Another cup of jasmine tea

chapter 2

We were greeted warmly at the station by a middle aged hippie with long straggly hair and a long beard. He drove us from the station in an old, draughty Land Rover that had seen better days. It had a peculiar earthy smell about it. The ash tray was full of dog ends from roll up cigarettes. It needed a good clear out in fact. It was almost as muddy inside as it was outside.
The hippie called himself Luna. He said we had arrived at a good time of year, a time of abundance after the harvest.
Luna drove up into the beautiful hills of snowdonia. The trees and hedgerows gave way to weathered rocks and gorse filled fields. I thought we must be going to live on some kind of farm with cows, sheep, horses and ducks. The road had gone from a two lane highway to a rather scary, twisty one track road with passing places. We turned off that road onto a dirt track with grass growing up the middle of it. We were getting close. I looked forward to living in a big farmhouse, with big hearty meals eaten by the fire in the kitchen. Instead, we stopped at a sorry looking, dusty campsite, with broken down caravans, huts and shelters made from bits of wood and plastic cobbled together. We were shown into what looked like the only substantial building, which was a wooden barn with a corrugated iron roof and a big metal sliding door. Inside the barn, it was strewn with straw on the ground. There was a lot of weird looking people hanging around the other end of the barn where it was smoky from a camp fire, over which was slung what looked like an old witch’s cauldron. We were introduced to Peony, a female hippie wearing long loose brightly coloured and mismatched garments that had seen better days. She gave us a bowl of the soup like mixture in the cauldron. We sat down amongst the other hippies that were there to eat our bean stew.

We had, in fact, arrived at a hippie commune. A group of dropouts who wanted to live an alternative lifestyle that didn’t rely on wealth, class or status. We could come and go as we pleased. Everything was shared and everything would be provided for us. In return, we would have to do some kind of work to help the group out. Most of the camp were vegan or vegetarian. Meat or fish was not allowed within the communal lands.
As we settled in, we found the commune owned a few goats and sheep that grazed the hillside slopes. They were kept purely for their wool, but occasionally they were milked as well. The milk was made into cheese and sold in a nearby village.
There were a few ducks and hens, who provided eggs, but most of those were sold. There was an extensive vegetable plot, sheltered from the prevailing winds with a woven fence made from green willow.
Within the commune there was someone who was in overall charge of the sheep, someone in charge of the cooking, there was a potter why had his own kiln made out of hardened mud, there were people who could spin wool, or weave or dye it. There were several gardeners for the vegetables. Other people made jewellery, made batiks wall hangings, crocheted hanging baskets, wind chimes from bamboo, or mobiles made from wooden beads. Everyone had their own home made project that they could sell on in the village, or a practical skill that could be used within the communal lands. One chap built and repaired dry stone walls, but could also weave split willow bark into fences or other objects. We could choose to have a go at any job we liked. If we didn’t want to work on a particular day, that was all right too, as long as it did not become a habitual thing.
It seemed like an idyllic lifestyle. It probably would have been if the commune was situated around the Mediterranean instead of a Welsh mountainside. The reality was probably very different to the dream. There was no piped water, so, every day someone had to fetch it from the stream. The water was sometimes brown from the peat and full of bracken. There were no showers. No baths. If you wanted more than a face wash, you had to go for a swim in the tarn about a mile further up the mountain. The water there was deep and freezing cold.
There was no electricity, which meant very little contact with the outside world. We had no telly, no radio, no phone. The nearest pay phone was in the village. The postal service was good, though and the postman delivered to the site, so we did not have to go and collect it.
There was no central heating. Some of the caravans could use calor gas, but that was expensive to run. Even in September, it got cold, especially at night. We wrapped up in communal jumpers and handmade blankets And sat by the fire in the barn while someone played the guitar and sung a few songs in the evenings.
One of the first things we were helped with when we got there was how to sign on. Everyone living there received dole money from the state as ‘pocket money’. They could spend that on whatever they liked. Money earned from selling things they had made was extra and not declared to the government. It struck me as a bit odd at the time, but I never thought it was fraud.
It did not take long for our appearances to change. As long as my hair was long enough, someone knotted it into dreadlocks. They were easier to look after on the mountain than our ultra short styles. With my short hair, I needed a thick hat and a scarf around my neck to protect me from the biting wind. My thick, dreadlocks with their natural oils were great for keeping out the cold.
Relationships in the camp were weird. No one was married, although you could have a long term girlfriend or boyfriend. If you fancied someone, you could approach them and ask them for a shag. It didn’t matter if they were in a relationship with someone else. Ken and I both received an excellent sexual education from one of the older women, who used to be a prostitute. You did not have to be private about it either. It was common for someone to couple up with someone else in the evening in the big barn. The only reason couples went elsewhere was because it was warmer or cosier.
As the months passed by, the days grew shorter and the temperatures dropped. The population dwindled in the camp as some of the residents left to move into proper centrally headed houses. As they left, there was room for me and Ken to move into a caravan. It was warmer than sleeping in the barn on a mattress on the floor, with a sleeping bag and blankets to keep warm, but it was still cold, especially when we were trying to save money by not putting the heating on.
There was always plentiful alcohol, roll up tobacco and marijuana in the camp. The alcohol came in the form of cheap beer or cider. It was easier to open one of those than it was to trudge down to the stream and fetch some water. We also made our own hooch from the glut of fruit, vegetables and grains in the autumn. The hooch was lethal! It tasted terrible, but got you drunk within minutes!
As winter fell, the ground became hard and icy. People no longer put energy into making things to sell. They put all their energy into keeping warm. That included getting so drunk or stoned that you didn’t notice the cold so much.
They reminisced about warm or hot summers they had spent touring pop festivals, meeting friends and getting stoned.
Ken and I fell into a similar routine. No matter how many layers I put on, I was constantly cold. We quickly learned how expensive the calor gas was. You needed to be right on top of it to get any heat out of it. It would only just take the chill out of the air. It wasn’t worth it. So we huddled with everyone else beside the campfire in the barn. Finding enough wood to burn was a constant worry. We lived above the tree line, so it usually meant a trip out in the Land Rover. If someone had just received their giro, we might buy the wood. It saved all the hassle in finding enough dry wood. Sometimes the only stuff we could find was wet and covered in lichen. We would bring it back to the camp anyway in the hop that it would dry out in the barn and we could use it in a week or so.