Pig killing day again. 

Only this time we were a shop. Iren and Feri it appears take orders from all their friends and neighbours for various parts of the pig.  They raise them and feed them until the dreaded abattoir day, then, everyone calls around for their various joints of meat, piles of fat, skin, bacon etc. and makes a contribution to the kitty.  There was Iren and I, her husband and their daughter and the hunter guy from last time. Iren’s grandson and son-in-law turned up later.

But in addition, there was a new member of the team.  They had hired a guy called Zoltan who was such an archetypal MGM, Warner Bros, cartoon butcher I nearly laughed.  Big guy with dark hair, dark moustache, huge stomach clad as expected in white top and trousers and shrouded in an enormous blood stained apron.  He had Popeye forearms and massive hands and wielded these huge knives, hatchets, saws, and the biggest cleaver I’ve ever seen as though he was peeling an apple.  He smiled rarely and worked like a machine only stopping every hour or so to squirt soda water directly into his mouth from a large gas mechanism topped plastic bottle. 

He was surrounded by every size and shape of plastic bowl, bucket and receptacle you can think of, including the biggest brown plastic plant pot I have ever seen.  It was about two metres across and nearly a metre high.  Every few minutes he would turn this way or that and deposit a huge hunk of meat into the appropriate bin.   He was tossing a half rib cage of a pig that had weighed 170 kilo, as though it was a piece of ribbon.  Watching him was mesmerising, his cuts with the huge chopper were so accurate and his sausage making used the minimum of movement for the maximum effect. Gabor the hunter did complain a little, but laughing at the same time, because we had made sausage strings between one and one and half metres long last time, but Zoltan made them over five metres long, so finding sticks long enough to hang them on was difficult. I found myself staring at him working quite often and had to try and tell him in my broken Hungarian that I had never seen this work before, as people don’t usually slaughter pigs in their gardens and butcher them and make sausages in the garage at home, in the UK.   I think he got it, because he was pleased when I said it was ‘good looking work’.  But I may have gotten the Hungarian slightly wrong. Anyhow, he warmed up to me a bit after that and even had a shot of that horrid strong Parlinka stuff.  I didn’t drink wine this time as it is very strong and acidic, so I found myself drinking pineapple juice and vodka at 9 am this morning. Is that a pinacolada? The vodka/pineapple ratio became a little uneven as the day went on and we ran out of pineapple juice, but I did manage to avoid being forced to drink the vodka as a shot every half hour by making my ‘girly’ mixture.

I was in my usual pig killing clothes, i.e. the worst ones I have, so I was pleased that at least this time I had bothered with a little bit of hair and makeup, because I didn’t know that people would be popping in all day from all over the district.  It was one of those funny things were they would say hello to me, and Iren would say something like “This is my English friend Tania, she is helping out” and they would reply with, “Oh yes, we saw her last April 17^th walking through Letenye at ten past three” or “ Oh yes, we know her, my cousins-neighbours-brothers-wife’s-aunt’s-boss’s-uncle sells her the corn behind the market in town”. So basically they all knew me but I didn’t know them. A little strange, but I just nod and smile, nod and smile and carry on doing what I’m doing.  They are all very nice, but then I don’t understand what they are saying, so who knows.  There are some advantages to NOT learning too much of the language because you can’t hear when someone is being rude or gossiping.

22^nd November

I had a wonderful drive to the market town today.  It is Sunday which means that usually it is actually the busy day of the week.  By that I mean that during the week you will rarely see any traffic or people in the villages as they are all working in their gardens or doing the labour intensive processing of goods they have grown, either in the house or in some outhouse, barn, garage or shed. Or they have left at some ungodly hour for their jobs in the far distant cities. However, on Sundays, it is ‘visit the relatives’ day, in common with most other countries, or it is ‘church’ day.  So, unlike the rest of the week there are many more cars around and many more people around.  There were however, on this occasion, many more animals around. 

I had to dodge an array of skittish goats cavorting across the road.  Their large black silhouettes’ indistinguishable from the smaller variety of deer they have here in the low morning sun.  Getting much closer I realised that they were not running away at top speed, as the deer would do, but rather grazing leisurely on the lush grass at the side of the road, their bums protruding some way onto the street.  In addition, there were another three or four on the opposite side of the road who had obviously been a little slower in finding the gap in the fence, and were now peering jealously at their compadres, and ready to leap into my path with hungry abandon.  Normally I would have stopped at the nearest house to let them know that the goats were out. But I was on this occasion in a hurry for my lesson with my student, in addition there were plenty of people about a few metres around the bend, and I was reassured that the village telegraph would work in double quick time when it came to the endangerment of anything edible. Plus the additional problem that I really could not think of the word for ‘goat’ in Hungarian and my usual solution of miming the appropriate animal would be inordinately laborious, as miming a goat has never-ending problems when attempting to distinguish it from a deer, a lama, or a cow. I think you can probably tell that I have attempted this enactment before, unsuccessfully. Also it is difficult to imitate the vocal vocabulary of a goat!

Having survived the goat encounter of the third kind. I rounded the corner to find an entire clutch of chickens crossing the road.  And you will be happy to report that I can tell you the answer to the age old question. ‘Why did the chicken cross the road?’ It is because …….. drum roll please…….. The grass is greener on the other side. Yes I know I have just jammed two metaphors together but in this particular case it was true.  So I executed a Michael Schumacher type swerve and found myself head to head with a huge wheeled tractor, so I rally drove the car into the classic S bend, throwing myself over to the right to aid the car in its endeavours to avoid direct contact with the huge metal ‘widget’ that was hanging down over the cab and onto my side of the road. I have to confess to an involuntary duck as I passed underneath it.  Goodness knows what this ‘widget’ was for? It looked like a two foot wide, baby blue, painted metal rose hanging off of an articulated arm which extended about five feet above the height of the tractor cab. Very strange. Needless to say, when anyone asks “Do you get bored of driving the same country roads every week with no traffic or excitement?” the answer is definitely NO!

25^th November

I have had to make a very difficult decision today.  I think that Rambo has to go.  His sexual appetite is causing so much damage to my lovely little hens.  One of them now has a completely plucked section on her back, with bright pink, bruised skin where pretty white flecked black feathers should keep her warm between her wings. The other two have the under-down showing through, gray, like an old lady who has neglected her roots.  And although the gash on Flopsy’s side is healing, it keeps being reopened every morning by Rambo’s salacious attentions. She is going to end up with an infection.   He is so beautiful that I will make some new pictures and drawings of him before the big event.

After several days and sleepless nights of agonising over options, (I thought about putting him in the big field with the geese, but then I remembered that George has already claimed half his tail and I would feel dreadful if George actually killed him, not to mention the stress to Mildred)  So I tried separating the chicken coop this morning.  I managed to get all the ducks and chickens out whilst the cockerels were doing their usual extra few minutes lay in, on the perching sticks that run across from one side to the other of the hen house, suspended on blocks with U shaped notches cut out of them to receive the sticks.  I had grabbed the chicken wire covered frame from the goose house when I got them up this morning and gingerly slid this into place before either Rambo or Zebra could come out.  I even managed to put a tray of food and a bowl of water in there without them jumping on me.  So I was very happy to see that the chickens didn’t seem to care at all that their men where trapped inside.  With the chicken door half closed the frame was held in place beautifully but the cockerels still had plenty of light. 

All was going well, and when I came back from giving today’s English lesson to the Policeman in the next village.  The ducks and hens were mulling about, scratching, pecking and generally chickening as usual. I thought it was only fair to let the cockerels out for the last couple of hours of daylight.  So after much shooshing and broom action I managed to get the hens into the next door compartment of the hen house and swiftly moved the wire frame over from in front of the cockerels.  I expected them to rush out and attack me as I had to stay put for a few minutes securing the door onto the frame to prevent the chickens from escaping.  They are quite big now.

Mrs Duck as usual was inspecting the work and being unusually quiet. I put some fresh water in a bowl for Rambo and Zebra as they had knocked it over some time earlier and wedged their door open with it.  They still hadn’t come out.

Watching the proceedings from the gate, it was all rather stressful.  The cockerels hadn’t seemed to mind being inside all day, naturally lazy I suppose, and the chickens seemed quite contented on their own outside and didn’t bother them even though they could see them.  But when I swopped them round, all hell broke loose.  The three chickens were doing aerial acrobatics trying to get to their men, they pecked and called and clucked and trilled.  Eventually Rambo came out to have a look, and casually Zebra joined him.  The only way to describe their demeanour was, confused, and a little shell shocked.  They both moved in slow motion, no further than two feet from the girls for about twenty minutes.  Rambo put his head very close to the chicken wire and crowed loudly at the girls several times, and Zebra kind of held back and watched.  Eventually he went for a scratch in the old straw pile, but was soon back watching.  In the meantime, Lilly had retreated to the far side of the wood sculpture as though he wanted to distance himself from the proceedings, and Mrs Duck remaining unusually silent watched from a safe five or six inches from the chicken house door and occasionally waddled in for a drink of the fresh water and then backed off again.   Meanwhile, Zebra did small circles in front of the girls, and often just stood still and looked at them.  In all they took so long to settle down that I went and sat in my coop observation chair by the woodpile as I got fed up of standing. 

I had to adjust the wire frame several times because the constant dive bombing off of  the nest box was opening up a gap. But eventually the cockerels backed off a bit.  I did try throwing some of that weird extruded green pellet chicken food in through the wire to get the chickens to focus on eating instead of the door, but it just freaked them out even more, so much so that the ducks from next door came over to quack in sympathy and solidarity at their neighbours dismay.

It was pretty stressful for them and me, but I had to keep reminding myself that they were only chickens and basically food! And that it was for the benefit of their poor backs having some healing time to keep the cockerels away from them for a few days.

I still can’t help feeling guilty. I had no idea they had such loyalty to their men. They always seem to treat them with contempt.  Maybe in the world of chicken love, the phrase ‘you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone’ is appropriate.  I will have to persevere, although I have made a date with Iren to convert Rambo to Christmas lunch next week. If this separating thing works, I can always change my mind.  

26^th November

Well I did the swap over again at three o’clock this afternoon and they were all pretty well behaved.  There was one chicken missing but I soon found her perched on the nesting box, scoopied right down low in the late afternoon gloom, with just her red crop peeking up above the edge of the old grey wood and giving away her hiding position.  Unfortunately, getting the other two in, made her panic and jump off to join them huddled in the back of the little wooden room, so I didn’t get any eggs today.  I am going to leave them indoors for a bit longer in the morning and see if I get an egg that way. The cockerels were very good and didn’t rush out when I was fixing the wire framed door over the chickens, so it wasn’t really necessary for me to wear the long pink wellies after all.  I have given up on Ian Botham sending me his spare leg pads.  Not feeling too well today so I have cancelled my lesson for today and will spend the rest of it asleep or wrapped up in front of the telly cuddling the dog.

27^th November

Beautiful day and I missed it. I was supposed to do a lesson today but I had a headache and the thought of trying to think well enough to do an English lesson to a Hungarian pupil just wasn’t going to happen, so I had to cancel it.  I hope that she is not too cross with me.  I have been out of sorts all week. Silly things, a little stomach ache or joint ache or headache. Very annoying. It slows me down and makes me feel a bit low.  I have been sleeping a lot which is good.  I hope that by Monday my body will have finished struggling to make the antibodies for the flu vaccine and I can get back to normal. I hate having to get up to an alarm after many, many years of working and having that shrill instrument of doom invading a nice dream and forcing me out of a warm cosy down encased bed.  So I have until now been happy to wake up with Lazi being my alarm.  He is very sweet and puts a cold nose to the nearest piece of flesh he can reach, a hand a cheek an arm or a stuck out leg.  If that doesn’t work he does have a tendency to bounce off my kidneys, delivering a glancing blow with both front paws accompanied by a subdued “Woof, I need to go out mum”.  I have to say it is very effective.  The funny thing is, that having set the alarm for the last few days, because I have been going to bed late or very tired and tending to sleep in, he absolutely ignores the alarm, which I think is slightly weird.  But then as I say, I haven’t done it before. 

There is a little church type tower down the road which rings the bell at 8a.m. every morning, but Lazi always knows when it is 7a.m.  I think his bladder has a timer on it!

Not too much problem with the swap over of the chicken genders, only a couple of laps of the chicken pen with the broom today to herd the girls into their new bedroom. And I got an egg this morning so that was good.

28^th November

It was raining this morning, but lovely and sunny this afternoon.  I went to my neighbour Iren today to colour her hair for her, and when I got back, I got such a lovely greeting from all my animals.  Lazi barked, the chickens clucked, Mrs Duck quacked and did her new dance, and the geese honked a ‘hello Mum where have you been’ and swooped down towards me.  It was so nice and made me feel much less lonely than I have been of late.  I do have bad news for Rambo though.  Monday has been set for his ‘going to the pot’ day by Iren.  I can’t possibly kill him, he is so beautiful, and I did tell Iren that I am not going to be able to eat him, even though my mother called him a ‘wife beater’.  I did point out to mum on the video chat last night that she doesn’t know the name of the chickens from the supermarket that dad cooks for her.   I will have to gird my Hungarian loins on Monday.  Of course I may also find an excuse to postpone it again.

Mrs Duck and Lilly were really sweet tonight.  I went down the path as it was getting dark as usual, and noticed that the cockerels were already perched in their house ready for bed.  So I called out, “bed time guys” to the ducks when I was half way down the path and unbelievably they waddle straight in! Now this is a first as you know.  Mrs Duck in particular usually likes to stretch out the last few seconds of puddling for as long as possible. But not tonight, they were good as gold.  Of course something had to go a bit wrong after that!

George and Mildred walked well enough to their goose house and went into the porch, but instead of slowly walking into their bedroom like they usually do, they just stood there and looked at me.  Then they had a chat amongst themselves, a canoodle involving rubbing of necks and making pretty crossed heart shapes with their heads, then they turn towards me again and finally I had to gesture with the YTB in the right direction to persuade them in as it was getting very dark and I hadn’t brought the torch out.  Maybe I should check out the rat situation again. Or maybe they have heard rumours about Rambo and are lodging a solidarity protest by not co-operating.  Geese are pretty selfish and vain and we know that George hates Rambo with a passion, he tried to grab his tail through the fence again today, so I think that maybe it is the approach of Christmas that is worrying them.  If I am going to have to tell them EVERY night that Goose is not on my Christmas menu this year, its going to get pretty annoying. Goose rather than turkey is the usual Christmas fair in Germany, but here they seem to serve river carp in a weak soup type sauce with the mud flavouring the liquid in a wholly natural but rather unpleasant way.  So the geese are definitely safe.  Tomorrow is the first Advent Sunday.  Another Christmas looms fast upon the horizon.  The days are a bit slow in Lispeszentadorjan but the years seem to careen by at an alarming rate!

29^th November

1^st Advent Sunday.  Actually I think it’s officially 1^st Schnitzel Sunday in Lispe. I have been given five of them today.  I am not complaining as they are delicious. I had hot ones with little fluffy potatoes given to me at 11.30 this morning by Iren, so lunch was brought forward gratefully.  And then this afternoon, my neighbour Gizzi gave me some more.  Well as you know, all my female friends and neighbours here are professional cooks of one type or another. So it was with grateful thanks I received the contributions.  I was going to light a candle this afternoon, but I couldn’t think what for or who for so I ate another schnitzel instead. 

I did attempt to get some net curtains up on my long sun lounge windows, I had been sewing them last night and moved enough furniture to get the ladder positioned in the middle. Unfortunately, what with the balancing on the window sills, the fear of falling backwards, the barking and pawing help from Lazido and the concrete wood that the man used to frame the windows with, I only managed to get two picture nails in and did not succeed with the proper hooks.  The curtains are now dangling half way across the window and my legs are bit shaky so I will finish the job in a few days when the attack of vertigo has passed and my muscles don’t protest at the height.  I think that any longings I might have had for a career as a trapeze artist in the Cirque Du Solei are definitely quashed.  If you could see me, this is a funnier notion still. I am not exactly built for feather-light aerial acrobatics!  It has been over 35 years since I was able to vault over a gymnasium horse, execute a perfect flick flack flip and land unbroken and still smiling, on my feet, on a large blue straw filled school gym mat that smelled of children’s feet.  I get a nose bleed just reaching the top cabinets in my kitchen these days.

30^th November

The last day of the month. Not significant to most people but I have an aversion, recently formed to November, so I’m glad it is nearly over and the down hill slide to Christmas and the New Year approaches with rapid certainty.   I am going to finish the month with a flourish and have so much planned for today that my feet won’t touch the ground until I eventually fall off them to sleep.  So here goes the potted chronology of my extremely busy final day of November.

7.30 up, dress in old work clothes as usual, pull Well water, get bird food mix, feed water and let out all winged and furry animals.

8.15 coffee and ciggy time. Debate advantages, disadvantages of breakfast with self and Lazi.  Lazi votes YES because he is always in the market for any unwanted meals or scraps as appropriate. Outvoted by me. (I always get one and a half votes).

8.45 tear myself away from TV as the film I wanted to watch last night but was too tired and fell asleep to so missed it, is on again this morning, search for appropriately clean and tidy clothes for busy business day.

9.00 Shower, hair, make up etc.

9.45 next coffee and ciggy time

10.00 dash into town for bank withdrawal and pay bills for all the people’s houses I look after.

11.00 just made back it in time for my first lesson in the village next to mine.

1.00 dash to next lesson with policeman

3.00 dash home

3.15 let out cockerels. Put in hens

3.30 finally make myself something to eat. Cold schnitzel sounds nice and quick.

4.10 change back into old work clothes again

4.15 feed Lazi before he ruins all my rugs doing excited ‘is it time yet’ circles

4.20 nightly routine of bed time for all winged creatures, some coop housework with YTB

4.35 admire beautiful pink sunset with Lazi for a few minutes (the geese don’t appreciate their surroundings)

4.40 find wooden ‘lobster’ to aid removal of very muddy, stuck on pink wellingtons

4.45 dash indoors to switch on computer, load up internet ready for video chat with mother in the UK

6.00 coffee and ciggy

6.30 catch up with emails, go to work on Yoville and Facebook, contact international circle of internet friends who get upset if I don’t leave them messages every day. Make notes for Goose Diaries

9.00 fall asleep in front of TV after last decaf coffee and ciggy

9.30 wake up, realise I’m too sleepy to watch another film I like and drag myself to bed.

Busy, busy day. November DONE. Over and out.