Last Tuesday, we went with a few members of Seven Camels and most of the
H-Squad to pick apples in a local orchard. We were supposed to be
working those fields Tuesday through Friday mornings, but we so
undershot the owner’s expectations that we were fired. Apparently
they were expecting twenty-five carts full of apples. We only filled
eight. That being said, it usually takes a team of forty men working
from 9 am to 9 pm to fill twenty-five carts. We were thirty-five men
and women working from 10:30 to 2:00 with little to no experience
actually picking apples.
H-Squad to pick apples in a local orchard. We were supposed to be
working those fields Tuesday through Friday mornings, but we so
undershot the owner’s expectations that we were fired. Apparently
they were expecting twenty-five carts full of apples. We only filled
eight. That being said, it usually takes a team of forty men working
from 9 am to 9 pm to fill twenty-five carts. We were thirty-five men
and women working from 10:30 to 2:00 with little to no experience
actually picking apples.
It
did feel very much like that scene with the apple trees in the Wizard
of Oz. One of the guys would climb a tree and shake it like crazy so
apples would rain down. The rest of us would collect the good apples
underneath, hopefully not getting hit in the head or limbs from the
downpour of fruit. I climbed a tree and shook, but apparently this
was not okay. The gypsies supervising us got angry because there
were girls in trees and guys gathering fruit. Traditionally, men
climb the trees and women collect the apples. Even the five or six
of us possessing two X-chromosomes who climbed trees sent the
supervisors into fits of angry Romanian. It’s amazing to me that
Viile Tecii seems to have stopped in time. The phrase “til the
cows come home” takes on a whole new meaning when a herd of cattle
passes you on your way home at 7:45 pm.
did feel very much like that scene with the apple trees in the Wizard
of Oz. One of the guys would climb a tree and shake it like crazy so
apples would rain down. The rest of us would collect the good apples
underneath, hopefully not getting hit in the head or limbs from the
downpour of fruit. I climbed a tree and shook, but apparently this
was not okay. The gypsies supervising us got angry because there
were girls in trees and guys gathering fruit. Traditionally, men
climb the trees and women collect the apples. Even the five or six
of us possessing two X-chromosomes who climbed trees sent the
supervisors into fits of angry Romanian. It’s amazing to me that
Viile Tecii seems to have stopped in time. The phrase “til the
cows come home” takes on a whole new meaning when a herd of cattle
passes you on your way home at 7:45 pm.
