WWOOF #2: Feels Like Home

After a cold and rainy drive southeast from Katikati to Te Puke (the Kiwifruit capital of the World!), we arrived at a lovely house at the end of a long tree-lined driveway surrounded by kiwifruit orchards. Colleen immediately greeted us with her spunky and boisterous personality, rushing us inside - out of the weather. After getting settled into our room and being shown a bit around the house, our mouths watered as smells of Colleen's cooking filled the air. Meat. It had been awhile and we were looking forward to it - a homemade version of hamburger helper. YUM. We shared our first meal with Colleen, her husband Mark, and Colleen's mother, Daphne. Daphne can be a bit forgetful, but she is always eager to help out around the kitchen and is generally in a pretty great mood.

Between calling people “silly sausages” and “cheeky monkeys,” Colleen always talks with her hands and often her whole body – imitating a cocky politician or the “Zoolander” look (the namesake for their gray cat). She seems to have endless energy and you hope that a conversation with her will never end because it is always interesting and filled with laughter. Mark – on the other hand - is laid-back and quiet (both in number of words and volume of speech). His sense of humor quietly surprises you between Colleen's animated stories. He seemed to be amused by us the majority of the time, especially when he was telling us stories that we were never quite sure about.

Staying with Colleen and Mark will definitely be one of the highlights of our trip. Each day we woke up and had fresh bread with manuka honey or homemade jam or fresh eggs and farm-raised bacon. We helped out with some household chores and then got to work outside – gardening, weeding, digging, planting, etc. The work was more than reasonable and the weather held up for the majoirty of our days outside. We worked a few extra hours during the week in exchange for the weekend off and spent our last Saturday baking everything under the sun with Colleen – orange marmalade, lemon honey, and pavlova. We ended many nights playing games at the dinner table, watching movies, and always with a cup of hot cocoa. We even spent a few nights in the hot tob (or spa in kiwi-speak) under the stars.

Colleen told us that on average, NZlanders move on average once every seven years. When she added up the number of homes she and Mark have owned, she agreed that yes, they have owned just that many. After buying the property they now own about 6 years ago, Colleen's parents moved in and Colleen and Mark soon after. Former bakers (among other things), the two bought a company that buys bulk ingredients (spices, dried fruits, dairy, etc.), repackages them into more practical amounts, and sells them to local restaurants and cafes. Colleen runs the day-to-day business with a staff of 4 – securing more clients and making sure everything is going smoothly from the orders to the deliveries. Mark is in charge of keeping the property up to snuff, mostly their large kiwifruit orchard. With no prior experience growing kiwifruit, Colleen and Mark started their orchard from scratch a few years ago and it's output is increasing every year. Eventually they hope for the kiwifruit to be profitable enough to be their sole income and allow them to sell their food distribution company.

A few notes on: THE HISTORY OF KIWIFRUIT...

• The first kiwifruit seeds were brought over from China in 1904 and wasn't exported until 1952!
• Originally named the “Chinese Gooseberry,” the NZ market changed it to “Kiwifruit” after their native bird, the kiwi, which is also brown and fuzzy.
• There are 2 commercially grown kiwifruit at this time – gold and green. The gold are sweeter, ripen quicker, have a thin & less fuzzy skin & are a slightly different shape (they have a little tail). The green are what you see in the American grocery stores, but they are working on cultivating them to be less fuzzy to appeal to public tastes, so go buy some kiwifruit and show them we like them just the way they are!
• Kiwifruit actually have more vitamin C than oranges, loads of potassium, and heaps of fiber!

A few notes on: GROWING KIWIFRUIT...

• The kiwifruit vines are male or female. There are about 4 females per male and the girls produce all the fruit! The males are just around for pollenation – done by honeybees hired by the kiwifruit farmer for a short time in the spring.
• Not only are the kiwifruit trees specifically spaced depending on sex, they are cut & new plants are re-grafted onto their stumps after 2 years. This allows for strong growth in the root stalk & beautiful kiwifruits up top.
• 
  One kiwifruit tree can produce 2000-3000 fruit.
• The orchards must be carefully tended to make sure that the fruit is growing to export standards & all the trees are healthy & disease-free. The vines are thinned and pruned several times throughout the growing season.
• The fruit is not picked until it reaches the right Brix level (sugar level tested in the lab) and is tested for the black seeds (all should be black), passing maturity & quality tests.
• Colleen and Mark hire a team of 20 plus people in May/June to pick all the kiwifruit in their orchard – and they do it in just 3 days!
• It would take 3 years for Colleen and Mark's orchard to convert to organic. In doing so, they would produce much less fruit and have no guarantees that they would break even because of the low profits growers make. (Colleen and Mark do work hard to use as many natural fertilizers as possible, anyway).

A few notes on: HOW KIWIFRUIT GETS TO YOU!

• Mark was kind enough to organize a tour of their packhouse one morning so that we could get a close look at where the fruit goes between the orchard and our stores at home.
• 
  Colleen and Mark work with a family-owned packhouse called Trevelyan's. They have a close personal relationship with their Grower Representative, Dave (also our tourguide), who they see nearly 50 times a year! This is not a common thing between growers and packhouses, nor do I assume it common for a packhouse to be so welcoming to curious young WWOOFers as to give them parting gifts when they leave – thanks for the beanies, Dave!
• Trevelyan's works on behalf of the growers to get the best price for their kiwifruit from Zespri, the global marketing and distribution company for all of New Zealand's kiwifruit.
• Zespri judges each grower's kiwifruit on a range of factors – size, shape, dry matter (this affects the sugars & taste), flavor profile (the fruit is put into 1 of 3 catergories – Y, T, ot M – Trevelyan's uses the words “Yummy,” “Tasty” and “Mush” to simplify it), etc.
• Zespri works with customers in Japan, Europe, the US, and other countries to distribute kiwifruit to their market. Japan will only accept Y fruit and pay a premium for it. New Zealand gets all the Class 2/non-exportable/“reject”fruit in their own stores.
• Other rejected fruit (10-15%!!) becomes NZ's stock feed (lucky stock). A rejected fruit could be barely bruised, mishapen, a little too big or small, have a small blemish...most problems are nearly unnoticable, but as the fruit ripens and travels, it can cause bigger problems for the whole bunch.
• Kiwifruit is packed & re-packed throughout the season & is often randomly tested by Zespri.

We feel very fortunate to be acquiring so much information. It can be a bit overwhelming at times, but our hosts are gracious enough to reitterate any important details I may have missed along the way.

Having said that, here are the top 5 things we've learned at Colleen & Mark's and would like to adopt:

1. Eat more kiwifruit - Not just because it's a delicious and healthy superfood, but because now I know the hard work that goes into a growing season and will be looking for Colleen and Mark's grower number on our shelves back home!
2. Provide Kiwi (spectacular) hospitality – I hope that I can give any future guests such a warm welcome, pleasant and comfortable stay, and lasting memories to boot. If everyone was more welcome to meeting strangers, what a world it might be.
3. Drink more hot cocoa before bed – it's the perfect sleepy drink and late-night treat (have one from Northstar for me, will you Columbusites?).
4. Ask lots of questions – You find out so much if you just ask and when people find out you're interested, they are happy to help you learn more (thanks again for the visit to Trevelyan's, Mark!)
5. Go for it - So far I have got the impression (and this has also been confirmed by Kiwis themselves) that NZ-landers as a whole are go-getters. They are not the type to be scared of failure or of trying something new, no matter their age, income, or knowledge base. If they want to start a business, they do it. If they want to build a food forest, no problem – just give 'em a few years. A kiwifruit orchard with no prior knowledge working with the fruit? Sure, why not? Ukelele lessons, theater, belly-dancing, cheese making classes – they do it all, young and old. There's very little fear or self-doubt – and you know what? It usually works out. And if it doesn't, it will next time. I greatly admire this attitude and fearlessness and hope that the tiny seed of it that I think I possess grows into a full-out kiwi ambition!