Day 35: Disastrous final skiing day with incredible friends

We assumed that our last day was going to be an easy ride. For one, because we know the piste and can ski it blindfolded. Secondly, it is not very technical, and thirdly, normally it is prepared to perfection. But considering the track record of this entire adventure, that's of course not how it went! 

We received a phone call to tell us the fantastic news that the last 10km of the piste were officially closed. So we said, thank you for this wonderful news, but closed or not closed, we are coming home (on ski's).  We checked the weather forecast which said 'a little snow', but that turned out to be an understatement; it started snowing around 10 and it never stopped! In fact, it is still snowing while I am writing this  (2 days later). 

Our friends (the sporty ones) decided to ski us home. Also, Stephanie Santer, a national ski champion, whose family supported us by offering us a hotel room in their famous Hotel Santer, decided to take a day off from work and ski with us as well. We were 7 in total. 



From left to right: Yolanda Clant, Arve Dinessen, Stephanie Santer, and me

We were supposed to meet at 10 am and because I know this crazy bunch of people, I stressed to be punctual, a suggestion that of course had no effect what so ever: -).  So once we all departed (30 minutes late), one of the group had put wax on his ski's that didn't work out too well. So instead of skiing, he kept collecting a mountain of snow underneath the ski's, making it very difficult to move forward. The both hilarious and great part of this unforgettable day is that two of our friends, Giorgio (Trainer world champion trail running) and Marzia (ex-professional XC skier), had not put their XC ski's on for many years, but decided to find their ski's from the attic just to be with us on our final day. To then ski (untrained) in fresh snow on a piste that is closed and thus, not prepared, is pretty hard work! 

And whereas Giorgio and Marzia had to remove the dust from their ski's, my friend Yolanda, the only other Dutch in the village, and European champion 400m (running), was going around the stadium before departure, and I wondered, what is she doing? Turned out she had never skied on XC ski's before: -) but decided to ski with us as anyway... So she took 5 minutes to learn how to do it. This is my crazy bunch of friends from the Italian village we live. Only when we were halfway through, ploughing through the messy snow on an empty track, Yolanda told me she also couldn't use her left arm as it was injured.. and the poles were too high..  So we all ended up swopping each other ski's and poles, to make it easier for one and other. So we have the wrong ski's, the wrong poles, the wrong wax, an increasing amount of fresh snow and a piste that is closed. So far so good...  then we arrived at a sign that said 'closed for risk of avalanche'...  which of course we ignored...  we finally entered a tunnel (where the train used to pass through). We had been informed that the tunnels were icy, so we were equipped with crampons to wear underneath our shoes. But we didn't know that the ice was not only on the ground but also hanging from the ceiling. 

There was no way of avoiding it, so we just tried to move as quickly as we could through the tunnels, hoping the ice would not fall on our head. 

The hardest part was that the snow was getting thicker and thicker and these are not the ski's to ski within the deep snow. So it was tough and we kept swopping ski's with each other, to give each other a break, as some ski's moved better than others. The ski day was like a soap opera and eventually, we made it to the end. I am very proud to call this crazy bunch my friends! 

A big thank you to Yolanda, Arve, Tanja, Stephanie, Marzia, Giorgio, Massimo and all the people that had to wait more than an hour in the snow at our arrival!  





From left to right: Yolanda Clant, Tanja Dinessen, Eleonora Orlandi, me, Marzia Brugiolo, Arve Dinessen and Stephanie Santer. 

Together we can end factory farming. You can support us via Tikkie or via of via ideal/paypal/creditcard

Thank you 🐷

Day 34: I support our farmers

While the only topic we can talk about these days is the Corona Virus, there seems to be a civil war going on in The Netherlands, On the one hand, there are the farmers and those who support the farmers. On the other hand, there are people who believe we should put an end to livestock farming. The farmer's argument is that they provide our food in The Netherlands. That is technically incorrect as about 80% of all the meat that we produce is FedExed to foreign countries. Every year we slaughter 640 million animals, so we can definitely say that we are one of the butchers of Europe.

Pigs that can go outdoors to explore the world, in a farm in Dobbiaco, South Tirol

I also believe it is not realistic to think that we all quit eating meat from tomorrow. So while there are still people who eat meat, we urgently need to move to a situation where our farm animals have better lives. Even if those lives are too short, let them at least be respectful. 

Following the undercover images of the barbaric abuse at pigs at Westfort by staff as well as by vets of the NVWA (the controlling authority), it surprised me that Minister Schouten was very quick to present a solution. In a professional environment, for example in aviation, which is an industry that leads in safety management, an incident is usually first followed by an investigation. People get suspended if the situation is serious, a thorough, objective investigation takes place, findings are analysed and conclusions are drawn. Only then, recommendations in the form of solutions are presented. Our minister, however, didn't need any of that; there was and is no need to suspend the operation, some form of investigation is on its way, the responsible people are told to behave a bit better next time and the solution is already there! Very impressive indeed.

The solution presented is to lower the production speed of the slaughtering. What the minister - or probably more likely,  the high-level NVWA manager who whispered this into the Minister's ear - didn't think about, is that this will just move the problem to a different place in the 'production line'. Already last summer thousands of pigs suffered from overheating while waiting for hours and hours in overcrowded transport vans to wait for their turn to be slaughtered. The presented solution is likely to make this worse. 

However, there is another solution, and it is a very simple one: we need to drastically reduce the number of animals we keep. Over and over again it is proven that we simply cannot cope with these quantities. So one would expect that I am against the farmers, but I am not.  If there is anyone to blame, it is the CDA and the VVD for trying anything they can to keep this sick industry going, I blame the supermarkets for pushing down the prices, that have contributed to the dire situation in which animals live; I blame the consumer for continuing to buy cheap meat at the cost of animal welfare, I blame the NVWA for being incapable, I blame Minister Schouten for a consistent lack of leadership and most of all, I blame myself for having eaten all sorts of meat for most of my life, without ever having wondered where it came from. 

Happy pigs at a farm in Dobbiaco, South Tirol

But do I blame the farmers? I sure believe that also they should take their share in the responsibility, but I often visit farmers and I know that most farmers really want to care for their animals as best as they can. All farmers I know are honest and hard-working people and I understand that they are fed up with people like me, who think they are clever because they read some reports and know all the numbers, but who have never stood with their feet in the mud. And as an entrepreneur, I also understand that farmers feel abandoned by the government for creating continuous uncertainty. Farmers ask for one thing and that is clarity, so they know where they stand, and the government is not even able to provide them with that.  

I think if we would enter in dialogue more often, we might actually discover that our ideals don't differ that much. Farmers might have great ideas on how we can improve animal welfare and what they would need in order to achieve that. If we would manage to stop exporting meat and live animals (and prohibit meat import), we can reduce our livestock by 80% and put a stop to long transport, which causes additional stress to the animals. This means animals can have more and a better life. Better for the environment, better for the animals, and probably more rewarding for farmers. The consumer will pay three times more, which means he will appreciate it more and is likely to eat less meat, which is also healthier. 

So yes, I support our farmers and anyone else who is open to not just achieve sustainable farming, but a way of farming that is kinder and more respectful to our animals, perhaps just like they do in South Tyrol.

Me, 20 years ago, with biological farmer Dick from Farm De Lindenhorst in de Hoef, I still visit their animals whenever I get the chance.  

Only through education, we can put an end to intensive farming and together we will!!! We are raising 10 Euros for every kilometer we ski, which will be used to make a documentary about pigs. Please help us to realise this documentary and make the world a place without intensive farming!

You can support us via Tikkie or via House of Animals Paypal Account
Thank you 🐷

Day 33: Let's stop insulting each other on social media (900 km Video)

When I read discussions about factory farming on Twitter or Facebook, I am surprised to see how perfectly decent people turn into untamed monsters as soon as they hit the keyboard. If I would count all the hours spent by Europeans (mainly in office hours), insulting each other and wishing each other the most horrible diseases, it might explain why our economy's growth rate sits at just 1.3%. 

Not too long ago, in The Netherlands, we fought against the sea and we managed to win that battle. I am not an expert on water management, but I somehow doubt that we managed to achieve this by throwing mud at each other all day and insulting each other from morning to evening.  

If we want to have any chance of improving the way we keep our animals, let's start by showing some respect for each other. 

#respect #dierenwelzijn #skiingforpigs

Day 31-32: Tyrolean hospitality

Since two days we are skiing in one of my favourite provinces of Italy, Sud-Tyrol. Until 1917, this province was part of the Austro-Hungarian princely County of Tyrol, but was then given to Italy as an incentive to enter the war on their side. During the rise of fascism, the German language was abolished, German teaching was forbidden and German newspapers were censored (except for the fascist newspaper called the Alpenzeitung).  Despite the political turmoil of the last century, the south-Tyroleans have managed to keep their identity, their culture, and their traditions and they are one of the richest provinces in the European Union.

I noticed that in South Tyrol there is a traditional culture of living with farm animals and from speaking to various farmers, they only have small to medium-sized farms and the animals live mainly outside on the fields for as long as the weather permits. Basically, they go back indoors at the end of the autumn, before the first snowfalls and that is a moment of celebration, a century-old tradition. 

The unconditional generosity and kindness of people from south Tyrol are exceptional. In the last two days, we have been skiing in Alpe di Siusi (Seiser Alm) and we were guests at Hotel Florian, a highly requested hotel, in the busiest week of the ski season. The family could have easily sold that room for a lot of money (as all the hotels were sold out) but decided to offer it to us instead. 

Mrs. Thomaseth, owner of this wonderful hotel

The next morning we had a photo shoot for the local press at the Alpe di Siusi Tourist Board and after our meeting with them, the tourist office called me to say that the Tourist Board of Alpe di Siusi had decided to financially support the realisation of our documentary of the pigs! They didn't ask us for publicity in return, they didn't actually seem to care about that, they simply care about the cause.  

The chairman of the tourist board, Mr. Kurt Malfertheiner wanted to meet us personally to hear more about our trip and invited us to have lunch at his hotel, Hotel Ritsch (recommended), which is located at the end of a beautiful ski piste with stunning views. Mr. Malfertheimer said that it is important that we respect our animals and that we offer them a dignified life.  

Mr. Kurt Malfertheimer, Chairman of the Tourist Board Alpe di Siusi (Seiser Alm)

As Mirko is officially THE most famous pig in Italy, he attracts a lot of extraordinary people. Also in Alpe di Siusi, he had a very special visitor who came all the way to our hotel to meet him. This time it was an Italian Olympic medal winner Karin Moroder, who decided to run the Medoc marathon with us in September: -)  

Olympic medal winner (cross country skiing): Karen Moroder

And a bit of weather on the way to keep us fresh and awake: -)

Only through education, we can put an end to intensive farming and together we will!!! We are raising 10 Euros for every kilometre we ski, which will be used to make a documentary about pigs. Please help us to realise this documentary and make the world a place without intensive farming!

You can support us via Tikkie or via House of Animals Paypal Account
Thank you 🐷

#SkieënVoorVarkens   #LanglaufenVoorVarkens

#Skiingforpigs #varkens #dierenwelzijn  #veehouderij #pigs  #altoadige #sudtirol #snow #freestyle #animalwelfare #animalstoday #olympic

Day 30: Hero

Yesterday, while I was skiing, I saw The Civetta (The Owl), one of the impressive mountains in the Dolomites, and one that I call home. I looked at if full of admiration and the next thing I knew (it must have been the tiredness), I found myself crying like a child just by the sight of it. On the left of it, the Pelmo, slightly higher than the Civetta, even though it doesn't look like that from the picture. If you cross the Pelmo, you literally arrive straight in our living room. 

In the last few days, I have been thinking a lot about someone who I don't often talk about, but who is always in my heart. My first boyfriend Maurice, one of the most determined and stubborn persons I have ever known. At school, Maurice was very clever and received advice to go to the highest possible A-levels (VWO). 

There was a problem though; Maurice had a dream, and this dream was to become a truck driver and to transport flowers (his parents are in the flower business). So Maurice had done his homework and discovered that attending VWO, would have taken him 6 years before he could see a truck from the inside. Instead, the lowest education would have taken him only 4 years... so why waste two years?  His no-nonsense motto was, if you want to do something, just go and do it. I thought it was an idiotic idea, and tried to convince him otherwise, but he was not having any of it. Maurice (with the brain of the size of the planet) chose the easy way, and attended the lowest eduction he could get and became a truck driver and drove flowers from Aalsmeer to France and Germany. 

In hindsight, he made the right decision, because not too long after he started working as a truck driver, Maurice became ill and fought against cancer for 3 years, a fight that in the end, he lost. In the years when he was ill (we were not together anymore at that time, but we always remained friends), not once have I heard him complaining. Instead, he was always joking, always cheerful and fun to be around. I visited Maurice the day before he died, and even then, at the most dire moment of his life, he was calming down everybody around him, and still making jokes. 

Maurice left us when he was 23 years old, and I have always wondered, why him? and why am I still here? I promised Maurice to do something useful with my life, which if course I didn't.... But I hope I made it up a bit and that today he would have been proud of me.   

This trip is challenging, not just physically, but also on other fronts.. and sometimes we all need a hero in our lives. Maurice is mine 💗

Day 27: COVID-19 Virus, I welcome you!

Factory farming is a major factor in the spread of new diseases like the coronavirus. 

As Bloomberg explains, epidemics are a product of urbanisation. It was only when humans started to live in highly densely populated cities around 5,000 years ago were infections able to attain the critical mass needed to kill us in large numbers. The worldwide disease outbreaks we call pandemics started to emerge only when our urban civilization went global. Think about this in terms of the livestock industry. In the space of 50 years, factory farming has “urbanised” an animal population that was previously scattered between small and midsize farms. 

Globally, the number of farm animals is about three times that of human beings. Some of the most serious disease outbreaks in recent decades have resulted from infections that have been passed on from intensively farmed animals to people. Yesterday, an Italian scientist who is working on developing a vaccine said: "As long as we continue to treat our animals and our planet without any respect we will have to be prepared for epidemics such as the COVID-19 virus". In other words, what goes around, comes around.

And therefore I welcome the Corona Virus and say thank you to China! Does that make me an extremist? No, I am not, and of course, I sincerely hope this virus will be under control soon and that there won't be any further casualties. But the world needs a serious wake-up call, and this might be just it!  I hope that this is a serious wakeup call for consumers, politicians, supermarkets and farmers to change this unsustainable system that has gone way beyond our control! 

This virus is a huge opportunity for sleepy Europe to wake up and turn the tides. There has never been a better moment than today. This is our chance as Europe, to take the lead, and convert factory farming into a sustainable, more animal-friendly and healthier way of farming. Simply put, to move from away from quantity and to start focusing on quality.  
This means smaller numbers of livestock, a full stop on the export of live animals, and reduced export of meat to other nations. Meat prices will increase, driving demand down (which is also healthier). So that is the price that consumers will have to pay. In return, they pay for improved animal welfare and for better quality, as the animals will have had a better life, without stress and will be healthier animals. 

Video in Italian for the 800th KM: I ask Italian meat-eating consumers to ask how the animal has lived when they buy meat in the supermarket, butcher or in restaurants, stating that if we continue to buy factory-farmed meat, we sustain this sick industry. In a civilised society, there is no place for any type of factory farm! 

Only through education, we can put an end to intensive farming and together we will!!! We are raising 10 Euros for every kilometer we ski, which will be used to make a documentary about pigs. Please help us to realise this documentary and make the world a place without intensive farming!

You can support us via Tikkie or via House of Animals Paypal Account
Thank you 🐷

#AnimalPolitcsEu #AnimalPolitics #PartitoAnimalista #Animalisti #StopAllevamentiIntensivi

#animalstoday.nl #varkensinnood #pigs #animalwelfare #dierenwelzijn #nvwa #skiingforpigs

Day 26: The Butler

I realise that I am more tired than I want to admit to myself and to tell the truth, I am officially exhausted. It is the thought of those millions of vulnerable, frightened pigs in those horrible closed and overcrowded spaces that keeps me going. The good news is that we just reached 800 km, and the bad news is that there is hardly any snow left. It is unsure whether we will be able to ski all the way home, but I have a good feeling that it will snow on the 1st of March, the day in which we should be arriving home.

My mother in law, who understands Greek and Latin better than most Romans and Greeks probably did themselves and who knows Dante's Divine Comedy by memory calls me 'The Ignorant'.  It may not sound very sweet, but I believe it is her way of showing affection (even though she would never admit that). To be fair to her, she has a point. There are many things, I have absolutely no clue about. There is one thing though... that I do know about and that is customer service. I travel quite a lot and the times where I experienced excellent customer service can be counted on one hand. Those who know me know that I never had much patience for poor customer service, but now that I am tired, my patience level has dropped to far below 0 and I risk to turn into an uncontrolled monster within less than a split second. 

The best things in life usually happen when you least expect them and yesterday was such a moment. Hotel La Tana dell'Orso near Ponte di Legno, a very elegant hotel decided to support our fight against intensive farming and offered us a room. We arrived very late, but were just in time to have dinner in their restaurant; a very posh place, filled with equally posh guests (apart from us: -). During dinner, I observed one of the waiters, and from very small things I noticed there was something special about him. He got my interest, he was polite but not stiff, he was friendly but not intrusive, he noticed everything that was going on and gave impressive advice on both the origin of the ingredients as well as on the wine. I noticed that he adapted his style to each different guest and the more I observed, I understood that to me, he was the most fascinating person in that restaurant. I was convinced he was not an ordinary waiter and was eager to get to know this person. So on our way out I chatted with him and he explained that he is actually a butler by profession (which explained why I was impressed) and a storyteller by hobby, with a prdound interest for local languages. His name is Iuri and he explained that this area (Ponte di Legno), like many other areas in Italy, had their own local dialect and when a language gets lost, a culture disappears with it  Iuri has a great knowledge of the local dialect that was spoken by shepherds. In that language, shepherds could speak to a lady, without her understanding what was said, and as such without risking to get into trouble. 

For example the shepherds would say: " Te do' 'na scabrinada sul baitel dei stodui' which is dialect for: "I am going to give you a slap on the house of the flees'; meaning: 'I am going to give you a slap on the head'. 

                                             Iuri



This is the last update about the actual skiing for the next few days because we have now arrived in Trentino and I do not wish to give any of my readers the idea to come here on a holiday! 

This province has opted for a policy to reintroduce the brown bear because that brought in interesting funds. In 2017 this became inconvenient due to so-called 'aggression to a tourist'.  Trentino politicians responded quickly and killed 2 female bears. Note that this so-called aggression was the result of a human being who proved unable (reason unknown) to use his brain. This perhaps, somewhat naive person (this is my best attempt at remaining polite, which I don't think is succeeding) met two bear cubs in the forest and decided to take a selfie with them. He didn't think that perhaps when there are baby bears... that maybe closeby...there might also be something else.... something slightly bigger... in the form of a mama bear. 

Having traveled in Alaska where I have seen brown bears myself, I have learned enough about these fantastic animals to understand that it is A: quite rare that a bear attacks a human being without provocation, and B: when he really intends to do so, there is not that much chance of survival and it usually ends in a slow and cruel death. In this case, the person in question just ended up with a scratch from mama bear. Clearly, this bear never meant to harm this person, but more likely, she wanted to protect her cubs and send a sign saying, get lost! 

Instead of educating people on how to behave when they encounter a bear, Trentino politicians decided this was not good for tourism and simply killed mama bear. 

So apart from a meeting with the organisers of one of the worlds biggest cross-country ski events (The Marcialonga), that happens to be here, we are refusing any hospitality in this province and we won't be publishing anything that might promote tourism here as a protest for the politics on bears in this province. We are here because there is no way around it in order to ski home, but we are keeping our stop in Trentino to the minimum. We recommend everyone to avoid Trentino as a holiday place until the bear politics change in this area. 

Only through education, we can put an end to abuse in intensive farming and together we will!!! We are raising 10 Euros for every kilometer we ski, which will be used to make a documentary about pigs. Please help us to realise this documentary and make the world a place without intensive farming!

You can support us via Tikkie or via ideal/paypal/creditcard



#butler #intensivefarming #pigs #skiingforpigs #trentino #orsi #bears #varkensleed #nvwa