Monday Learning Day

Today, we started with a seminar about personalities and how the counselor’s personality affects the client. We took some personality test, learned more about ourselves, and about others. It was a really fun and informative seminar.  After lunch, we had an artist who makes masks come and talk about his craft, the history of masks, and give us a mask-making demonstration. It’s interesting because the way people live here is really different. One of the things about the American culture that is distinct from the culture here is about the role of work in our lives.  One of the professors pointed out that most Americans immediately have questions about how the mask maker makes his living, who buys the masks, where does he sell them…..the business part of stuff; where as the mask maker concentrates more on the artistic quality and enjoyment side of what he does.

This is the mask making demonstration.

 Some of the finish products. Some of the masks are used for theater actors.

Some of the masks are just show pieces for decoration.

After the mask making seminar, some of us decided to take a walk into town. We heard that there’s a little coffee shop/minimart about a kilometer away. So we went for a nice walk and found the little store. We bought some snacks to take back to Casa Cares and got back just in time for the cheese making seminar.

 We had a chance to meet Salvatore, a shepherd and cheese artisan, to come show us how he makes his pecorino and ricotta cheese and talk to us about the work he does. It was really fascinating. Salvatore and his 200 sheep are from a region called Sardinia. We got to taste the fresh cheese and have some of the cheese from his “farm” with our dinner. It was delicious.

One of the things that Salvatore said is that even if he doesn’t make the cheese himself form the sheep’s milk, he could sell his milk for about 0.90 Euros per liter….so if we find cheese that is less than 7.00 Euros per pound, we should wonder what is in it.

One of the biggest things I forgot to mention about Casa Cares is that it’s a guesthouse that belongs to the Waldensian church. The concept of creation care/caring for the environment and the earth is very important to the Waldensians. That means that Casa Cares has it’s own vegetable and herb garden, buys food from local artisans/farmers/etc., and have solar panels to produce the electricity to run the place. It is pretty nifty. Dr. Paul Krieg, our host at Casa Cares talks about the slow food movement a few times. The food we eat his is fresh from local sources and it is really good.

This is the old chapel that is being restored.

This used to be the olive press.

You can see the olive trees planted on each step of the hill.

Casa Cares is an interesting and very special place. One of the professors said that it might not be the typical Tuscan experience but maybe more of a Waldensian experience. There’s a spiritual feel of the place somehow.  The place is full of history and is run mostly by volunteers. At one point Casa Cares had it’s own olive press to make olive oil but now they take their olives down to a bigger farm to get it pressed there. The olive oil in this region is know for being one of the best in the world. They sell the oil they make for a small profit to keep the place running. They also make enough electricity from the solar panels to run the place and sell some back to the national grid.