Yesterday: Stung by a scorpion. (non-lethal. obviously.)
Today: Cured bamboo with a blow torch all afternoon.
- - -
Life is never boring around here.
27 January 2010
18 January 2010
The past 4 1/2 weeks...
...have been completely and utterly non-stop. Which, on one level is fantastic! I'm in a space of constant learning and processing about life, love, relationships, permaculture, people, community, the world, compost, building, gardening, teaching, etc...and am eager to keep learning more.
While on one hand, the last two and a half months have been filled with a plethora of *amazing* experiences and it has felt SO good to have my brain be once again in sponge mode, I've also been finding it really difficult to keep balanced with the varied and numerous contradictions embedded in the lifestyle here.
For example:
-living and experiencing vs. recording and relaying (note my inability to keep up with this blog as often as I'd hoped!)
-community contribution/responsibility vs. personal/healing time
-working on community projects vs. personal projects/goals
-physical/mental exertion vs. getting enough rest
-craving more hands on experience vs. my actual energy levels and role at panya
-desire for stability and consistency vs. the ever transient nature of life on the farm
-desire for daily routine vs. strong desire for flexibility
thinking about what's next vs. truly living and cherishing every moment as it happens (future vs. now)
-planning vs. doing
...to name just a few.
* * *
So! I've been chillin in Chiang Mai for the past 9 days, primarily to take a break from all of the goings on, and hopefully to gain some clarity and peace on some of these issues that I feel have recently limited my ability to truly just enjoy where I'm at and what I'm doing.
I keep forgetting that probably the reason I'm feeling overwhelmed right now is because there *is* so much stuff that's been happening, and happening so fast that I'm having a really difficult time processing it all. I also seem to need a lot more time to myself than any of the other long term volunteers in the community. Although they have all been incredibly supportive and patient with me about it, I still find it to be a tremendous personal challenge in regards to living successfully in community.
So, anyway...About "all this stuff that's been happening..." Here's some of the highlights (starting with the most recent events first):
Motu Proprio: Watch this (amazing) 10 minute teaser for the full length film by Ahooha below. The Thai man you hear talking in the beginning is Jon Jandai, the founder of Pun Pun, one of the closely linked, neighboring communities to Panya and organizer of the Living Seeds Festival (which I'll talk a little bit more about later). Christian Shearer, the founder of Panya, also speaks many words of beauty and wisdom in the film.
I think it is so exciting and encouraging that this film is being made. Not only has it been masterfully created, it expresses in such an honest, empowering and graceful way how this type of alternative living can be possible and successful.
If any of you have been curious about the philosophy behind why I've chosen to come out here and live on this farm for months with this community and learn how to live a fully engaged permaculture lifestyle, this teaser does a pretty darn good job of explaining it:
Other films I've been watching and highly recommend:
The Age of Stupid (with Pete Postlethwaite)
Food, Inc. (with Michael Pollan and Joel Salatin of Polyface, Inc.)
The Coconut Revolution (amazing, amazing film about community and self reliance)
Garbage Warrior
Haven't seen yet, but plan to very soon:
The Future of Food
The Story of Stuff
The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
The Real Dirt on Farmer John(true story of a farmer in Illinois!)
What the Bleep Do We Know?
Other Visuals: Here's some photos of recent happenings at Panya and nearby:
Panya Holiday Celebration
Living Seeds Festival (mentioned above, organized by Pun Pun. Here is a short article on the Permaculture Research Institute website about it! I had a really great time at the festival. It was the first time it had ever been put on, and was a total success!)
December Permaculture Course
Border Run to Burma (for my 90 day visa renewal)
Life at Panya (updated photos in here too, showing progress on new, natural buildings going up on site, peanut harvesting, thanksgiving...among other fun stuffs...)
Some Random Videos! (don't forget to read the captions!)
Other Stuff: Another thrilling thing for me over the last 2 months is that I've kindly been given the repeated opportunity (by the instructors of the building courses - Geoffroy and Greg - and Permaculture Course - Christian and Richard) to teach a session in each course on drafting and design. This has been such an amazing learning experience for me, and also extremely challenging. I aim to one day (in the not too distant future!) teach full permaculture courses, and it's so wonderful to have been able to start here. To all of you who are, or ever have been a teacher, thank you. I now have a slightly deeper understanding of the complexities involved with this job. You inspire me so!
My Role at Panya: Yet another thing that's been keeping me busy at Panya is the role I've taken on as visitor/volunteer coordinator. What this entails is greeting, essentially, *everyone* who comes to visit, whether it be for a day, a course or short/long term volunteering...get them settled in and feeling comfortable and giving a tour of the property. The property tours have been a great learning experience for me as it allows me to get to know the land better and better each time and teaches me what I don't know and still have to learn about the various aspects of the farm. Another responsibility I have in this role is checking/responding to emails from people wanting to visit and come for courses. This is pretty cool because I get to see every day more and more people learning about and eager to come visit Panya (which is awesome!)...however, it does tend to conflict with my personal desire to be on the computer/internet less and less. Like I said before, it's all about balance. I just haven't quite found it yet.
Learning Thai!: Something I've been very excited about in having so much time here on this trip is the opportunity to learn to speak, read and write better Thai. It's *such* an interesting language and I'm loving every minute of learning it. Within the last few weeks, one of the members of Pun Pun and I set up an informal language exchange, and have met once already to try to teach each other our respective languages. It's really cool on so many levels, especially because it's given me the opportunity to interact with and get to know their community a little bit more. And, it's super fun.
Wow! I feel as though I've only scratched the surface of the massive multitude of things that have been going on here in the last couple of months! I haven't even touched on the kombucha making (Maggs, that book you gave me has *definitely* been cherished and used lots around here! Thank you so much!), my furniture design/building project, vermicomposting, things learned for effective other methods of composting, my experience volunteering with Makhampom (back in November...), the incredible experience and sobering stories told by the people who came to visit from the NGO-NEED Burma, my bike ride though the village where I briefly witnessed a live cock fight in progress (weird and sad), building a traditional thai style haystack with Kae, Shelly and Will, the incredibly powerful and transformative 5 Rhythms dance night experience, the even more powerful and transformative EFT experiences I had during the PDC, the deeply moving and mind expanding conversations had during the World Cafe scenario night...But! I feel as though I should stop here for now (for your sake, and mine!) and try my best to *really* send smaller updates, more often.
I'm starting to sound like a broken record, aren't I?
Anyway, in a nutshell: things are amazing and intense and hard and fun and more full-on than I ever could have imagined...
Wishing much love to you and hoping all is wonderful in your worlds!
Thanks for taking the time to read this..!
While on one hand, the last two and a half months have been filled with a plethora of *amazing* experiences and it has felt SO good to have my brain be once again in sponge mode, I've also been finding it really difficult to keep balanced with the varied and numerous contradictions embedded in the lifestyle here.
For example:
-living and experiencing vs. recording and relaying (note my inability to keep up with this blog as often as I'd hoped!)
-community contribution/responsibility vs. personal/healing time
-working on community projects vs. personal projects/goals
-physical/mental exertion vs. getting enough rest
-craving more hands on experience vs. my actual energy levels and role at panya
-desire for stability and consistency vs. the ever transient nature of life on the farm
-desire for daily routine vs. strong desire for flexibility
thinking about what's next vs. truly living and cherishing every moment as it happens (future vs. now)
-planning vs. doing
...to name just a few.
* * *
So! I've been chillin in Chiang Mai for the past 9 days, primarily to take a break from all of the goings on, and hopefully to gain some clarity and peace on some of these issues that I feel have recently limited my ability to truly just enjoy where I'm at and what I'm doing.
I keep forgetting that probably the reason I'm feeling overwhelmed right now is because there *is* so much stuff that's been happening, and happening so fast that I'm having a really difficult time processing it all. I also seem to need a lot more time to myself than any of the other long term volunteers in the community. Although they have all been incredibly supportive and patient with me about it, I still find it to be a tremendous personal challenge in regards to living successfully in community.
So, anyway...About "all this stuff that's been happening..." Here's some of the highlights (starting with the most recent events first):
Motu Proprio: Watch this (amazing) 10 minute teaser for the full length film by Ahooha below. The Thai man you hear talking in the beginning is Jon Jandai, the founder of Pun Pun, one of the closely linked, neighboring communities to Panya and organizer of the Living Seeds Festival (which I'll talk a little bit more about later). Christian Shearer, the founder of Panya, also speaks many words of beauty and wisdom in the film.
I think it is so exciting and encouraging that this film is being made. Not only has it been masterfully created, it expresses in such an honest, empowering and graceful way how this type of alternative living can be possible and successful.
If any of you have been curious about the philosophy behind why I've chosen to come out here and live on this farm for months with this community and learn how to live a fully engaged permaculture lifestyle, this teaser does a pretty darn good job of explaining it:
Other films I've been watching and highly recommend:
The Age of Stupid (with Pete Postlethwaite)
Food, Inc. (with Michael Pollan and Joel Salatin of Polyface, Inc.)
The Coconut Revolution (amazing, amazing film about community and self reliance)
Garbage Warrior
Haven't seen yet, but plan to very soon:
The Future of Food
The Story of Stuff
The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
The Real Dirt on Farmer John(true story of a farmer in Illinois!)
What the Bleep Do We Know?
Other Visuals: Here's some photos of recent happenings at Panya and nearby:
Panya Holiday Celebration
Living Seeds Festival (mentioned above, organized by Pun Pun. Here is a short article on the Permaculture Research Institute website about it! I had a really great time at the festival. It was the first time it had ever been put on, and was a total success!)
December Permaculture Course
Border Run to Burma (for my 90 day visa renewal)
Life at Panya (updated photos in here too, showing progress on new, natural buildings going up on site, peanut harvesting, thanksgiving...among other fun stuffs...)
Some Random Videos! (don't forget to read the captions!)
Other Stuff: Another thrilling thing for me over the last 2 months is that I've kindly been given the repeated opportunity (by the instructors of the building courses - Geoffroy and Greg - and Permaculture Course - Christian and Richard) to teach a session in each course on drafting and design. This has been such an amazing learning experience for me, and also extremely challenging. I aim to one day (in the not too distant future!) teach full permaculture courses, and it's so wonderful to have been able to start here. To all of you who are, or ever have been a teacher, thank you. I now have a slightly deeper understanding of the complexities involved with this job. You inspire me so!
My Role at Panya: Yet another thing that's been keeping me busy at Panya is the role I've taken on as visitor/volunteer coordinator. What this entails is greeting, essentially, *everyone* who comes to visit, whether it be for a day, a course or short/long term volunteering...get them settled in and feeling comfortable and giving a tour of the property. The property tours have been a great learning experience for me as it allows me to get to know the land better and better each time and teaches me what I don't know and still have to learn about the various aspects of the farm. Another responsibility I have in this role is checking/responding to emails from people wanting to visit and come for courses. This is pretty cool because I get to see every day more and more people learning about and eager to come visit Panya (which is awesome!)...however, it does tend to conflict with my personal desire to be on the computer/internet less and less. Like I said before, it's all about balance. I just haven't quite found it yet.
Learning Thai!: Something I've been very excited about in having so much time here on this trip is the opportunity to learn to speak, read and write better Thai. It's *such* an interesting language and I'm loving every minute of learning it. Within the last few weeks, one of the members of Pun Pun and I set up an informal language exchange, and have met once already to try to teach each other our respective languages. It's really cool on so many levels, especially because it's given me the opportunity to interact with and get to know their community a little bit more. And, it's super fun.
Wow! I feel as though I've only scratched the surface of the massive multitude of things that have been going on here in the last couple of months! I haven't even touched on the kombucha making (Maggs, that book you gave me has *definitely* been cherished and used lots around here! Thank you so much!), my furniture design/building project, vermicomposting, things learned for effective other methods of composting, my experience volunteering with Makhampom (back in November...), the incredible experience and sobering stories told by the people who came to visit from the NGO-NEED Burma, my bike ride though the village where I briefly witnessed a live cock fight in progress (weird and sad), building a traditional thai style haystack with Kae, Shelly and Will, the incredibly powerful and transformative 5 Rhythms dance night experience, the even more powerful and transformative EFT experiences I had during the PDC, the deeply moving and mind expanding conversations had during the World Cafe scenario night...But! I feel as though I should stop here for now (for your sake, and mine!) and try my best to *really* send smaller updates, more often.
I'm starting to sound like a broken record, aren't I?
Anyway, in a nutshell: things are amazing and intense and hard and fun and more full-on than I ever could have imagined...
Wishing much love to you and hoping all is wonderful in your worlds!
Thanks for taking the time to read this..!
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