Agri-business - Agri = Business?

Today, I will talk about gardening. The irony in my talking about gardening is funniest to those who know me best. If a good gardener has a green thumb, and a bad gardener has a black thumb, I haven't got a thumb, just an arm with four fingers. You give me a plant, and I promise you, I can kill it. A plant that needs watering, I don't water it. The kind of plants that need no watering, I drown those suckers. Cactus, dead. The only plants I can handle are fake, and the majority of the time the fake ones are tacky, so I live my life plant-less, or until now.

My offical title in Moldova is an "Agri-business development volunteer". Agriculture is built right into the name, they are going to rue the day they put me in any position to consult about anything 'agri'.


Moldova is a blurr of gardens, as an agriculturally based country, growing your own food is pretty much mandatory. And so, in order to fully assimilate myself into my community and family I decided to get involved with the garden. I was doing great. Picking strawberries, cherries, raspberries, no problem! I was all about that, nothing better than picking some fresh produce on a cool summer evening.

Today was different, I entered the world of weeding. Now, having only really ever weeded a flower bed before, and not really weeding it anyways, given my exception of all dandelions. (I still stand by them being prettier than some flowers, and as such, refuse to pluck them until they are in the seeding stage, when you can blow them into the wind and make a wish. I know, I know, and look like a toddler.) Anyways, when weeding a flower bed it's pretty apparent which green thing is a  'plant' and conversely which is a 'weed.'

Today we were weeding the onion bed. Yes, onions look a lot like everything else when they are growing beneath the ground. But, I wanted to help, so I began plucking everything that looked like a weed, tweleve onions later, I pretty much knew what they looked like. Luckily I have a good host family who understands, 'the poor american who knows nothing about gardening'...'little', try nothing. We all laughed it off, I got more comfortable and began pulling away, a little while later my sister pointed out the dill plants intermixed with the onions. Sure enough, I had pulled a couple of those plants as well and they lay among the heap of weeds. Yes, it was a proud day for me, I truly showed my talents and did a job well done...

Tonight we ate onion.

I wonder if they will ever let me near their garden again? As awful as I was at pulling those weeds, I got a lot of satisfaction when I was able to yank out the correct green-thing. Yet another lesson in 'practice makes perfect', I suppose.

Until next time,
Peace