The Farm in the Blaeberry: 4 French NFP Managers

At the end of March we received a request for woofing from Clément, Ben and Manu, who wanted to ‘go to countryside or mountains in the view to helping local people, being in contact with nature, improving our english, meeting new people and working outside.’ We arranged for the 3 wws to arrive on May 2 and stay until May 19^th. Shortly after this Clément emailed us asking if their friend Philip could stay for a week as well. This then was extended to the entire time that the other 3 , Ben and Manu would be with us.

So on May 2, I picked up 4 very French, very willing young men, all prepared to work. Loren of course was very happy to have eager strong help. I on the other hand knew that feeding these 4 men would require a lot of groceries, meal planning and cooking. Needless to say in the end it was very worth while and as usual we found 4 great friends who I am sure we will follow through life.

All four Clément, Ben, Manu and Philip had recently graduated from a Masters in Not For Profit Management, and had already completed their practicum in other countries. Philip was already working in the field. It was wonderful to know that they had met at school and become very close knit friends.

All were from Frances, Philip from near Paris, while the other three were from smaller Towns. Ben played the guitar and they all joined in to sing their favorite French songs. While they were here the French elections were on and they were very excited and closely watched the results and change to a new French Prime Minister.

With so much snow in the mountains, their recreational activities were limited, but we did visit Thompson Falls, a truck tour with Loren up the Blaeberry and attended a couple of neighbourhood bon fires. We fixed up four bikes and they went for bike rides, and even developed a competition to see who was fastest to race the loop around past the sawmill and back to the fire pit. Ben was the winner at 3’19”, and Loren vows to beat this by September 30^th . We bought a soccer ball and they set up goal posts in the field and vigorously played soccor a couple of evenings, only to have the ball punctured on a nail. But mainly they communed around the firepit. I don’t think our fire pit has ever been fired so many days in a row, there was barely an evening when these friends didn’t sit around the fire.

As such it was a good thing that they were helping Loren to tear down a neighbour’s house, because we had plenty of scrap wood to burn. Yes, that was the biggest job they did for us, tearing down a neighbour’s house which was both frame and log construction (watch the video below).

They all helped in the Garden spreading compost. Philip and Manu planted potatoes, parsley and peas (all are up now),and Clément and Ben planted beets, rutabagas, lettuce and arugula (which were up before they left). They all cleaned up the brush around the cabin and stacked firewood at the cabin, Ben and Clem painted the cabin walls upstairs and Clem peeled the pine railings we hope to put in later this year.Other jobs included tidying around the stove, cleaning the chicken coup,pulling fence nails, insulating and putting up plastic in the to-be woofer bunk house.ere Ben and Clément painted the walls upstairs and Clément peeled the ne railings which will hopefully be installed this year.

On the second last day before they were to leave we went to a dinner ping pong party (Manu took home the prize) at a neighbours where two were offered a ride to Vancouver, the following night we had a neighbourhood bon fire where again the remaining two were offered a ride to Vancouver. So I watched Philip and Clément leave on May 19^th and Ben and Manu leave on May 20^th (in a Volvo hard top convertible with the top down, grinning ear to ear).

After these 4 left, it was quite quiet around here, and we missed their conversation and the friendly demeanor of the group.

We have already had several emails from them and they are doing fine. Philip has gone back to France, the rest will woof on Vancouver Island. Then Clément is travelling to the North, Ben will head East and Manu’s girlfriend will join him and they will travel around BC.

We know these four will continue to have a good life, it is evident in all that we observed.