This spring, seniors and students of Richmond, British Columbia are coming together again in the garden on Richmond High School’s property. Seniors who live in the high-density housing around the city centre started the Community Garden in the same plot of land that the High School had used for its garden in previous years. Working in the same space, they have created the beginnings of intergenerational relationships with students of the Fit for Lifeand Pre-Employment English classes who learn about gardening, sustainability, local foods and nutrition while they work the soil.
The Richmond High School & Community Garden pilot project, an idea of Evergreen, a national charity that makes cities more livable, was initiated last year with grants and funding from 7 different companies and community agencies. This model hybrid garden, sponsored in 2010 by the Vancouver Foundation, includes four 3’ x 32’ beds for the students and 16 garden boxes with 6’x 6’ plots for the seniors.
After the implementation of the garden on school grounds, teachers adapted school curriculums to include activities such as: learning about local foods and adapting recipes; growing herbs and spices for use by culinary students in the cafeteria program; creating tasty, nutritious snacks students can reproduce at home; making bread; and digging and building new gardens. Students who may have experienced difficulties learning in the classroom became receptive, helpful and useful in the garden.
“The students enjoy being in a non-academic environment doing different tasks,” said Ian Lai, local chef and project coordinator in this pilot program. Ian, founder of the Master Gardeners program of the TerraNova Schoolyard Society (which brings 300 elementary school children a year into a 65-acre local community garden to learn about soil science, gardening and cooking from volunteer experts and teachers), will be mentoring two Richmond High students to maintain their school garden during the summer months this year. These students, stewards of the Richmond High School & Community Garden site, will spend two half days per week learning how to garden from Ian and connecting with the local seniors while they tend their garden plots.
This year, both generations are planning to cook together or share a potluck meal together at the high school on Earth Day, World Food Day and possibly Harvest Festival in the fall. Seniors and youth have developed a mutual comfort with being in each other’s ‘territory’: just by being in proximity to each other over an extended period of time, they have gotten past the stereotypes about people who are older or younger. Old and young alike now share and explain what they know and keep an eye on each other’s gardens.
“We see the Richmond program as a model of what a hybrid community/school garden could be,” adds Ian. “If other schools and districts who own the land their facilities are on would convert a portion of their school grounds to gardens, they could support learning objectives, local food production and the ‘green’ movement, as well as develop intergenerational collaboration in their communities.”
I recently came across
a website called The
Beauty of Aging. Besides the fact that I love the title, I was
impressed by film producer Laurie Schur’s commitment to find role models
who demonstrate that aging is a beautiful process. Her 35-minute
documentary, Greedy for Life, captures the stories of two dynamic
women over 80 who embrace life—despite its challenges—with energy and
enthusiasm. Shirley Windward, an 88-year-old free spirit, has recovered
from being in a coma and near death in 1990 to live life fully: creating
ceramics, writing poetry, dancing and sharing music and laughter with
her husband and friends. Lavada Campbell, an 83-year old dynamo, has
“still got things I want to do”. She flamboyantly exudes energy and
warmth in all her activities. Proceeds from sales of Greedy for Life go
towards production costs for The Beauty of Aging, a one-hour documentary
about the optimism, fearlessness and sense of purpose of five vital
American women of diverse ethnic backgrounds in their 80s, 90,s and
100s.
The New York Times reported
on March 5th that the U.S. is helping the Somali government prepare to take back Mogadishu. As part of a counterterrorism
strategy, this American support may make the country, steeped in anarchy
for 20 years, less hospitable for Al Quaeda and Al Shahab and its
allies. Young Somali men who have been training for the past few months
in neighboring Djibouti, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Sudan are now
reinforcing the 6,000 to 10,000 troops, freshly armed and equipped, that
will be led by General Gelle. What this means for the Somali people
waits to be seen, but in all probability, it will involve more forced
displacements and refugees seeking asylum.
While government
forces in Somalia get ready to regain control in the capital, Djibouti
is steeling itself. According to Ann Encontre, UNHCR representative in
Djibouti, southern Somalia and Mogadishu have been relying on local food
supplies since WFP withdrew its food aid program in January this year.
Local UN staff in Somalia have been distributing non-food items, such
buckets, pots and pans, and UNICEF have been providing vaccinations.
Other agencies on the ground have been catering to people’s needs where
they have access outside of Mogadishu. But by April, Somali’s reserves
from its 2009 bumper crop might run out. It is expected that hundreds or
thousands more of its 1.5 million uprooted citizens will desperately
try to cross the 36-mile long border with Djibouti, avoiding Kenya’s
closed borders and Ethiopia’s numerous roadblocks, to find refuge and
sustenance.
Djibouti is supportive of the Somali government.
This tiny coastal nation, with its scant rainfall and rising
unemployment, already imports most of the food for its 600,000 citizens.
Considering Djibouti now shelters 13,000 registered refugees in Ali
Addeh camp and 1,000 Somali and non-Somali asylum seekers in urban areas
(many of whom have been here since civil war broke out two decades ago
in Somalia), the gap between what the government can provide and what
the people need will continue to grow larger. Currently, Djibouti
government staff and UNHCR staff screen incoming refugees at the border
at Loyada to verify they are legitimately coming from the troubled zones
of Somalia (and not peaceful areas like Somaliland) before granting
them prima facie status. Once they are registered, fingerprinted and
photographed, legitimate refugees are taken by truck to Ali Addeh, the
closest camp in the district of Ali Sabieh, which shelters 12,000
people.
All refugees here face two possible solutions: local
integration or resettlement. Recently the U.S. government started a
resettlement plan for people at risk, taking in approximately 400 of the
most vulnerable women, household heads and some of the longest-staying
refugees in the camp. Meanwhile, brilliant university students, young
men who left Ethiopia in 2005 along with others who fled Mogadishu and
Eritrea, find life in the camp untenable: they have no future there.
Education facilities and resources only are available up to grade 8 for
2,000 of the 3,000 camp children. Resources are needed to build a
secondary school to accommodate the 1,000 adolescents who are receiving
no secondary or higher education, especially the young male adolescents
who, like the ex-Mogadishu university students, are all potential
targets for recruitment by Al Quaeda and Al Shahab. UNHCR is discussing
the possibility of establishing resettlement programs with Canada,
Australia and Nordic countries to ensure opportunities exist for those
who are willing and able to create a new life elsewhere.
For
those who remain in the camp—and that is the vast majority—life focuses
on the essentials: shelter, food, water, healthcare.
It is an
ongoing struggle to meet the needs of new arrivals. There are never
enough tents to provide shelter, and in the extreme heat and
strong winds of the region, families are left to fend for themselves.
Soon after arriving, many women, unable to make ends meet, are forced
into domestic service to feed themselves and their children. “Girls are
exposed to sexual violence at all times,” shares Ms. Encontre. “We see
them being forced to work as domestics as young as 8 years old, and very
often they come back to the camp pregnant after having been raped by
the men of the household.”
“We’ve been seeing an alarming
number of refugees coming into the camp from south and central Somalia
who are severely undernourished, anemic and sickly,” adds Ms. Encontre.
Last year, the UN started a nutrition project with donations from
a French company that provide robust proteins, vitamin A and iron in
the form of enriched peanut butter. UNHCR supplements this with liver,
sardines and vegetables. Currently, one medical doctor from the
Asian Medical Doctors Association bears responsibility for the health of
all 12,000 people in the camp. This one doctor cannot possibly meet the
growing needs of the camp’s population.
Cooking has its
challenges in terms of energy resources. The French Army brings in
20,000 litres of kerosene to the camp each month and every family
receives an allotment. However, without the benefit of energy-saving
stoves, the women must resort to scouring the desert for sticks,
trees and charcoal. Not only do they destroy the environment in doing
so, but they also put themselves at risk. Young girls and women now have
to travel 5 to 10 kms to find firewood and water: a number have been
assaulted and raped by men from the camp and the surrounding areas and
districts. Lighting some key areas around the camp with solar panels may
provide some limited protection, but cannot address the underlying
issues: lack of sufficient fuel and lack of respect for women.
Water
is even more essential than food and energy in this very arid desert.
Providing 20 litres of safe drinking water per day to each refugee in
the camp poses enormous problems. The area has received its first rains
in 6 years, but the sheer number of refugees has pushed the area’s
natural supply to its limit. Each week, money goes to pay for a rented
truck that brings in water from the closest well, which adolescents
from the camp help distribute. The relatively inexperienced refugees
are responsible for chlorinating their own water with pellets, a
critical task with latrines still located downstream and upstream from
the camp.
In January, the team of Djibouti’s French-speaking
water experts who were to be working on setting up a proper water
filtration and preservation system for the camp were sent to Haiti
to help with relief efforts there. Meanwhile, the camp, on standby for
another team to be identified, hopes to find assistance to buy their own
water truck. Discussions are being held between UNHCR, UNICEF, and the
Government focusing on the possibility of digging another bore hole in
the camp or of opening a second camp in an area where the water supply
is more plentiful. Wells in any location require permits and the help
of outside experts for at least a year to supervise the necessary
work.
The cries for help are many.
Efforts to
empower the Somalis caught in this situation focus on providing them
with essential skills and opportunities to contribute to their refugee
community. Adults and young children alike clamor for lessons in
English. Every afternoon, parents sit in on their children’s lessons in
the camp school for an hour or two to learn what they can. The camp’s
university students and adolescents all speak English as their common
language, and crave to learn more. Local Catholic and Protestant
churches have housed volunteers teaching here in their accommodations,
which are a 45-minute drive away. UNHCR’s guest house is available near
the camp as well; however, volunteers tend to stay for only three to six
months before moving on. The need for volunteers to teach English
has not yet met the demand. At the same time, opportunities for French
language courses are also very welcome by refugees to help them
integrate locally into this Francophone country.
Last
October, the UN began running several pilot projects to keep refugees
busy, provide additional food and give them some income. Those involved
in income-generating projects (involving activities like sewing,
baking bread, providing tea and cool drinks in cafes and selling goats,
meat and vegetables) receive a certain amount of money to run their own
small ‘business’. They must account for their expenses and report their
profits every week. Refugees use their earnings to buy clothes and
shoes. The initiative, funded by several thousand dollars saved through
restructuring done at UNHCR’s headquarters in Geneva, is a beginning.
If
you or your organization are interested in contributing time or
resources to the process of empowering the Somali refugees living in
Djibouti, please visit www.givethemshelter.org and join UNHCR’s campaign
to send them 2,600 much needed tents. To find out more about the living
conditions and the situation of Somali refugees, join a live Twitter
feed organized directly from Djibouti with Kathryn Mahoney, UNHCR public
information officer, on March 23.
12 am EST
9 am PST 7pm Geneva 6pm London 5 am Sydney
Opposing forces are constantly in dynamic motion, striving for balance and harmony.
When
99.99% of human beings all desire the same things (to live peacefully,
feed their families and enjoy life's abundance), it is no longer enough
for us to simply strive for peace.
In these challenging times, we need to transform the entire dance of creation and destruction.
By Shae Hadden | BioPerhaps
as a reaction to the annual peak of consumerism (the pre and
post-Christmas holiday season sales), I’m thinking these days of ways
of alternative non-material gifts for my friends. What comes to mind
are the types of things we, in our technology-driven world, may be
taking for granted as everyday conveniences. Yet, in many parts of the
world, these are considered luxuries.
It’s easy enough now to
share images and videos of ourselves with either the world at large or
a select group of friends and colleagues using sites like Flickr, Vimeo, Blip.tv, Facebook and YouTube.
When it comes to gifts for loved ones, creative items like online photo
galleries, calendars, books, photographic prints, and ‘home-made’
videos made with images you’ve taken are one-of-a-kind presents that
say “I took the time to create this for you…instead of spending 5
minutes at a store buying something made in a factory.”
And
you don’t have to rely on your ability to shoot extraordinary photos or
video. As prices for consumer-level photography and video electronics
drop, more and more ‘amateurs’ are able to play with these media and
share their creative work online. When they apply Creative Commons Licences
to the materials they publish, they are, essentially, giving away their
rights to their online digital media. Depending on the type of licence
they’ve applied to the image or video, anyone can republish it, edit
(or in the case of video, annotate) it or link to it with or without
attribution. This has impacted both the photography and video
industries in that prices for ‘stock’ footage have dropped: there is
just too much quality content available now through user-generated
online sources. Which again, makes it easier for consumers to find
exactly the right images to create high-quality creative gifts.
For some people, getting cited or mentioned on Wikipedia
is on their ‘wish list’. It’s easy to give them their wish. Anyone can
become a contributor to this free global encyclopedia. To contribute,
just create an account and log in. There are currently over 11 million
‘users’ (contributors). Wikipedia content is also under a Creative
Commons Share Attribution Licence…so you could even capture an entry
you create or modify and then turn it into a poster or other brochure
to share as ‘the gift’ (just include an attribution).
If you
know of other ways to give holiday gifts that are essentially ‘free’
and environmentally friendly, please share them with us by submitting a
comment.
By Shae HaddenAccording to Dr. David
Suzuki, “it is not progress to use up the rightful legacy of our
children and grandchildren.” He opened the first Elders and the Environment Forum
on Monday in Vancouver, Canada with a keynote address that focused on
the role of elders in the environmental movement and how we can make a
difference:
Tell it like it is, find our voice and speak out
Tell us all what is possible and keep us fixed on creating the future
Remind
younger generations that true wealth is found in our relationships with
family, friends and neighbours (in community) and that people lived
full, rich lives long before we had all this ‘stuff’
Teach children that the word ‘disposable’ is a ‘dirty word’
Help
younger generations see how things are shifting environmentally in the
world by sharing the changes we have seen and are seeing in baselines
(for example, the differences in salmon runs between now and years
past)
Challenge the perspective that views the natural world
as an ‘externality’ (as economists do), in which all the services that
ecosystems perform are irrelevant to calculations of value
Teach
young people the values of thrift and stewardship by showing them how
to live in community (for example, teach them how fix things when they
are broken; how to compost, grow things, harvest and store food; how to
knit and sew and darn, etc.)
Dr. Suzuki’s message is not a
nostalgic call for a slower-paced lifestyle. It is a vital reminder
that we have had and can have fulfilling lives based on what we do with
other people. And that we can help heal our relationship with Mother
Earth while we’re at it.
I attended the David Suzuki Foundation's first Elders for the Environment Forum
today in Vancouver, Canada. The event drew 200+ people, including Elder
representatives from several First Nations and concerned 'older'
citizens from Canada and the U.S. Following are some of the highlights
from an inspiring talk given by Miles Richardson, former Grand Chief of
the Haida Nation and a member of the board of directors of the David
Suzuki Foundation.
"We are all in the same canoe, and we have to begin paddling together in the same direction."
"An Elder is very importantly and universally recognized as a
knowledge-keeper. But we look to them for more than that. We depend on
them for wisdom, the distillation of that knowledge gained from
living and experieneces, and we depend on them to pass that on from
generation to generation.We look to them for guidance when we face the huge challenges that life puts in front of us. We look to them for validation when we are doing what we believe is right when others can't understand or cannot see what we see."
"Being an Elder is not about age. You don't become an Elder because you've grown old. An Elder is someone whose integrity I trust and whose wisdom I respect. That must be earned and real."
"Talk is good. Actions are stronger."
Overheard at the 4th World Wilderness Congress: "Economic growth is an interpretation. The environment is a matter of survival."
Wisdom from an Elder given to Miles when he was complaining about
the loss of his native culture: "Before you take another step forward, take a step back and listen."
Check back later this week for more highlights from the speakers at this event.
By Shae Hadden | BioMy
habits of reducing and reusing come from a tradition I inherited from
my family, a tradition that firmly believed in the value of sharing and
stewardship. My father used to tell me of Depression days when his
mother would wash the tea bags and dry them for reuse, and when he,
being a ‘middle’ son in a family of 13, could always count on wearing
‘hand-me-downs’. Considering the environmental and economic crises we
face, it’s no surprise that the principles of communal sharing,
stewardship and ‘gifting’ are feeding the move to reduce, reuse and
recycle. People of all ages are looking at ways to keep ‘stuff’ out of
landfill sites.
In the 1960s the hippies of Haight-Ashbury
opened ‘free shops’ to swap clothes, shoes and personal items. In the
US today, ‘giveaway shops’ have evolved into ‘swap sheds’ in rural
towns (where people leave things that are usable but unwanted for
anyone to take) and ‘free stores’ or ‘free bins’ on college campuses
(stocked with donations or items that students have sorted from trash).
Official give-away stores with retail storefronts have existed in
Amherst, Massachusetts and in several locations in the Detroit area.
And The Free Store operated in NYC until March 2009.
An online version of this concept has emerged. There’s a free national website where you can search for items by zip code: Take Me I’m Free. The global player in this scene, the Freecycle Network™,
comes out of Tucson, AZ. This online network of 4,836 groups with
6,601,000 members is moderated by volunteers. Of course, there’s always
the FREE listings on Craigslist as well.
An
‘offline’ development is the Really Really Free Market (RRFM)
movement. Collectives of people commit to creating community around
sharing resources and caring for each other: they gather in community
spaces to share goods and services, clean up afterwards and take home
what they are unable to give away. The first RRFM was organized in
protest of the G8 Summit during the anti-globalization protests of 2004
against the Free Trade Area of the Americas. RRFMs have emerged across
the U.S., and the first Canadian one was started in Toronto earlier
this year.
Next up… how ‘gifting’ influences our lives online.
By Shae Hadden | BioI’ve
been glancing in shop windows recently as I wander my new neighborhood.
There seem to be more sales and discounts now at the retail outlets
than ever before, as if lowering a ticketed price will lure consumers
in to buy when the prevailing mood is one of restraint and caution.
Experts argue over whether our market economy is going to limp along in
its current form or be remade or redefined. Scarcity thinking seems to
predominate consumer behavior. Meanwhile, what I don’t want us to lose
sight of are the barter and gift economies that co-exist (and continue
to evolve) alongside the regular buying and selling of goods.
A
‘gift economy’ is one in which people give away products and services
without any expectation of compensation. In a way, bartering is a
reciprocal form of ‘gifting’, in which two parties exchange what they
need with each other and eliminate the transfer of money. In a gift
economy, simultaneous giving to others (and not just a back and forth
between two people) is looked on favorably, as it circulates and more
widely redistributes resources within a community. In some societies,
the person who ‘gifts’ is seen as being altruistic and is accorded some
social status for being the ‘giver’. In others, gifting is simply seen
as an expression of a genuine concern for others.
Thinking of
the world in terms of limited resources and little time left to save
the planet can easily lead us into thinking along the lines of “There’s
not going to be enough…”. Conversely, the gift economy rests on a
belief in ‘abundance’. In early human societies (before the existence
of currency), the sharing of food and other perishables ensured the
continuity of the group and the ‘abundant living’ of all. Native
American potlatches allowed leaders to strengthen the community by
sharing their accumulated wealth with their followers. In Tonga, Samoa
and some of the outer Cook Islands, reciprocal gifting is still part of
their culture today.
In North America, we still practice this at
the family level (when we share our time, money, food, shelter and
wisdom with relatives). What I find interesting is that the concept of
‘gifting’ has expanded to include things like:
Open source software (free access to software code for developers)
The blood bank system
The organ donor system
Gift exchanges
Regiving networks
Creative Commons Licences (free access to other people’s creative works)
Wikipedia (a free online encyclopedia)
Free schools
Give-away shops
I
see a connection between this movement and Eldering: a common
commitment to sustainability and a shared future for all. And I'm
reminded of the wisdom of my grandparents and my parents in dealing
with troubled times in their lives. I’ll be writing more about these
and other ways in which the gift economy is showing up in our lives
today in the coming weeks.
I
was in an interesting conversation recently about how we can interact
with people who hold different beliefs than ours. The question posed
was, “How can one be with someone whose beliefs are the antithesis of
our own?” An important inquiry to engage in, considering that a clash
of beliefs is at the heart of most conflict and strife between people.
Responses
from the group varied from escape (“We can’t be with them at all, so we
leave”) and avoidance (“We can’t be with them, so we avoid them”) to
pity (“The only way we can be with them is to think how sad it is that
they hold their beliefs”), and curiosity and compassion (“We can be
with them by observing their thoughts and relating to their essential
humanness”). Many in the conversation found it difficult to move beyond
pity. And yet, even pity is insufficient to resolve a conflict. For one
who pities still sees themselves as being ‘more’ or ‘better’ than those
they pity.
When we pity, what remains unspoken is sensed and
colors the relationship. I worked for a manager once whom I pitied, and
that contributed to increased antagonism between us—for it didn’t
create an opening for us to discuss what we shared in common and what
we both considered to be our birthright as humans. Basic things, such
as:
• Access to education and meaningful work • Freedom of expression • Safe places in which to live, raise children and grow old, and • Access to sufficient resources (food, water, shelter, medical care) to be healthy.
We
clung to our beliefs as if they were what we knew to be ‘truth’.
Unfortunately, the relationship deteriorated and I chose to leave the
organization. I found out years later that she had eventually left
shortly thereafter. Neither of us got to have a conversation about what
we really cared about, because we were entrenched in our positions
about ‘what was so’.
One of my friends once pointed out to me
that, for them, beliefs are not knowledge. That seemed to me to be
self-evident at the time, but in l my recent conversation about
beliefs, I became aware that many confuse their lives by equating
beliefs with knowledge. Yet, it seems to me that when we collapse what
we hold to be ‘truth’ (our beliefs) onto what we think we ‘know’, we
shut down any possibility of anything else being ‘true’. When we cling
to what we believe and know as ‘truth’, then we destroy all chances for
peace.
According to leaders like the Dalai Lama, true
reconciliation (and perhaps the only peaceful way through the world of
differences we inhabit) is available to us through wholehearted
compassion. When we can see and interact with others as human Beings
(as individual souls having human experiences) instead of as a
maelstrom of beliefs, then perhaps we can begin to live together
peacefully. I’m certainly not advocating that we condone behaviors and
actions that destroy life in any way. However, setting ourselves up as
better than another because of what we believe is a covert form of
resisting their beliefs.
Perhaps what underlies our
difficulties as a species is a belief that it is not possible to
fulfill everyone’s birthright to the basic elements of life. This type
of thinking contributes to our disagreements over resources and rights
and creates the so-called battle between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have
nots’.
What if … we individually and collectively choose another belief?
What if … we see the world as being sufficient for all our needs—as long as we respect each other and the planet?
What if … we see it as our responsibility to each other and to future generations to base all our actions in this belief?
What if … we focus on collaborating instead of resisting each other?
Perhaps
we could develop a whole new set of beliefs from this—beliefs that
support and serve our collective future and the future of our world.
Friends
and family have been stressing the importance of taking vacations with
me for years. I have somewhat deliberately avoided the conversation as
much as possible until now. End result: a lifetime of little travel,
lots of work and limited 'fun'. All work and no play makes for a dull
life. I've been beginning to wonder if perhaps I am afraid of taking
vacations...for every time I think about it, my concerns about all the
things that are remaining 'undone' while I'm away 'at play' loom larger
and larger. Yet I watch people around me taking time off throughout the
year (anywhere from a few days to several weeks to months at a time) to
go on pilgrimages, to make sandcastles at the beach, to idle away time
doing nothing in particular, and they don't seem to be suffering at
all. In fact, they seem to prosper for taking time off to rejuvenate.
So
I'm going to break my mule-like habit of grinding on through the summer
and take next week off. That means idle time away with no work-oriented
mindset. I've scheduled a couple of posts to go live on this blog
during the week...and will return in September. My intention: to follow
all that good advice and rejuvenate myself before summer disappears.
What
we do with our time seems to be an ongoing topic of interest for many.
Popular belief says we need to balance time for 'work' and 'life'.
Innumerable authors and experts have invented tools and techniques for
us to 'manage' our time. Common sense says that procrastination occurs
when we 'waste' time doing nothing or doing things other than what we
say we're going to do. More experts have written about how we can get
motivated, stop procrastinating and get down to business. Then why is
it that many still struggle with trying to stay focused on what they
really want to do?
I
was talking with a friend recently about our parents, about what we're
observing in their health as they grow older and what we think is
possible for them in terms of living arrangements. I think a lot of
Boomers are in this same conversation these days. A few things we
discussed got me wondering about how 'true' any of our thinking about
health issues in later life really is for our parents. I began
to ask myself whether we are fully present and mindful about this..
I’m sitting at my desk, watching the sun set behind the mountains,
listening to the city winding down at the end of a long, hot summer
day. My big move is now complete: all boxes unpacked, everything put
away (at least somewhere, for now), cupboards stocked, and fresh linens
on the bed. Three months ago, when I chose to relocate, I had no idea
it would be such a circuitous route to my new ‘home’. But now that I’m
here, I’m glad for everything that showed up in my journey and for
everything I had to let go of in order to arrive at this most perfect
place for the next phase of my life.
By Shae Hadden | 
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