At 8 am (which is not really all that early for most people, but when you have come from working your ass off in NYC for an aging cantankerous rock star, to landing on a surreally mellow farm in Chile, all the eyes and brain want to do is sleep, sleep, sleep). So at 8 am, there was a knock on my door. It’s chilly here in the mornings, chilly to the toes and the fingers mostly. (I have a wood burning stove in the corner of my room, and I am constantly feeding it’s caliente fangs. It roars all night making me sweat, yet in the morning, unless I get up at four am to feed it some more, it’s lifeless. There is something about a dead fireplace that makes the room in which it is placed, seem very very cold).
So what was I saying? Ah yes, a knock at my door. The famous knock; I tip toed to the door to keep my feet from fully absorbing the frigid bite of the floor, and Juan Ignacio (the main bee keeper, who is also 18 years old and unusually pretty even in dirty sweatpants) informed me that we needed to leave because it was going to rain soon and the bees hate the rain. Bee keeping is all about making the bees happy, because when they are happy, they work better. (This philosophy should be incorporated into US work ethics. I agree, when I am happy, I work better too.)
I piled into the truck with Juan and Bernardo (a surly man who seems bored by everything) and we drove to the bee farm and hour away from the fundo where I am currently residing. They keep the beehives off-site on a lush hill overlooking the Rio San Pedro where there are wild flowers (heather and rosemary blossom) from which the bees gather sufficient nectar and pollen.
While potholing our way to the bee hill, Juan, Bernardo and I made small talk and listened to Juan’s Spanish death metal tape. My Spanish is derisorily bad, but I know that in order to learn anything in life, you have to make a bit of a fool of yourself. Here is a translated recap of our dialogue:
Me: Is this satanic rock and roll?
Juan: It’s from Spain.
Me: Are nice to rock and roll?
Juan: Yes I like rock and roll, but I like hip hop even more.
Me: And you Bernardo, Are you nice to rock and roll?
Bernardo: It’s OK. I prefer pop music.
A few minutes later…
Me: I am writer of book and painter of food. Are you nice to food? What do you eat, pork, chicken, fish?
Juan: Yes I like all meats.
Me: And you Bernardo?
Bernardo: Yes
Juan: Do you drive in New York?
Me: I drive, but in New York, no cars, just lots and lots of people.”
We arrived to the bee farm and changed into our bee suits, hats, gloves, and boots. The gloves, stiff and lined in a rubbery protecting fabric, made it nearly impossible to handle anything, and the mesh covering my face on the hat prevented me from seeing clearly. Together in our yellow suits we looked as though we were waiting for nuclear fallout. (Because I couldn’t really articulate the fact that I thought we looked like we were in nuclear fallout, I enacted nuclear fallout by, sticking out my tongue, covering my face and falling backward. Concerned, they rushed to help me up from the ground. I explained that I was “making bad joke,” which they finally understood, then laughed hysterically for a couple of minutes).
Approaching hundreds if not thousands of bees at one time is a precarious experience especially if you have never been stung before (and are unsure as to whether or not you may be deathly allergic) and you are in rural Chile with two guys you barely know who now think you are a crazy white girl.
With a tin smoke producer that looks a bit like a tiny accordion and a funnel, Juan emitted smoke (which is known to calm the bees) as we moved from hive to hive. The larger beehives produce the most honey, bees, and buzz (the buzz comes from their wings), which is one of the most primal and deafening sounds I have ever encountered.
Bees are very docile creatures until you get close to their hives, and when you do, it’s war. They will do anything in their power to save their queen.
This occurrence of bees covering my face mesh, to the point where I was blinded, was an overwhelmingly dark (dark because the fear of being stung is paralyzing) yet enlightening experience (enlightening because I have somehow made myself do this potentially life-threatening thing and I am still in one piece).
Juan and Bernardo moved from hive to hive gracefully, as though they had poker night and cigars with the bees every Tuesday. I however stood frozen, hypnotized by the bees that covered every inch of my face net, asking them nicely to “shoo”.
Back on the fundo, it was time to process the honeycomb that we accrued on our dark voyage to the bee hill. On this farm, killing the bees to gather honey would be unheard of, so we spent a large part of the rest of the day, capturing bees that had snuck back into their hives, and setting them free.
Here, there is gleaming modern equipment that does the crushing of the honeycombs, separation of the wax from the honey, and barreling of the honey.
To see the finished product after tenderly handling the bees (despite their ferocity) and successfully appropriating the honeycombs is a bit like giving birth (although I am unsure as to what giving birth is like. I imagine it is quite similar without all the slime and contractions).
This amber liquid devoured by so many people for thousands of years for both medicine and flavor, is the impressive work of a colony of insects that direct their energies to a single purpose in their short lives.
If I compare myself to the honeybee, I can’t help but wonder. What is my queen bee?
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