Hazing

Today was a slow day. We didn't have much to do- so we spent most of the day finding things to clean and taking a long time doing it. One of the highlights of our cleaning frenzy was cleaning "the press"- a huge machine that you feed grapes into that presses the juice out and leaves the grape skins and sediment behind. Grapes go into a hopper on top via forklift and the grapes fall into a cylindrical chamber that holds 10 tons of grapes, the whole chamber spins, juice is fed out of the machine and the skins are left inside it- at which point one of us "cellar rats" has to climb inside of the press (through a little porthole in the bottom) and shovel the grape skins out. But fermenting grapes, which is what we're doing here, releases a tremendous amount of CO2 gas- which is kind of poisonous- and going into confined spaces, full of CO2 gas, and doing physical work is potentially dangerous (we use the buddy system, don't worry) and something that we will all get ample practice in apparently. (There are a few other situations, imperative to winery operation, that involve CO2 gas, confined spaces, temporary employees and shovels).

So today, we just cleaned the whole thing in preparation for using it. Which involved all four of us climbing through the little port hole in the bottom of the machine wearing headlamps, coal miner style, and crouching in the dark damp stainless steel chamber as Jordan showed us all the different valves, grooves and traps that need extensive cleaning. One of the tools that is used to clean under the seams of the bladder that lines half of the machine, looks like an Ascheulean hand axe. Crouching in the dripping cave, our faces dimly lit by each others headlamps, holding Ascheulean hand axes, I felt as if we should be butchering an antelope carcass. But no, we lowered ourselves one by one, back onto the winery warehouse floor, Jordan's horrible music still beating on from the radio perched halfway down the first row of tanks. He apparently bought his iPod used and the last user didn't bother to erase his music before giving it to Jordan and Jordan never bothered to replace it with his own. Or so he claims. It's very possible that he just has very bad taste in music. It mainly consists of terrible remixes of already very mediocre pop. Anyway, we emerged from the chamber unscathed.

I was the one however, who they sent back up- clad in rubber boots and a camoflage rain jacket- in the chamber with a hose to wash out all the chemical we sprayed up into it. The hot water from the hose fills the cave with hot steam and it starts to feel like a sweat lodge, sound from outside dampened, echoey and dripping. Anyway, this is what I deemed as hazing. Although secretly, it was kind of relaxing.

The next instance of hazing was much more outright. With all of the tasks at hand occupied, I was kind of puttering around the warehouse in a post-lunch digestion haze, hosing things off and tightening things with wrenches, when Jordan had the idea of having me clean the skylights.... These are skylights on the ceiling of the warehouse- two stories high. I thought he was kidding.

But sure enough, he dashed outside and came back a little while later with the forklift. In it's forking grip was a plastic bin- one of the ones we transport grapes in- and in that, a bucket of soapy water and a sponge. I hopped into the bin and, reminiscent of a hot air balloon ride I did a few years ago, but much less varafiably safe or at all legal, the forklift slowly rose me up two stories where I washed the skylights and weathered playful abuse as to how they were going to "dump me" if I didnt do a thorough enough job.

Tomorrow- back to real work. Whew!