I had my first go at conservation volunteering today. In the morning we erected a fence around a bank in the lake at Chorlton Water Park. The fence was designed to keep waterfowl from eating the plants we put in. The roots of the plants will make the bank more resistant to erosion.
In the afternoon we thinned (non-native) Norway Maple saplings from a patch of woodland so that the indigenous flora could thrive, and planted bluebells. The group is made up of some nice people, and I had a brilliant time. Five hours on volunteering doesn't sound like much, but the satisfaction that I got out of it was reassuring - I'm making the right move, I can tell.
Pepe came round for some help with what we've dubbed testa merda - the shit test - a fiendishly difficult listening paper for his non-native English Speaker examination. It's bitchingly tough! Even Louise, who speaks several languages, thought it was hard. Once we'd nailed testa merda, we went on to some tasks for the speaking exam, in which Pepe gives a few short talks / speeches about various parts of his life. We talked about his home village, Montecalvo, and about his twenty-two years of naval service. He told me about his trip to South America, about his time in the Med after 9-11, about boats he'd sailed on and women that he'd known. It was fascinating. Five hours flew by.
Ten hours of work on a Sunday wore me out. In a good way.
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