What a Winetasting in Portugal Taught Me about Raising Another Generation of Farming

The Vineyard

Sunday evening my wife and I were deciding things to do while we were in Portugal. We thought to ourselves, let’s go see some ruins, castle, and all the historic sites. Going to a vineyard was an after thought because we thought they were all closed on Sundays, but there was one that stuck out to us. We said why the hell not, let’s go try it out.

Once we entered the estate there was very little activity. I saw all of about three cars and I thought to myself, yes, well, I think it is closed, until my wife said just go check and see if there’s somebody there. So I went to the door and a man came out. I asked if he was doing wine tasting. He nodded yes as he was coming from his vineyard, and dusting himself off. He looked like he was just getting done doing work by himself, no help, very sweaty but eager to meet me.

After a while he came out cleaned up and gave us a rundown. He was going to show us where he makes the wine, show us his vineyard. We got close enough to see some of the beautiful grapes and we got to have a charcuterie board with some of the wine he had available.

As we were making our way through, he was talking to me about how they got started, how his grandfather started this vineyard in 1960, his father was also growing wine, and he was next up. I felt this was very similar to my circumstance. Third generation. Here I am, potentially talking to my future self. It was interesting, it was fascinating, it sparked me. I loved the wine before I even had a taste of it.

After seeing his process, it wasn’t some high-tech machinery. It seemed very old-school, very manual, as if he paid attention to craft, detail, and the art of making wine. Soon my wife and I became fascinated by his methods and surprised that it was just him and a couple of friends who helped sparingly on the weekends for a bottle of wine, and his wife as well. The estate was immaculate. A garden, some fruits, some rooms that he rented out, and of course the beautiful vineyard and a dining room that was something out of heaven.

We started talking about whether he loved what he did and if he saw himself growing his operations. Two things stuck out to me. One was when I asked him if he wanted to grow the operation, he said no, I like my regular day-to-day job, which was as a banker in the local town.

The second was when I asked if he saw his kids running this vineyard when he was gone. He said I hope they do, but I am not going to pressure them. That right there flipped my whole perspective on its head. I always thought that our job as lineage and heritage was to pass the work to the next line. It was almost like a moral obligation or duty regardless of what you wanted to do. But his approach really sat with me. He said if my daughters want to, then so be it. If they don’t, then so be it.

The Generation That Left

As a third generation in coffee and cocoa, I think to my situation. In the early 1990s, late 1980s, my family fled Liberia when the civil war broke out. The migration from the farm had started before then, but my family was producing rubber for Firestone during that time. The work we were cranking out, it was almost by destiny that we had to work the farm. But the war tore me far from it. Fast forward to here we are now. I found my way naturally back to it, not by force but by honest will and vocation. Sometimes I believe the land calls you back. In my instance, I think that is what happened.

What War Takes That Isn’t Land

It is in our innate nature to want our kids to learn the skills and disciplines, especially those of agriculture. But sometimes things don’t go according to plan. There is always a big fear from grandparents and even parents that feel like farming can’t be rekindled, and once you break the link it is gone forever. You can teach us how a cocoa pod smells. You can teach us what cassava looks like. But the things you learned from being there and doing the work on a daily basis is a different thing, and when that breaks, the fear of it being gone forever, especially when it is being passed down from generation to generation, can hurt.

I am not the only one in this circumstance. There are plenty of people from around the world whose grandparents or parents had to leave farming to flee their land for a better life. The land didn’t leave them. The circumstances did.

 I Came Back. That Was My Choice.

Nobody asked me to come back to this. This is exactly why it meant something. I grew up in America, far from the farms in Liberia, far from the rubber trees and the cocoa and the coffee. I came to farming not through inheritance but through intention. That distance is actually what made it real for me. When the land calls you and you answer, that is a different relationship than one you were born into without a say.

The Mobile

Now that I have my own grom running around, I think about these things. A family friend gave us a baby mobile for my son and it has been the biggest inspiration for me. Every night I look at it when I walk into his room. I think about what we are building and who we are building it for. It is not pride or passion. This is memory. It’s a reflection of what we come from. For all of those who depend on our goods in their coffee cup, we are the beginning. I find it fitting that the reminder lives on a mobile, where everything is connected but none of the pieces control the other. It moves, it adapts, it balances. That is the most symbolism of all.

VI. Fourth Generation, If He Wants It

I also think to myself, does he want to do this? Will he want to do this? Does he want to become a baseball player, a football player, a mathematician, a teacher, a firefighter? Sometimes my wife humbles me. He will be what he wants to be. And that couldn’t be more true.

The vineyard owner and I are not so different. We are both trying to leave a door open instead of a debt. I will continue to build this for my family, our legacy, our heritage, to show that we come from origin. Shane the same. What our kids decide to do with it, that is their own, it’s our moral obligation to make sure we leave them with something that is worth having, not something they are forced to do.