounge, Louisiana, which is in desperate need of repair.

The proceeds of today's dance will be a down payment on the project.

Lil’ D & the Zydeco Allstars (Dikki Du’s son).
Dexter Ardoin.
Horace Trahan & the Ossun Express
Corey Ledet Zydeco Band
Dikki Du & the Zydeco Krewe
Chubby Carrier/Earl Washboard Sally.
T Broussard & the Zydecdo Steppers.
Jeffery Broussard & the Creole Cowboys.
Lil’ Malcolm & the House Rockers.
Koray Broussard & Zydeco Unit.
Curley Taylor & Zydeco Trouble.
Plus The Soul Express Brass Band from New Orleans showed up around 6 pm and blew the crowd away with its funky trumpet trombone tuba percussion performance.

T Broussard, Horace Trahan

Corey Ledet and youngster who played the rub board all afternoon.
   

Chubby Carrier, Leroy Thomas


The next generation of zydeco players is having a great time - so did everyone else when a brass band from New Orleans played for one dynamite 30 minute set.
 

Horace Trahan, Rodney Bernard (Horace's father in law) pt; Rodney's son, the band's drummer, pt, Rodney 

Roy Carrier Tribute: New Year's Day Dancers, Opelousas, Louisiana

“A Tribute to Roy Carrier” (1947 - 2010)
A Fund Raiser To Rebuild Roy Carrier’s Offshore Lounge
At Slim’s Y Ki-Ki Lounge, Opelousas, Louisiana
Saturday, January 1, 2011

Cajun and Zydeco dancers from the east coast to the west coast and everywhere in between homed in on Louisiana from New Orleans to Lafayette and its surrounding towns for days of dancing and celebrating right up to New Year's Day.

These people, and the bands that power the music, seem to have no limits on endurance. The dancers might collapse for a few days when they get back home but while they're within a drive of a bandstand, they're pounding it out on the dance floor. The bands might play two or three gigs a day and they make it sound fresh every time they hit the stage.

The proceeds of today's love fest of a dance will help Roy Carrier's family rebuild Roy Carrier's Offshore Lounge.

 

Top left -this whole group partied together for days, top right at right, Dick Brainard, who helped organize the event - Dick's a long time friend of Troy Carrier.

 

The dance floor was full from 2 PM until around midnight.
 

pt and friend, mother and daughter (R)
 

Dick Brainard (L), and a group from Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut on a rare break (R).
 
 
Clifton and Mona Broussard (top L) were King and Queen of Opelousas First Friday in November, 2010
 
Dancers take a breather as day turns to night, others stay inside and party...
 
so does pt!

Roy Carrier Tribute: New Year's Day, Opelousas, Louisiana

“A Tribute to Roy Carrier” (1947 - 2010)
A Fund Raiser To Rebuild Roy Carrier’s Offshore Lounge
At Slim’s Y Ki-Ki Lounge, Opelousas, Louisiana
Saturday, January 1, 2011
http://www.roycarrier.com/biography.htm

The 14th Annual Carrier Family New Year's Celebration, this year subtitled “Keeping Roy’s Dream Alive,” was a high-octane event fueled by a dozen of the best zydeco bands (fairly complete list below) in the country.

The timing was perfect. Dancers from Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston, Austin, Madison, San Francisco, Nashville, Birmingham, Portland and beyond had come to Louisiana to welcome the New Year in a staggering amount of venues from New Orleans to Opelousas. Hundreds of them wanted to come to Opelousas to put an exclamation mark on several days of dancing.

They came as an act of love for one of zydeco’s crown princes, the late Roy Carrier, who died in May 2010. Roy Carrier knew how to have a good time and he was intent on growing the zydeco community. He was a mentor and cheerleader to many aspiring musicians. He also owned Roy Carrier’s Offshore Lounge, Louisiana, which is in desperate need of repair.

They know the members of the bands, their songs, and their histories. Many women I dance with softly sing the lyrics of their favorite songs as we dance. Dick Brainard of Vancouver, a friend of Troy Carrier, convinced him to organize this tribute concert today, New Year's Day, while hundreds of dancers who knew Troy's father Roy, were still in Louisiana. That's the way it worked.

“Keeping Roy’s Dream Alive” was a fundraiser Roy Carrier’s family, led by his son Troy “Dikki Du” Carrier, organized to raise money to repair and refurbish Roy’s legendary dance hall in nearby Lawtell, Louisiana.

Family members took the stage between acts to thank patrons for showing up. They exhorted us to buy Roy’s CDs, commemorative T-shirts, and posters piled up on a table near the door. We did.

Every band played for free. Roy Carrier was one of their own. In this part of the country, you don’t turn down a friend in need.

Dancing began at 2:00 PM. I arrived at 2:45 PM. I left at 9:30 PM.  I don’t remember sitting down. I do remember eating a huge bowl of red beans and rice. In southwest Louisiana, if there’s a dance, there’s food. It might be sold inside, it might be sold on a truck or a stand outside the premises. It will be home cooked. It will be good.

There was a box for donations at the food table. After paying $4 or $5 for gumbo or red beans and rice or jambalaya, people dropped fives, tens, and twenties into the box to help Roy’s family rebuild his rickety dance hall.

Dancers I talked to today say Roy’s Offshore Lounge really could use an upgrade. The biggest complaint, especially from women, was acknowledged several times by Troy Carrier - “Fix the bathrooms!”

Dancers’ descriptions of the flimsy interior of Roy’s Offshore Lounge underscored the fact dancers went there because they loved Roy more than his dance hall. From all accounts, it sounded like the place would collapse in a huff and a puff of a Louisiana thunderstorm.

A woman from Connecticut commented on her first visit. “I stepped out of the car and went up to my calfs in muck… totaled my brand new dance boots.”

Music is a tough business, even in Louisiana where it’s a way of life. Many musicians have day jobs to make sure the mortgage gets paid and the groceries bought. Roy worked on an oil rig offshore and played his music in his “offshore” lounge when he got home.

Roy’s sons Troy and Chubby are in the music business. They believe that if they get Roy’s Offshore Lounge up to modern building code, the dancers will show up again. It will be hard – but it would be harder to walk away from a father’s dream.

In a thank you speech to a hundreds of dancers who kept pouring into Slim’s Yi Ki-Ki all day long, Roy’s daughter recalled his favorite saying: “What you gonna do with a man like that?”

Answer: Rebuild his dance hall.

Partial List of Bands –

Lil’ D & the Zydeco Allstars (Dikki Du’s son).
Dexter Ardoin.
Horace Trahan & the Ossun Express
Corey Ledet Zydeco Band
Dikki Du & the Zydeco Krewe
Chubby Carrier/Earl Washboard Sally.
T Broussard & the Zydecdo Steppers.
Jeffrey Broussard & the Creole Cowboys.
Lil’ Malcolm & the House Rockers.
Koray Broussard & Zydeco Unit.
Curley Taylor & Zydeco Trouble.
Plus a Brass Band from the French Quarter showed up around 6 pm and blew the crowd away with its funky trumpet trombone tuba percussion performance.

A  few of the bands

 

 


 
 

New Year's Eve: Cajun Country Style

New Year's Eve
Vermilionville in Lafayette, Louisiana
December 31, 2010

New Year’s Eve. Geno Delafose and French Rockin’ Boogie. Vermilionville.

Those three phrases won't mean much to the average human being. To a zydeco dancer, they are a trinity that transcends time and space, creates a joyous zone in which the outside world, all of it, simply vanishes for three hours, replaced by a joie de vivre incomparable on this planet.

On most days of the year, the big  ol’ barn-like building in which the dance is held is part of Vermilionville, a historic village in Lafayette, Louisiana, that recreates Cajun life between 1765 and 1890 – eighteen structures, six restored homes, and costumed interpreters demonstrating traditional crafts. Tonight Cajun and Creole music radiates, transcends, and transforms the barn.

A pilgrim discovers the Holy Grail. A seeker pulls Excalibur from its stony base. A dancer enters a fourth dimension in which energy is generated by swiveling hips, fancy footwork, spontaneous stylings, and goofy grins that don’t stop till well after midnight.

I have fallen in love half a dozen times. Every dance ends with a hug, some with a kiss. I have danced so seamlessly with several women that I’ve felt their DNA.

William Blake has written:
“To see the world in a grain of sand,
and to see heaven in a wild flower,
hold infinity in the palm of your hands,
and eternity in an hour.”

I have held infinity in my arms and tasted eternity tonight. And I wasn’t the only one.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Geno and The French Rockin' Boogie love to play...and dancers pack every centimeter of the floor.
 

 
By midnight, we've raised the rafters in the old barn...and welcomed in a new year!

Photos by Paul A.Tamburello, Jr.