Departure and Arrival?

So I started off this morning, very early mind you, and thought I couldn't be more prepared. So far though I've gone through 2 mini freak-outs about forgotten items, 1 broken camera (you will notice the lack of pictures because of this), 1 friend with lost luggage and 1 delayed flight... but 14 hours later I am HERE! No more flights to catch for me, at least for a few weeks that is.

Aside from the rough time actually getting here, the place is BEAUTIFUL and the restaurant in the airport, I think it was the Hungry Horse(?) makes a mean jerked anything sandwich. :) I'm pretty sure you all would be jealous of me right now, as I type this entry with the sounds of the ocean outside the screen door. Seriously, the deck outside the door is right on the beach. I want to type more but the mosquitoes are really all over and I am beyond jet lagged!

(First day in the water is tomorrow! I'll have to let you know how that goes...)

Who stays at home on a Saturday morning?-Farmer’s Market (June 18th, 2011)

As usual, I went for my run Saturday morning at 7AM and was running through town-square till I bumped into the townspeople setting up farmstands, carts full of soaps, candles, vegetables, clothes, hats, shoes, meats, cheeses, and many other goods. As a class, we were not expected to be at the market till 9ish, but I was surprised by how many people were already out buying their week’s worth of groceries. There was a strong sense of community as I watched buyers and sellers greet each other with hugs as they were buying their groceries. The farmer’s market offered an intimate relationship between the town. I overheard a farmer talk to his usual customer about how he had a special batch of jelly made and brought it up to market just because his customer had shared a liking for that jelly once upon a time in the market.
As a class, we met Dr. Healy and Dr. Haggblom at the farmer’s market a few hours later. We split into groups and went out shopping. Below are pictures from today.
Later on that night, we went out for dinner as a group. Some of us tried escargot (snails) for the first time. Dr. Max claims that it is a good excuse to eat delicious garlic, butter, and parsley. I dipped my bread into the sauce and it was delicious indeed!



Farmer's Market Goods

Dinner!

Religion+Science=Great Cheese?! (June 17th, 2011)

Today we visited the Abbaye of Citeaux, which is actually a working monastery. There were about 10 brothers of this monastery, and they sustained themselves by making Citeaux cheese at their “factory”. The milk that went into making the cheese came from their own herd of Montbeliarde cattle (the brown and white cows) of this region. Ironically, they artificially inseminate their cows with prize bull semen based on the prized DNA sequence from this bull. I was flabbergasted with the amount of science that each of the monks knew and how heavily they incorporated science into their work. The philosophy that was central to monastic life is that hard work and worship. So in a way, science was part of making the work possible, and the combination of religion and science was working well since the French people love the Citeaux cheese. After eating the aged Citeaux cheese, I fully agree based on my taste buds.
After the milk is gathered from the cows, the cheese is made in a series of steps. We were lucky enough to be invited INSIDE the actual cheesemaking factory itself! They take a big risk in cheese fermentation by allowing any outside flora to enter the factory, so I really appreciate this privilege. Anyhow, back to the cheesemaking….The cows are milked in the morning, the milk is then heated to a higher and lower temperatures as two starter cultures of LAB (lactic acid bacteria) cultured exclusively in a BL3 facility (for maximum care) are added into the milk to outcompete any pathogenic bacteria. After the starter cultures, the rennet is added to the milk to coagulate the curd. This curd is then cut many times and pressed over so that the whey drains out. After the whey drains out, the curd is salted and pressed into molds. The molds are then stored and washed daily in separate, isolated room of the factory as they age. After production, the machines and the factory utensils are washed thoroughly. Each brother of the monastery helps out in each of the cheese-making steps and the whole production is made by a community.

The Montbeliarde Cows:

Cheesemaking

Regarding Landscape Architecture

Landscape Architecture, may very well be something you have never heard of,
or worse, something you associate with mowing lawns. Landscape Architecture
is a discipline, that, as one of my professors would describe it, as an exploration
in space. Space, in the way that we shape the space around us and we define the feeling
you experience as you interact with it. Now thats a bit esoteric and "spacey" in and of itself.
So really, landscape architects deal with problems on varying scales, from the private residence to large scale city planning and even to regional redevopment. And we deal with problems like sustainability, environmental footprint, storm water management, horticulture, construction detailing, project management and countless other things.
As Landscape Architects, it is important that we see as many works as possible to familiarize ourselves with different solutions to problems as they present themselves. By seeing as many parks, city scapes, and natural areas, we become better acquianted with how things work, and more importantly what actually works and what doesn't.
By knowing these things we are better conditioned to making spaces that people will be able use and enjoy while at the same
time contributing to the local ecology.
This trip to Germany is very important in that it provides me with the opportunity to see things that I would never would have had otherwise. To see a place and people that are different from those that I see on a regular basis. And ultimately to further my design education.

The Abbey of Citeaux

The fourth day of our excursion in Burgundy was an intense seven hour day of microbiology in our little lecture room at the hostel. So, seeing as how most people who may be reading this aren't microbiologists, I'll spare you that whole bit and go straight to the next day, which was our trip to the monastery of Citeaux. The monastery of Citeaux is an ancient monastery that used to be quite respected in its heyday, even receiving royal visitors. Now it is a high tech cheese producing facility that is still operated by the monks of Citeaux who take an oath of chastity, poverty, and humility. As we toured the cheese making facility we met some of the monks, but they didn't attempt to talk to us at all, which made us wonder if they weren't allowed to, or if they just didn't speak English.

After seeing the inner workings of the cheese factory, we went outside and got to the real beginning of the cheese, the milk. We walked into a large barn that housed in the area of a hundred cows that were feeding when we arrived. The cows were all the same type of cow, the Montbelier, which over time has proven to the brothers of Citeaux to make the best milk for making their cheese. We met the herdsman in charge of the monastery's herd and learned all about the life cycle of one of these Montbelier cows. While they were at the monastery they each produced around 30 kilos of milk per day for cheese production, and those who didn't were sold into surrounding herds. Those who got to be too old were sold for meat, which seems to be the fate of every cow in the area at the end of their lives. I thought this was very interesting, but at least they don't waste anything, right?

Professor Max

Brother Rafael on the left translating, and the herdsman in the center explaining the role of their herd in cheesemaking.

When we left the herd we explored the more scenic parts of the monastery and had a picnic on the grounds, which was even better than the last picnic we had two days before (which previously was the best picnic I've ever attended). After lunch and a nap under some of the trees at the abbey we took a guided tour of the older buildings like the library and dormitory which had been reconstructed. The life of a monk was quite dull, and still is in this modern age. They wake up at 3am, study old texts, pray, make cheese, have lunch, pray, work some more, pray, and then it's bedtime by 8 o'clock. I know that there's no way I could do that day in and day out, but some of the brothers didn't join the monastery until they were about 40 years old! I find that incredible because they had to have experienced modern life, and willingly giving yourself to something like a life of chastity, poverty, and humility after that is unheard of.

Again we found ourselves driving through the countryside on the way to another cheese tasting, life is just so difficult these days... haha. The next fromagerie, or cheese factory was much more modern and had been designed with tourists in mind. The whole cheese production area could be viewed from the large glass windows that give you a great view of the cheesemaking in action. Also, this fromagerie had a video explaining the various parts of the cheese making process in French, English, and German. I find it interesting that here in France agritourism is a huge part of their business, just as it is in the US. Today was the most hands-on day with cheese making that we've had so far and it was very interesting to see the cheese making process come to life in front of me.

Our cheese tasting

The way home was filled with chateaux and beautiful terroirs that we were almost too tired to appreciate! Imagine that! Hahah, but there's no time for sleep here in Cluny, were about to go hit the town in what is sure to be another exciting night. À bientot mes amis!

Singapore is like home

This week so far has been pretty ordinary and therefore deserves recognition.

By this I mean, now when I wake up every morning I am not startled by the heat, I nod my head in recognition to the security guard for our apartment, I don’t notice curious eyes watching me on the train, I’m becoming more familiar with my lab…

It is like I used to wake up and say “Wow I am in Singapore today” and now I just wake up. I do not mean this to imply that I am ungrateful for my opportunity or that I am bored of the country. Rather, that this country is feeling like home.

There are some parts of this like home (Singapore) that I do like. Most mornings outside my window there is a bird, about the size of a crow, covered in goldenrod feathers, that makes a melodious whistle chirp.

Occasionally, I will find a land snail too. I watched one yesterday for about five minutes, I think it was eating ants and personally I feel like it wasn’t moving all that slow.

Last Sunday, walking home from church, I was excited because I thought I found a large sea shell on the grass (the big spirally ones that are always broken at the beach). When I picked it up, it was a giant snail! No lie, the size of your thumb to your pinky finger!

We also have geckos. Our first gecko in the apartment I named Scottsdale (previously Elias named a gecko Winfield, so now I feel that all geckos should have very proper names) but Scottsdale moved out. Then yesterday, I found a new buddy about two inches big. He wiggled under the counter when I tried to catch him. I think these geckos are nocturnal because they have almost translucent skin.

I am glad that Singapore is a like home. In addition to my unique research experience, I wanted this trip to serve as a test run for real life. I am away from home, am working full time, am supporting myself (with help from Rutgers, thank you so much again), and am responsible for figuring out what to do with myself when I am off work.

The reason why Singapore is a like home and not my actual home (ahem the United States of America, god bless) is because of some of the things Singapore lacks.

This past Sunday after a hike in the rainforest, Dibyo mentioned how it would be nice to have a slice of pizza. Like a disease, the thought infected the entire group. PIZZA! I’ve never had a desire to have pizza back home-but that Sunday I needed to have pizza. We scoped out the entire strip of restaurants near the nature preserve and disappointedly settled for Indian food (it was delicious, but it was not pizza).

The next day, Elias and I were grocery shopping at the mall (the malls here have complete grocery stores) and we found a place that served pizza!! We ordered a $13 pie for the both of us. Unfortunately, the waiter lied to us because the $13 pie was not meant for more than one person-or maybe not meant for more than one American. So after eating there we went to Burger King for fries (we did that with extreme pride).

The following day I made spaghetti and poured Prego tomato sauce on top. It was so delicious; I can’t even begin to explain it. The sauce was no where near what my mom makes at home- but the taste was so familiar and different than everything I had eaten for the past two weeks. Its also one of the cheapest things I can eat here (6 meals of spaghetti costs me $0.80 and I bought a big jar of sauce for $3.50-they were on sale =] ) so I will be having that more often.

This week, I’ve also had a little bit of reverse culture shock. A friend at work asked me if I go out a drink a lot and then said “It would be interesting to see how you dance.” One of our apartment mates (French Masters student, born in Columbia, who speaks fluent English, French, and Spanish, conversant in Italian, and is so excited to be taking Chinese classes-yeah I like her a lot) said that when she heard she would be living with Americans she expected that we would be partying every night. Now, I got the moves-but how different are they than Singaporean moves? I guess there is a stereotype that Americans are just party revelers (GRE word-I’ve been studying instead of partying).

Two people gave me the inkling that Americans like to party. But, two other Singaporeans gave a little old state university in New Jersey- maybe you have heard of it? Rutgers -some serious ups. One person said she recognized the name from all the research articles that she has read. The other was really excited. “Rutgers! Isn’t that an Ivy League school?” It settles it for me, Rutgers has some serious science clout as its prestige has carried its name all the way to Singapore.

The weekend will be rolling in soon-they are always very busy but extremely exciting. We are planning to go to an island offshore from Singapore that is a little less developed to get some more nature time in.

From like home to home with love
=]

Pretoria June 11-16th

“This is all nothing but miserable stammering. I do not know what Africa is really saying to me, but it speaks.” –C G Jung, in a letter to his wife in 1920

My first week showed me just how true that is. The first week was spent at a wonderful guest house in Pretoria, called Kniff un Gaffel (if you ever go to Pretoria, stay there!). The owners there are marvelous; every meal is eaten together like a family so you meet everyone staying there. Ron, the owner's son, even took some of us out to a local square and taught us sokkie. Sokkie is a social ballroom dance that most people learn growing up; it's called sokkie, meaning “sock” in Afrikaans, because it is done in socks. It was a much different scene than something you'd see at a bar in the US. A lot of the music was familiar except for a few songs; those unfamiliar tunes seemed patriotic. The first night I was there, Steffi, who became a good friend, decided to make Shakira’s Waka Waka (the African version) our theme song for the next three weeks. The next day the rest of the girls arrived and our 22 day adventure began.

We were a group of thirteen girls: ten from the US, one from Canada, and two from Trinidad and Tobago. We met our guides Morne and Jaco (Ya-ku) and first laid eyes on, Jezebel, our bus; we had our first dinner and started to get to know each other. Our first day brought us to the University of Pretoria and the Onderstepoort campus, which is home to the only veterinary school in South Africa. The university was very impressive, and the vet school had amazing facilities. Unfortunately, it is a seven year program; once I found that out, I immediately changed my mind on applying there.

The next few days were spent with Community Led Animal Welfare (CLAW), an organization that provides free healthcare for animals and helps to educate their owners. We went to a township called Lawley, where there are one-room homes with metal walls held together by rocks and tires; broken glass shined on the ground where people walked barefoot. When the news spread that we were there every family paid a visit with their animals; we dewormed almost every animal we encountered, and ended up taking orphaned puppies home. It was hard to see some of the dogs because of their conditions--emaciation, tick-bite fever, etc., but in Africa, animals are viewed as protection not pets. Many dogs are given poisoned meat by intruders, and ticks are allowed to grow to the size of dimes; puppies and kittens were plentiful and regrettably, most will die because their owners cannot afford to feed them. Our second day with CLAW, we went to a school to spend time with children; they learn Afrikaans as their first language and English as their second. The school had no electricity or heat, and it does get cold during the winter months; it would never meet the standards of an educational facility in the US. The children loved it there and enjoyed singing songs about the days of the week and the months of a year, listening to music, dancing, running around and playing games; they were okay with where they were and made the best of it. The children were fascinated by cameras and loved to get their pictures taken. When we said goodbye, I wondered when the last time they had eaten anything was.

Back at the guest house, our 7 am breakfasts and 7 pm dinners were consumed with gusto. Our last breakfast at the guest house was a bit interesting though, we were served eggs and fish sticks; even our guides were a bit confused.

We loaded up Jezebel and set off toward Horseback Africa where we would get the chance to play with some lions! When we arrived we were given a second breakfast with the rundown of the facility; it is home to lions of all ages, and there are plans of introducing disease free lions into game ranches. Kruger Park’s lions have Feline AIDS and Tuberculosis which impede on the lion population. We went on a walk with some of the 7 month old cubs where we got to hold their tails and watch them play. They wrestled and climbed trees as if they were rowdy cubs in a Disney movie. We were warned of the “McDonald look” that they give when sizing up a target; their eyes get big and round and they stare hard. Apparently, a bop on the head is enough to tell them no, but if a lion's looking at me like its next meal, I’m not so sure that defense would even cross my mind. After the walk we migrated to a big enclosure where the rest of the older lions were and watched them tear apart pieces of a carcass. Next, we observed 12 week old cubs; we gave them belly rubs and played with sticks while their lunch was being prepared. They each received a bowl with milk and meat to help transition their bellies into growing up. At one point the runt was being bullied and ended up sharing his food--poor little guy. Finally, the cutest of them all, at 3 weeks old! There were two, a boy and a girl; I liked to call them Simba and Nala :). We bottle fed them and burped them and rubbed their bellies until they were bored. When you gave them their bottle they would reach up and try to grab your arm, it was adorable.

Back onto the bus we went, filled with giggles from all the adorable-ness we just experienced. We were on our way to Imbambala in the Loskop Nature Reserve. First, we had to stop at a food store to stock up on breakfast goods for the weekend; this is where the trip went sour. A half an hour passed while in Groblersdal and when we returned to the bus we found a broken window. Our bus was broken into and things were stolen. Out of 13 backpacks, 3 were gone. Since we were moving out of the guest house we had everything in our bags: journals, childhood friends, cameras with pictures, money, credit cards. By the end of our police report we found that the thief had taken over $6,000 worth of personal belongings between the electronics, medications, and documents (yes, two passports). The guides told us to leave our things so that we were not targets in the store, little did we realize that the bus (a giant safari bus) was to be left unsupervised, a target in itself. It was a long and emotional bus ride to Imbambala with cardboard over the broken window. Africa lost a bit of its charm.

Going from Paris to Aix en Provence

In my first entry, I mentioned that I was on a TGV train heading from Paris to Aix en Provence. These super fast trains are a huge improvement to the slower train system that stood previously. It is most comparable to the Acela train that runs from Washington D.C. to Boston. However, this system is much more extensive. The TGV interconnects with the still existing slower rail lines to allow most travellers to reach almost any French town or city. It goes further and allows the traveller to go internationally by rail to places such as Brussels, Berlin, and all the way to Moscow. The rider can arrive up to the leaving of the train to the station and get aboard to go anywhere. I know from my experience that I much prefer this method of travel to flying. Sit back, relax, and watch the view go by.

I arrived in Aix en Provence which now has a beautiful new station that was built in 2001 with the extension of the TGV system. Unfortunately, as I found out the hard way, the station is 13 kilometers away from the center of town where my hotel was located. Unfortunately for me, I found out that the French labeling in this particular station is not very good, and I was lost on how to get to the center of town without walking quite a distance. Lucky for me, and I say that sarcastically, there was a nice French information desk where I tried to ask in Frenglish how to get to Aix center, as they call it. The information desk was no help because all I could get out of the man was the phrase, “There is a bus downstairs.” I thanked him and went downstairs to find the bus stop. A bus stop I did find. However, there was no bus schedule to tell me when the next bus would be and where it would go. I was further concerned that there was no one at the bus stop.

Discouraged, I pulled my bag back upstairs to ask at the information desk about the bus and when it would next come. To my discontent, the man was gone and the information desk dark. At that point, I became quite worried. Tired of travelling and out of my element because I was no expecting a station on the outskirts of town. I wished I was still in Paris where the signs were clear and the metro could take me anywhere I wanted. In my opinion Paris was much nicer than this small city in the south of France. Just wanting to get to my hotel, I took the sky bridge over the tracks to the otherside of the station where I had seen other people getting into taxis. Dearly wishing that there would be one, I found a line with a sign post saying taxis. There were several in a cued up line that reminded me of the taxi cue outside of Penn Station in New York City.

Immediately, a man walked up to me in a leather jacket from his car and asked me in rapid French where I needed to go. In broken French, I told him Le Hotel Cardinal in Aix Center. He smiled and said of course. Before I could protest he grabbed my bags put them in the back of his taxi. Only then did I realize that the symbol on the back of the taxi I was getting in was a high end Mercedes Benz. That’s when I knew that I might be getting myself into trouble, but I was stressed from the days experience so I got in. The driver hopped in and starting driving like every professional European driver, and that is fast with great precision. He whipped the wheel over hit the gas and we were on our way.

At that moment, I remembered the words of my Dad when I was much younger. Those words paraphrased were to watch out when getting into a taxi in an unknown city that the driver doesn’t take you on a very expensive tour of the city. Having only a basic tourist map I tried to follow the route on the map. Even if I realized that this driver was taking me the long way, what was I going to do? Yell at him in English? He really only spoke French so that was out of the picture. He was a nice kind of driver though and seemingly took me a direct way with some traffic as we exited the motorway. He told me along the way in basic French where we were as we sped along. I was watching the meter jumping 20 cents every 5 seconds that we drove on top of a flat 2 euros 30 cents. We got to the hotel, and I had to give over 40 euros for one short trip. Ugh I thought at that point. It was about to get a lot worse though.

I walked into the hotel and gave my name to the woman at the desk. She looked at the register and didn’t see me there which was odd because I was holding my confirmation email in my hand. Then she began to read off names trying to find me on a register that only had about 10 names on it. When we got to the end, she let out an exclaimation and looked over at a stack of papers and asked me if my name was Kurtz which I said was really Kurz. Then in very rapid French she spilled into a long narrative that could not be stopped my exclamations to please slow down. Luckily her French speaking son that was a few years older than I am came out and helped translate. The gist of the story was that I had said in my email that I would arrive at 6 PM and it was now close to 7 PM so the woman had given my room away to someone else. I was told with some smugness that I should have at least called if I was expecting to be late. For the record, I was not late of my own doing but rather the inconvenience of poor station location.

I was outraged at this because I was holding a confirmation email in my hand that showed me sending my credit card number to confirm the room. I explained to the son that I was on a train and my cellphone does not work in this country so I could not possibly call. The son proudly smirked and said oh well and the woman looked no more concerned than the son. In fact, she looked quite overjoyed at my discomfort with being told that I now had nowhere to stay at 7 PM in a remote city in Southern France. Luckily for me at that moment, a conversation that I tried to follow started with the woman and another couple. The gist was that they could not stay even though they had just checked in and were leaving free of charge. With reluctance I was given their room that was not recleaned before I got up there. At least the room was clean and had a bed and I managed to insist on a lower rate for the inconvenience they had put me in.

As soon as I settled in my room, I decided that the people of Aix are not nearly as pleasant or willing to help as Parisians. I had been told people outside of Paris were more pleasant than Parisians. I beg to differ. Further, the things that I had planned to do while in Aix would cost a lot of euros because they were not within close public transport as I had thought they were. At that moment, I decided that I was abandoning my plan to spend 4 days in the Aix region. I was heading to the city I really wanted to see, Avignon, and then back to Paris where the metro was readily available.

I found out from reading online in the evening (on Wifi that I had to pay extra for) that in reality the bus is very reasonable and easy to use. Only problem is that they don’t publish there maps anywhere accept online and at the bus station in the center of Aix. I took the bus the next day for a lovely 3.20 euros. It was great learning experience though because never again will I be so early to become stressed and take the more expensive route. I should have stepped back and thought more carefully about my circumstance. It was a stressful leg of my trip but very educational.

Lesson learned here when going to a remote region expect that the movement around the area without a car may take some real exploring with fluency in the language of the locals. I also learned that a confirmation or what is said to be true is not always the real truth so expect the worse and hope for the best.

Exploring Oaxaca

As of today, I have spent a full week in Oaxaca, Oaxaca. I must say that I am highly impressed with the culture, atmosphere, history, and overall experience in this Mexican state. The first few days I experienced a culture shock because everyone I interact with (from my home-stay family to the staff at the health clinic) speaks only Spanish. After a few days of feeling discouraged, I realized I have an option of continuing to pity my Spanish skills or to accept the challenge and go outside my comfort zone to learn as much as I can. I indeed chose to take on this challenge and my Spanish is getting better with each day.

The Mexican state of Oaxaca is nothing less than beautiful. The people here are extremely friendly and always have time for conversation with a stranger. In the city of Oaxaca, the streets are setup like a grid. This makes it easy to navigate around the city. I already explored various restaurants throughout the city and still have many more to go to. I live about 15 minutes from the Zocalo which a popular plaza located in the center of the city. What I like most about the Zocalo is that any day of the week you will find families and individuals sitting down enjoying the scene. It captures the very essence of the culture in which they take time to appreciate life for what it’s worth. In the United States we are often caught up in the hustle and bustle of trying to get to the top that we often forget to appreciate the beauty of the world around us. We neglect the simple things in life which sometimes hold the solutions to our problems.

We got the chance to explore the history of Oaxaca. Last weekend I participated in a field trip to Monte Alban, an archaeological site that has history dating back to 500 BC. It was an amazing feeling to climb the stones of pyramids of one of the first major cities in Mesoamerica. The elevation of the site is about 6,400 feet making the air thinner and the sun hotter. This provided a great defense location for the Zapotec civilization, the indigenous occupants of the land.

I am looking forward to the adventures that lie ahead.

A different language is a different vision of life. ~Federico Fellini

Little Maconnais Goats (cheese) and Delicate Wines (June 15th, 2011)

Making wine is hard work and a serious commitment. We visited Jean-Christophe’s vineyard—Domaine Perroud, as an example of Burgundian vineyard and winery. The grapes grown in this region are primarily pinot noir and chardonnay. We learned about the impact of soil, climate, and each region’s terrain on the quality of the grape. In Burgundy, the soil is primarily limestone and each row of vines is covered with gravel in between the vines in order to get sugary grapes. The gravel helps absorb the heat for the cooler nights, and prevents a majority of other plants growing next to the grapes, so that the grapes can get maximum nutrients from the soil. From the soil, we learned about the harvest in August and how the grapes are juiced and destemmed mechanically using modern stainless steel equipment. Red wines differ from white wines because the skin [containing the pigment that gives the color] is fermented with the juice as opposed to only fermenting the juice for a white wine. Usually red wines are aged in oak barrels while whites are kept crisp in stainless steel vats. Temperature, pressure, and humidity are controlled as much as they can by the wine producer to make sure that that he/she gets the taste that he/she would like to sell the wine as. Different grapes can be mixed in various amounts to get the desired taste and the variables seem infinite. The parts of the grape such as stems and seeds are not just thrown away, but are actually used in the cosmetic industry. Additionally, grape seeds are used to make oil!
We also had a wine tasting at the same vineyard and learned to actually spit out the wine into a bucket (see picture below).
Our picnic was also at the same vineyard by the water. We had fresh baguettes, cheeses, meats, fruits, macarons, and savory wines. Look below at the pictures to appreciate the food! I will miss having casual 2-hour lunches when I leave France.
Following the picnic, we went to a local Maconnais cheesemaker where we met the goats, the kids, and finally the delicious cheese! Most cheese in France is made from raw milk unlike the US pasteurized milk. Unpasteurized cheese are safe to eat locally since they have the friendly LAB (lactic acid bacteria—same bacteria referred to as probiotic cultures) and outcompete pathogenic bacteria since the LAB are the dominant fermenters. We tasted fresh cheeses with tiny spots of Penicillium mold as well as older entirely moldy goat cheeses. I have to say that the Penicillium [naturally occurring fungus] offers the most flavors, and hence I love old stinky cheeses. The cheese was made by mixing morning and evening goat milk with a bit of old whey as the starter culture. Whey is the precipitated solution of water, lactose, bacteria, salts, and whey protein. Whey proteins and supplements are widely used as a health shake or protein powder. Cheese, similarly to wine, is able to be very efficient since all parts of the production can be put to more use.

Below are some pictures of goats and vineyards
This little goat thought my shirt was tasty:

The Maconnais Goat Cheese

The Cheese-molds

Cheese Tasting

Maconnais Vineyards and Wine Production (with our usual wine tasting of course)

Wine tasting and the bucket