Ethics (on Island Time)

Photo: 9am at the classroom... but where are the students?

Day 1 of the Vanuatu PDC started promptly on island time (2pm vs the scheduled 9am), and we had a beautiful class discussion and exchange of cultural ethics & values to kick things off.

Photo: English on the left, Bislama on the right.

English: Earth Care
Hawaiian: Malama A'ina
Bislama: Lukaotem Gud Kraon ('Look out 'em good ground')
Local Example: The traditional practice of slash-n-burn agriculture (where a garden plot is cleared from the forest by a controlled burn) has evolved from a cultural practice of working with what the landscape has to offer.  Once food crops were grown & harvested, a family would move on to clear & farm another plot, leaving the old one to fallow so that the jungle could reclaim it and replenish the nutrients taken from the land to grow those crops.  Only after the land had a chance to regenerate itself would it be farmed again, a practice which makes sense given the low populations supported by the land.

Photo: Child on Dixson's Reef; wanting to create a better world for our children is fundamental human value which transcends all boundaries.

 English: People Care
Hawaiian: Aloha
Bislama: Lukaotem Gud Pipol ('Look out 'em good people')
Local Example: The islands' communities are interdependent with each other, and rely upon people looking after each other - each producing its own specialty matched to its lands (good fishing, or special varieties of yam, taro, banana, kava, etc) and trading its surplus with neighboring communities.  In this way a diverse, resilient network of community has been created which can adapt dynamically and respond creatively to challenges; especially useful in a land of seasonal cyclones and volcanic activity.

Photo: Community bamboo woodlot outside of village at Dixson's Reef.

English: Resource Share
Hawaiian: Kapu
Bislama: Sherem Ol Samting / Tabu ('Share 'em all something / Taboo')
Local Example: Sharing of resources also means stewarding of the resources entrusted to you; this is done most effectively by setting limits to consumption, population & growth.  Tabu is one system used to to limit consumption by forbidding the use of an overtaxed resource to allow it to recover (e.g a reef ecosystem or wild harvest area); the practice of requiring marrying daughters to move to the communities of their spouses was used traditionally as a way to limit population growth within island communities.

Photo: The balance between tradition & innovation / culture & change must be maintained if healthy culture is to keep evolving.  Without one or the other, culture (tradition) will become extinct.

Permaculture Design Training Begins (Day 06)

Opening ceremony with the Governor of Ulgii soum, the region's 'State' Representative, and none other than Dr. Beket (who showed up just after our 9am scheduled start with the other two in tow).  The customary speeches of acknowledgment, goodwill, and best wishes were given, and there were even some representatives of the other NGOs working in Ulgii City, bearing gifts and more well wishes, and even sending along representatives to attend the training (if they sent this guy all the way from Australia, then he must have something worth sharing). 

 

Photo: The Governor gives us his blessing.

 

To our surprise, Dr Beket joined the class and stayed for the entire day, quizzing me over lunch (potato-pickle salad, meat dumpling soup with cabbage, potatoes, and carrots, and a Kazakh version of a hamburger pattie drowned in brown gravy served on steamed white rice; enough food to send everyone into food-induced comatose for the next ten sessions) about the vast Aussie sheep and cattle ranches he had heard about, and how the heck (and why bother anyways) do they fence in their grazing areas (some of which are bigger than the American state of Texas)? 

 

We have a conversation (through Bek) about the state of agriculture in the developed world, the destructive consequences of modern conventional agricultural techniques, and of the need to be wary of 'science' and 'expertise' that is being given by a person whose livelihood depends upon the advice being Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Introduction to PermacultureEthics

 

The first day is as much a sales job (these students are NGO staff being paid to attend vs. paying students hungry & searching for the information), as it is where we set up the context for the entire course.  People anywhere in the world can usually spot a fake a mile away, and if there is no value shown in the beginning sessions than the potential to lose control of the class is high.

 

Apparently, we are doing alright because everyone manages to stay conscious for the last two sessions (Attitudinal Principles and Design Principles part I), even showing up early and staying a half-hour overtime to complete the day's final lesson on the Needs/Functions/Products analysis.

 

Photo: Dr Beket and Guest (in background).

Photo: Doc and Tileubek Kapu.

Photo: Makhadbbat, Chief Agronomist, ADRA SEAL Project.

Photo: Janat.

Photo: Janibek, Project Specialist for ADRA, Sagsay soum.

Photo: Altangerel (ADRA) and Gulia (World Vision).

Mongolian Permaculture: Day 14 – Preparation for Start of PDC

FLOODED!

Flooded out last night!

Nothing too major, but an impressive stream flowing right through the compound and threatening to back up the well. Trenches dug to take the water… right off the property!

It’s an interesting situation: Mongolia is actually a dry country, and the sandy soils do not retain what moisture there is very well. So why are they diverting this excess water flow right back off the property?

It may seem to be a blinding flash of the obvious when I state it like this, but let’s remember that this is a culture with no history of growing vegetables. The nomadic herding lifetsyle has developed as an energy store to last families through through the cold winter, and is a system that has worked for thousands of years. There has simply been no need to develop any agricultural skills. Rick summed it up well in one of his faceBook posts:

You should try gardening here. -40 degree winters, beach sand, super short growing season and little acess to water. Some co-operatives are watering 20 plus hectares by watering can. Apart from that the Mongolians don't like eating vegetables. Unfortunately grazing patterns are no longer viable due to population growth and weather change.

...just about sums everything up!

We all slept in this morning, worn from the last week on the road. Discovered the solar shower I brought along for the trip in a secret backpack pocket after hankering for a decent shower for the last 5 days. The shower I had last night replaced my previous experience about a week ago as BEST. SHOWER. EVER.

Went for a walk around town this morning to research resources available in the aiymag center and replenish supplies: bottled water, dried fruit, and other nibblies to break the monotony of meat-based dishes and supplement energy needs while teaching so intensively.

Kat scouted materials to knock together a solar oven, finding the necessary reflective foil for $3AUS in the last shop we entered – after walking into every single store on the main street. We walk back out of town with our bags overflowing and hands full of empty and crushed cardboard boxes.

The compound has been transformed since we left, four more gers and an old army tent marquee where class will be held have been put up since we’ve been gone.

Another walk around the compound the do a resource inventory for the practical lessons, and I find myself scouting for manure, dry weeds, waste cardboard, sawdust and green weeds for the compost prac. There is a whole houseful of manure in one of the abandoned building shells, and a huge mound of dry, carbony material on one of the rubble piles.

Rick has just walked in at 8pm from another scouting walk, back into town to prepare for his Observation Walk / Reading the Landscape class on Day 1. The Andi and George Band, with a kind of jazzy, bluegrassy sound plays on Kat’s computer, the shadows are lengthening outside and the compound is a buzz of activity as last minute preparations are made.

Mongolia’s first two week intensive Permaculture Design Class begins at 9am tomorrow.

THE CLASSROOM