More Canadians reconnecting with rural roots

Every day, before and after school, Kris Vester and his seven brothers and sisters used to do chores on their family farm.

In addition to growing grain, hay and a massive garden, his parents raised goats, chickens, pigs and cattle on their land, a quarter-section west of Carstairs and north of Calgary.

They expected, indeed needed, their kids to help out.

Kris was in charge of the goats: milking, feeding and cleaning up after them.

"It was just part of life," he says.

"Everyone realized they had to do something to contribute."

But Vester, like so many farm kids, wanted nothing more than to leave rural life behind him.

"I was like any of us. You wanted to get the hell out," he says with a laugh.

And he did. After high school, Vester, now 34, completed an honours degree in German and Classical Studies at the University of Calgary. He then taught for a year in Germany, and came back to Canada to start a master's degree.

That's when he realized that although he was good at the academic life, he didn't want to do it.

"I couldn't chase things around in my head the rest of my life," he says.