Maybe having a farm girls in the City isn't all that bad...

I must say finding my feet in the ever busy city life has been all but easy, I don't think that it is only the change in lifestyle that I have been struggling to adapt to, I feel that it is a completely different way of thinking; a diversely different group of people with a completely different upbringing for the greater part based on the people I have come to know since I came here. Not that I am saying its wrong - simply just different.

Being used to a small farming community where everyone knows almost everyone else and greets politely while walking past even if you don't know the other person is very common, and now being here, it often feels as if people around here in the city are a bit more harder towards life, almost impersonal in a way. Greeting a stranger is almost frowned upon, and so much of the common courtesy that I am accustomed to is completely lost on the system. But I am happy that I could at least bring some of that country style mannerisms with me when I came here.

But there is also some other good aspects about being raised a country girl, and as it would turn out, my everyday skills from the farm seems to be a handy trait that counts in my favor. Apparently farm skills come in handy.

I started making jams and jellies for the house with some excess fruits, to me this was quite a common thing on the farm, whenever there was any excess, we would make the most of what we had, and very little would ever go to waste. The results were, that the people of the house enjoyed it so much, that they would offer anyone who stopped by a taste and tell them "its home made" it turns out that making jam and jelly is a very sought after skill that is not a common practice in the city, and that there is a big market here for home made products. Since then I have been making jams and jellies and have even expanded my range since to making some savory relishes in my free time and flogging them on the sidelines.

It wasn't long before people started asking me for other stuff as well, and soon I found myself in the middle of making green mango atchar as well and selling that, and bam - I had myself a sideline home industry, and stock is moving fast.

Since then I also started making some rusks as well as stone ground sour dough bread, and that has been an absolute hit - In fact I will be making a new batch of rusks today.

The thing is that this was now over and above my day-job maintaining the school, making a full range of cannabis products and trying to stay active online. But at least I am keeping busy and out of trouble right?

But making and baking is just one aspect of farm-life that I am living out here.

The other day we woke up to no power, because Eskom (South African electricity public utility) started implementing load-shedding again, this is a planned and scheduled power out in order to reduce usage because of lack of supply - it would be amazing if they would share their plans or scheduling with us in advance though...

Well now, I don't know about you, but I am very dysfunctional without my first morning cup of coffee, so waking up and realizing that there was no power in the house did not exactly sit well with me, but this issue was easily resolved by building a small fire outside.

But it rooted deeper than just a cup of coffee or a simple small fire - a short while later some neighbors showed up and joined us for coffee, a short while later more people, coffee soon ended up as breakfast over the fire, with heartwarming company. We eventually killed the fire that nigh, but it brought so much love and laughter home - and it was certainly worth the effort.

So maybe, being a farm girl in the city is not all that bad, at least if I get to share a bit of love and light while I am here and make some extra pocket money in the process...