The Restorer’s Apprentice: Laboring in lower Austria

As the Olympic season sprints into action in other parts of the world, our Work-Away marathon continues, cross-country style, among the paradisal rolling hills of lower Austria. After traversing numerous mountain ranges and entering a region of densely planted vineyards, we arrived in this private, secluded east-west running canyon, eager and anxious to meet our new hosts and to get acquainted with their bucolic, backwoods ways.

Knowing that they too had four children—ages 1, 4, 8 and 11, unlike our previous hosts whose two sets of twins were just two years and nine months old—we had high hopes for better playtime opportunities, and far fewer diaper duties. We had also learned, rather serendipitously, that this family was hosting an international un-schooling conference this same month. So our arrival was already cast with great expectations, but also, as always, an abundance of uncertainty.

No time was wasted before launching into the nitty gritty of work schedules and mutual understandings. Seasoned hosts, they had seen their share of volunteers, freeloaders and workhorses, and meant to be sure that everyone pulled his own weight in order to keep the property running like a well-oiled power saw. Seeing as how we’d brought along a couple freeloaders of our own, we had to be aware that our workload would be increased in exchange for feeding and housing the two children in addition to our indentured selves.

From there it did not take long to realize that the work was going to be a little more involved than the casual-but-demanding scenarios we’d seen back in Saxony and Westphalia. Much of the work I had done elsewhere, like mowing lawns, feeding livestock and collecting eggs, is done here by the oldest son. Clearly I would have to step up my game a little if my usual tasks were being managed by an 11-year-old. Instead I would act as sidekick and subordinate to the man of the house who has been renovating and restoring centuries old European houses for about 15 years.

I quickly gathered the distinct impression that this was a man who had done everything worth doing and seen everything worth seeing, and none of it was half as good as everyone said it would be. A consummate polyglot, he speaks Greek, his mother tongue, to his children and his house pets, German with everyone else, as he grew up in East Berlin, and flawless English with me, as he lived for several years in New York City. And with a background in electronics, he’s also fluent in html and who-knows-how-many programming languages.

On the job site, which consists of various secondary structures and guesthouses on the property, he handles every aspect of construction himself, from the cellar to the attic, from the front door to the kitchen sink. He grows his own tobacco, makes his own salt and jars everything imaginable from the garden to get his flock through the long Austrian winters. I’m halfway surprised he hasn’t built himself a watermill in the nearby creek to draw electricity into his home and get just a little further off the grid.

After pulling an 11-hour shift on my second day here, I was not actually feeling all that thrilled to be acting as a sub-apprentice for this Renaissance man. But gradually, like the moss on a 16th century stone rampart, he grew on me. Though he insists on calling me by my real name, which he somehow intuited on his own, and something only my mother and my accountant do, I soon came to appreciate the opportunity to work alongside someone so knowledgeable. My own experience with Wwoofing and Work-Away has taught me that most people doing this kind of thing are just squeaking by with a lot of guess work, and half the time they are happy to let me come up with my own best guess to solve their brick masonry and animal husbandry dilemmas (areas which genuinely interest me but in which I can claim absolutely no degree of expertise).

As for the international convention of homeschoolers and unschoolers, it was more or less cancelled, following too closely on the heels of the Austrian unschoolers meet-up held a month earlier and hosted by this very same family. Back in California, unschooling is a growing trend associated with an active social scene. Moms and kids meet up regularly for tide pooling, wild exploring, open gymnastics, and the like, while exchanging stories and materials from their unbound classrooms.

In Europe, however, it’s just like that old saying: When homeschool is outlawed, only outlaws will homeschool. Traditional schooling is essentially mandatory throughout Europe, so those who insistent on an alternative, home-based education have formed something of a close-knit community, a subculture of free-styling families. They are participating in a form of collective civil disobedience bordering on (but not in fact) a political movement. And the self-proclaimed House of Freedom, with its creative workshop and guest quarters, provides just the perfect setting for such families to convene and converse.

We have already converged with several of these families over the course of our working visit here, and every encounter has been illuminating. On top of that, the scenery that surrounds us is spectacular, and every meal—garden fresh and home cooked—is delicious. It is without hesitation that I bestow the Work-Away gold medal to these hosts, and I’ve already begun to worry that every subsequent work stay will fall measurably short of this one.