The Harvest

‘So where are you from?’ he asked me. We were on a break from harvesting, having just worked like slaves for several hours.

‘Scotland. I drove down yesterday.’

‘Have you moved down here then?’

‘No, I came for the experience.’

“What, of grape picking!’ 

The incredulousness of this man was understandable. I had driven about 450 miles for a spell of back-breaking work at a vineyard for very little money. Indeed, there had been moments where even I doubted my sanity. 

But I like wine a lot. In 2015 I spent a large part of the year poring over books and preparing for exams on the subject. I drank a lot of it too, with pleasure. The possibility of working a harvest in the south of England therefore appealed to me. Like the narrator in Zorba the Greek – one of my favourite books – I felt the urge to flee the world of the mind and throw myself into work, even if it amounted to no more than picking grapes off vines. 

I packed enough clothes to last about ten days, along with my massive encyclopedia of wine, an iPod and a few other essentials, got in my car and drove nine and a half hours to the southern coast of England. I holed up in a youth hostel on the edge of Eastbourne, where I had a musty room with a minuscule window all to myself. 

Arriving at the vineyard on the chalky South Downs in Sussex the following morning I was apprehensive. This was largely because I suffer from a stiff back, and I genuinely feared I might injure myself. There was an element of excitement too, though, which I guess my fellow grape pickers didn’t share. It was the thrill of being among vines and seeing the famous grapes that roll off the tongues of wine lovers: Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Pinot Meunier, Riesling. 

The team of harvesters numbered about forty, and they were all white locals. This was a surprise to me, for I had expected an abundance of young Spaniards, Poles and Eastern Europeans. Several were clearly past retirement age, while a small minority looked like they could have featured on Jeremy Kyle or a Channel 5 show about benefits claimants. 

One or two of my compatriots had unusual backgrounds. There was, for example, the middle-aged man who’d worked for a couple of decades in south east Asia. As someone who spent two and a half years in Japan I felt a bond with him, and we regularly chewed the fat during breaks. Mostly though the pickers were just hard up, and their favourite topic of conversation was how the agency had done a number on us. This was in fact entirely true, so their anger was understandable. 

My first hour of picking was accompanied by a bout of stiffness in my lower back, and I managed to cut my thumb with the ultra-sharp secateurs we were given. Still, as the morning wore on my body loosened up and I became pretty efficient. Given the wet and cool summer, the small and compact bunches of blueish-red Pinot Meunier grapes we picked were surprisingly ripe.

I quickly discovered that one day of harvesting is like any other. There was the initial stiffness which soon tailed off, followed by a surge of energy which lasted most of the morning. After lunch, however, my work rate nosedived as fatigue took hold. As for the grapes, well, they all looked pretty similar: small, blue or green, with some rotten ones here and there. It was repetitive, boring work. 

As the six days of harvesting passed by I became increasingly irritated by some of my co-workers. This was to some extent inevitable, for the work was draining, involving as it did hours spent bending over foliage and lugging around heavy crates of grapes. 

What really began to irk me was the fact that certain pickers were brazen slackers. I particularly recall two men who were virtually joined at the hip. No longer in the prime of life, they would lazily work a section in tandem while casually discussing football. They were thoroughly inefficient. One of them even had the nerve to criticise a young guy behind his back for his allegedly poor performance, although he was doing the job correctly!

Some harvesters would wander up and down the rows of vines, removing a few bunches here and there, which they would then chuck into someone else’s crate before continuing on their way. This saved them the hassle of hauling a crate of their own about. On one occasion we worked beyond the normal finishing time of 4 o’clock. As the light failed, a couple of women gave up and collapsed on the ground at the top of the slope, too exhausted to carry on. 

I was annoyed with these slackers because I felt drained of energy and irritable, but I couldn’t really blame them for not pushing themselves. For why should they have? We were getting paid the minimum wage for physically demanding work. In such circumstances, you realise it simply isn’t worth your while to make a big effort. 

Moreover, we were subject to occasional demotivating slights. For instance, one afternoon we finished in a distant corner of the huge estate. After the foreman collected our secateurs and signed us out for the day, we had to undertake an unpaid fifteen minute trudge back to our cars. 

After just five and a half days of harvesting, the job came to an end. We picked the entire Chardonnay crop in a day and that was it. There were rumblings of discontent within the group because we’d earned bugger all, but I didn’t share their resentment. I’d had a bellyful of the slackers and I was ready to leave.

The Taxi Drivers of Zhangjiajie

           When I was fourteen I spent a few days in London. Endeavouring to get to The Oval cricket ground, where England were playing the West Indies, I got into a black cab and was promptly sent packing by a surly Londoner, for no obvious reason. The next guy, who at least accepted my fare, yelled at me for closing the door too hard. Since that day I have never liked taxis.

Nonetheless, on a few occasions the taxi ride has been worth the fare simply for comedy value. I particularly recall a journey with a Japanese driver called Hamada or Harada – something like that – from Fukuoka airport. He got out of the cab, a short and bespectacled figure of about retirement age, with his shirt sticking out of his flies. As we drove through the dark streets a dull boom was audible behind us. Looking back I saw that my suitcase was blocking a lane about a hundred metres back. Hamada (or Harada) stopped the cab and started reversing, all the while muttering the word ‘daijoubu’ (‘It’s OK’). I’ve never figured out if he was talking to us or to himself.

Having reached the item of luggage, he got out and shoved it back in the boot, oblivious to the horns of passing cars. In some countries our lives might have been in danger. Then, when we reached our destination, Hamada/Harada had the nerve to charge us the full fare!

Never in my life, however, have I encountered worse taxi drivers than in the small Chinese city of Zhangjiajie, in mountainous Hunan province, where I recently passed a few days. (It’s small by Chinese standards, but the population is in fact roughly the size of Edinburgh’s.)  

The taxis in Zhangjiajie are all filthy lime green and yellow Volkswagen Jetta SDIs, which look like they date back to before the end of the Cold War. Inside the cars the floors and doors are caked with the dirt and grime of years of service. The upholstery is peeling away, revealing the vehicle’s steel frame, and seatbelts are not available. The one time we tried it, the boot didn’t shut. A set of steel bars separates passengers from the driver, so you have to stuff notes through narrow gaps to pay the fare.

A drive through this city, which lies at the foot of a staggering serrated ridge of mountains and features a lot of new and apparently half-empty high-rises, is certain to shave at least a few hours off your life expectancy. The drivers weave in and out of traffic like Matt Damon in The Bourne Supremacy. Roundabouts are a free-for-all, with those approaching the junction unwilling even to consider giving way. Use of the indicator is for wimps, the cabbies preferring to blast their horns as they overtake. It’s as if they’re saying I’m coming through, and you’d better get the hell out of the way.

The cars are all atrociously maintained, and having underinflated tyres appears to be a badge of honour among these people. Moving from one lane to another felt like we were travelling on an ice rink.

Still, these rides did have the advantage of being dirt cheap, with a short journey costing the equivalent of about sixty pence. Moreover, these daredevils were all honest, and never once overcharged us. It wasn’t until we travelled to more touristy areas that we began to get ripped off – to the tune of about forty pence per journey.

The Streets of Fenghuang

            It’s lunchtime in Fenghuang and we are the only customers in the tiny restaurant of four or five tables. It’s in an alley of grey brick buildings and uneven stone slabs close to the turbid Tuo River and, unusually, it looks clean. One of the three staff sits by the entrance and tries half-heartedly to drum up some business, calling out ‘chifan ma?’ (‘do you want to eat?) to passers-by. It’s a losing battle, for the streets are strangely empty, the tsunami of Chinese tourists having vanished in the intense midday heat.

          We order rice, a plate of fried tofu and salty, charred pork, and an aubergine dish. The food is delicious. I knock back two bottles of very weak Snow beer, whose alcohol content is below 2.5%. We get talking to the two young local women who cook and serve the food. Unusually for Fenghuang, they are friendly. They complain about the recent introduction of 148 yuan (about 15 pounds) tickets that give access to large areas of the Old Town. Businesses have been hit hard, they say. 

Indeed, this small ‘ancient town’ in Hunan province in the south of China is all about business, specifically the tourist kind. You get the feeling that most locals look upon visitors as little more than cash cows. The extortionate levy for entering the Old Town makes you feel like you’re in a theme park. Worst of all are the town’s taxi drivers; they are shameless rip-off merchants, overcharging anyone who fails to converse in the local dialect. 

And yet, I liked Fenghuang. Early in the morning, before the Chinese holidaymakers have taken control, a resonant pat-pat-pat sound comes from the edge of the river. It is the noise of a handful of bendy women washing clothes, and beating them against the floor with some kind of paddle. Parts of the river are veiled in mist at this hour. Deeply tanned boatmen with muscular arms stand or sit at the back of sampans, alternately using a sturdy bamboo pole or an oar to propel small groups of tourists over the water. Their songs rise above the hum of voices coming from the banks. 

Traditional and photogenic buildings of three, four and five stories border the river, which is about fifty metres wide. They have wooden balconies and balustrades, sloping roofs with dark tiles and hanging basket chairs. Some even stand on wooden stilts, though it’s hard to believe they offer a very firm foundation.  

          The narrow and sweltering streets of Fenghuang are for all the senses. Men strut around, their shirts rolled up above their fat bellies for coolness. Women from the Miao ethnic minority sit listlessly beneath cone-shaped hats made from bamboo leaves, hawking boat rides and photo opportunities with local girls in headdresses made of silver and shocking pink or red dresses.

Charred and flattened pigs’ heads hang outside restaurants, and piles of broken roof tiles litter the streets. A yellow star on a grubby wall and some flaking Chinese script serve as a reminder that you are in a Communist state, though the orgy of money-making all around you tells its own story. Then there are the smells: incense, grilled lamb cooked by Uighurs, the rancid stench of rotting food from bins, and urine in the back alleys. 

          There is an ugly side to Fenghuang, though, aside from the effort to squeeze every yuan out of visitors. Signs of abject poverty are visible, like the hapless beggars in the gallery atop the handsome three arch sandstone bridge. Blatant racism is on display too, for a bright red sign outside one establishment informs Japanese visitors that they are not permitted to enter. (Perhaps not surprisingly, I saw no Japanese in Fenghuang.)

I also witnessed a fight - at about nine in the morning. At the foot of the sandstone city wall, several metres below me, a shouting match between two furious local men degenerated into a scuffle. Peering over the battlements, I took in the chaotic scene. One of the men was lying on top of his foe, and landed a punch in his face. Five or six locals – family members, I guess - were more or less involved: there was an old woman brandishing a small chair over her head, an old man trying to pull the pugilists apart, and a woman of about thirty lying unconscious beside the mêlée.

Climbing Ben Lomond

          “Ben Nevis were boring”, he says in his thick Yorkshire brogue. “You just zigzag all the way to the top. At least here you can actually see summin’”. This twenty something hiker and his mate have stretched out their legs and are chomping on white-bread sandwiches. Their faces are wet with the exertion of a climb of around 700 metres to the top of the Ptarmigan, a satellite of Ben Lomond. 

Ben Arthur - 'The Cobbler'

He’s right about the view. Across a plateau, a couple of hundred metres above us, ant-like figures are moving slowly along the curved summit ridge of Ben Lomond. To the west, on the far side of Loch Lomond, Ben Arthur –‘The Cobbler’ – stands out among the mountains of the Arrochar Alps, its remarkable, craggy ridge looking like a great chunk broke off in the forgotten past.  

Ben Lomond is Scotland’s most southerly ‘Munro’ (a mountain above 914 metres in height). I’ve only ever scaled one other, Ben Hope, which happens to be the country’s northernmost Munro. Like my cheerful acquaintances from Yorkshire I opted for the more demanding, Ptarmigan route up the mountain, rather than the more popular ‘tourist’ path. 

View south east from Ben Lomond

Ten minutes into the walk and I’m already feeling tired. Despite some cursory stretches in the car park, my body is as stiff as a board and I rue my decision to tackle this 974 metre behemoth without first hitting some less gruelling hills. After twenty five minutes I’m all in. My legs are lifeless, and the back of my shirt is saturated. I can’t imagine how I’m going to make it. “It’s always hard when it’s hot”, remarks a grinning Scot who passes me on his way down. I’m not sure that I consider 18 degrees hot, however. 

It crosses my mind to beat an ignominious retreat back down the narrow path, but I push on, motivated by the stirring sight of The Cobbler. Four years ago I zoomed up that 884 metre peak in pouring rain. If I could do that, surely scaling Ben Lomond is achievable. 

The hazy outline of the Isle of Arran

          Just below the summit the ascent is punishingly steep, a rugged jumble of rocks that demands some scrambling. The wind whips up and I suddenly feel very high and exposed. There is a lightness in my limbs and I’m aware of a slight dizziness: the first stirrings of vertigo. You can do this, Mike, I tell myself. Then, a familiar buzzing sound breaks my focus. I look up and see a single propeller Piper Warrior light aircraft no more than 100 metres above me, rocking its wings as it performs a fly-by. 

          After two and a quarter hours of pain, I reach my goal. I’m filled with the sense of elation that I always experience at these times. The panorama is awesome: far to the south, beyond the tip of the loch, rise dimly the tower blocks of Glasgow, while an ocean of mountain peaks, some still sprinkled with snow, is visible to the north and west. Four friends – students, I think – stand near the triangulation marker, chatting and laughing. Enviably, they look as fresh as daisies. Still, I bet they took the tourist path.

         

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