GPC News
VOICES
Mango-An yori
(Words) from my Mango Hut
by Dave Ashworth
September 25, 2011
1. Making Friends with the Wild Tomato
I very much appreciated Dexter Kishida's presentation on his efforts to bring the farm to the school. He made me realize how many of the youngsters…as well as young adults, would know where a carrot or a potato come from -- just 'stuff' that appears on their plates 'cuz 'they're good for you,' along with a Big Gulp of carbonated, corn-syrup enhanced, water.
If they grow up in a suburb, they spend most of their time looking at screens on their i-phones or game players, and even when they put their electronics aside, almost everything they see or do comes from other people: products made and packaged by others (even the healthy snacks at Starbucks), interacting with other humans most of their waking hours, viewing the scenery of "Nature" either through a veil of windows (often car windows), telephone poles, power lines, other traffic. They have practically no chance to 'be alone,' walking in the woods, watching two fireflies flying joined together, a frog zapping a fly with its tongue, or a snake swallowing a frog.
Even here in Makakilo, you hardly ever can see a mountain DIRECTLY – either they are obscured by power lines, or you are driving on the freeway into town at 0730AM with your windows tinted so dark you are lucky to see ANYTHING outside (cops cannot see you texting, either)… your world is almost totally just you and machines. When you get out of your machine, it is mostly you and OTHER PEOPLE AND NOISES MADE BY OTHER PEOPLE—and maybe a couple of dogs or cats, but you don't notice any geckoes or spiders. No time to watch fish darting out of the ocean, listen to waves crashing on the shore, taste a strawberry guava from a tree in Moanalua Valley.
When I was a kid in rural Massachusetts, you could say that the 'school went to the farm.' One early afternoon in the fifth grade, the principal came around to our classes and explained that the neighbor in the farm below our school told him that his three pigs and gotten loose and were wandering around in the woods. It took us a couple of hours to help catch them and get them back to their 'house,' --- and nobody ever thought of 'getting time off for overtime.' We often helped out in such situations.
If you have the good fortune to live in both urban and rural settings, you can experience both human life as it 'folds in on itself' in the city and compare this to the openness of forests and fields, birds and insects moving freely about. You will see the direct connection we have to not only our human selves but to our animal selves which include other humans, of course, and all the other creatures that have existed alongside us from the beginning of man.
Even here, near Kalaeloa, next to Kapolei, we do have the chance to discover food in the wild – the 'wildness' that comes from abandoned buildings and lands of Barber's Point. I have discovered wild tomatoes, the size of large blueberries, with a tart taste, ideal for pasta sauces. The abandoned lands, however, are shrinking as more development (redevelopment) clears them away. At least there is some chance to 'get away' into a more natural environment.
Regrettably, we seem to have lost this connection in many cases, losing affection and respect not only for our fellow plants and animals, but practically anything that is not human – especially if it can bring us advantage or profit. We have become blind to the fact that man is part of nature, that nature is not a tool for ignoring or exploiting as we wish.
I was thinking the other day of the ocean as one enormous living creature, a creature that senses all that happens in it. The following 'poem' came to mind. (The inspiration comes from the Zen monk Dogen, in his 'Kai-in Zanmai'
The ocean senses its surface and its depths, its bottom
All at once, everything alive,
Producing a symphony of many rhythms and vibrations
Fishes go after fishes – to join in their 'school,' to mate,
To consume other fish in one gulp.
'Rocks' on the sea bottom come alive to snatch some prey.
Whirlpools of warm and cold waters spiral upwards and around
Changing the rhythms and tones, all at once, and everywhere.
The rivers, which are the ocean's brothers
Pour their contents into the bays and inlets,
Contents both nourishing and enriching
And contents foul and toxic
Into basins and gulfs
Providing meals or mayhem
Nurturing the ocean's inhabitants
Or poisoning them, through no intention of their own.
In the shadows behind this aquatic drama
Stand corporate men of money and power,
Folding their arms across their chests
Treating the rivers and the lands
As dispensable, disposable, consumable
As they continue pursuing profit from anything not human.
2. "News FLASH"
This morning (Sunday) I happened to hear the New Dimensions program on NPR. The guest was Rachel Kaplan, who, together with Ruby Blume recently wrote Urban Homesteading, a book on home gardening for urban dwellers. It is certainly valuable to listen to the podcast of the program at New Dimensions on NPR.
They address important issues that ideally should be included in urban planning here in Hawaii. For example, if the development of Ho'opili goes forward despite the strong objections to the abuse of rich farmland (of course, I hope it does NOT go forward), it would be great if 'urban homesteading' could form part of the planning for such communities.
I downloaded it on my kindle, which now on the computer displays all the illustrations in color. It is well worth reading as it is ideal for the Hawaii environment. You can check it out at http://urban-homesteading.org/
Of course, we need to expand and improve our farming, bringing the farm to the school, as Dexter Kishida proposes (and implements!) and also to explore ways of cultivating a greater sense of individual and community responsibility for sustaining ourselves and enriching our environment by increasing the contacts we have with Nature, with the land, with our neighbors, and with Gaia herself.
Attached is a photo I took at Kaena Point several years ago.
