Kitchen Permaculture

My friend Nandini in Delhi, I recently had the opportunity to visit. It's always fun staying with her, plus the food she makes is awesome.

She and a friend have recently put together a cookbook will be published this spring. It is international vegan food.  They've organized it in the form of menu's.  It sounds amazing, so far I've tried one item in the cookbook which is awesome.

It was a gluten free, oil free lasagna.

Basically it's made of steamed veggies which have been cut into strips, carrot, zucchini, eggplant, potatoes, and in between the layers is put a tomato sauce and a fermented cashew cheese.

The cashew cheese tops it, and I could not even believe that after baking it, the cheese even became crispy on top!  It was so delicious and I am certainly looking forward to their cook book coming out :)

An interesting thing they do with their orange peels is putting them in a big bowl of water to soak. This water than became very fragrant, and makes an awesome floor wash!

She also showed me her rooftop garden which was lovely, all of her kitchen scraps get placed in the top clay pot, mixed with leaves and then slowly the pots move down the line, until it becomes finished compost at the end. The compost then gives back to her garden in pots :)
She is growing spinach, sprouts, radishes and others.

She was having a hard time with aphids, and someone came to help her switch out all of her soil for new soil, and this seemed to clear up the problem.

All Creatures Great and Small & Naz Foundation

I recently had the opportunity to visit the animal sanctuary run by Anjali Gopalan.

I was contacted by Claude who is in charge of composting at the sanctuary.  They have a something like 1/2 an acre of a vegetable garden from which they feed their staff and center for children who are affected by HIV in Delhi.

I came to test the soil, which the results should be coming out soon, for general nutrients and also testing for heavy metal contamination.

The organic farm/animal sanctuary was beautiful. It was so touching to see all of the animals taken such good care of by Anjali and her staff, the animals are visited weekly by the employed veterinarian.  The animals that make their way there are typically in critical condition.  They may be missing limbs, or have broken bones, orphaned, blind, etc.  They had a small monkey who was paralyzed they were feeding, I also saw a calf who was rather disoriented as he was blind. A small pup couldn't quite keep his tongue in his mouth, he was missing a part of his jaw.

I asked Claude, is it possible to get prosthetics for these animals, is there such thing as a prosthetic jaw?  Claude looked at me and smiled, "Well just because they may look a little funny, doesn't always mean that their quality of life is any lower or they are less happy.  This one still eats normally and plays normally, just because he looks different doesn't mean he hasn't the right to be, or shouldn't deserve to be around."

Of course I didn't mean it in the sense that something ought to be done or else. But it's always a good reminder, for us all when we are ever seeking perfection and improvement.  I guess there are those who feel that way, that a dog with three legs may not live a happy life.  I didn't get that impression from the animals here. Their very presence really touched my heart.  You could definitely tell they had a good life, and had so much love, they were love. And it was beautiful to be there.


 They had many animals, they had donkeys, horses, cows, one camel, emus, baby monkeys, over 200 dogs, cats, peacocks, chickens, and baby deer who were very very adorable.

They also had a pond of fish :)

 They also had such a beautiful big and open kitchen

They recently purchased more land so they could expand the amount of land that the animals could have.  Claude is very keen on integrating as many permaculture principles as he can into the design as well.

As of now his compost his a mixture of old farm soil, ash, compost/fresh greens, straw and newspaper.  The crop looks awesome, he bought some simple soil pH tests, which indicated that the soil and the compost were rather alkaline -- about 8.0

Our thoughts were to maybe decrease the amount of ash used in the  compost.

Yet, it will be interesting to see the results from the soil lab because we also don't really know how accurate those tests might be.

In this picture you can see their system for watering, they put in these tubed pipes so that they only need to water into the tube, so the plant receives directly the water that it needs.

I am a little apprehensive about this method, just because watering the soil isn't just about making sure the plants get the water that is needed, it is also important to take care of the soil itself and the organisms that break down organic matter for the plants.  It would seem like a good idea to water the soil periodically to keep the soil itself alive, but I guess if there is limited water on site, of course the plants themselves will be prioritized.  

Assam, India

I am currently in Assam, India.  Upon arrival we drove through Guwahati, where we would be staying as well.  My husband is doing a 2 week project with a company located in Assam, and we will be travelling around visiting their different sites.  Mostly I’ve been room bound, since I’m working on school stuff.  My advisor has been generous enough to let me come to India and work on write-ups for my project.

 Some pictures from the road :)

I did manage to visit a museum in Guwahati.  It was actually one of the cutest museums I’ve ever visited. There were 4 floors to this museum many artifacts, most likely more than one hundred, however they had no descriptions posted for any of the items. It was anybody’s best guess what the items could have been used for, some of the items had a single name, and perhaps it was listed what the item was made from, often it was cow dung, hair, etc.  Amazing all of the things you can make with cow dung. I had no idea.

The most interesting part was 2^nd level where they had put mannequins out with all of the traditional styles of dress from all of the different communities. I had no idea there was such diversity among the people in the way they dressed themselves. Assam is in the Northeast region of India, quite close to China, Bhutan, etc.  It was interesting for me to see how politically we have drawn borders between countries, but how culturally borders aren’t so defined.  It’s observable in the styles of clothes that can be seen as well as in the bone structure of the face and shape of the eyes.  It’s interesting how the mixtures of characteristics typically defined to certain regions, take on a very unique form of beauty when they are blended with another 'country’s'. 

Afterwards our driver took us to the only ‘male’ river in the world. At least in the hindi language.  It was explained to me that the river looks very gentle from the outset, however on the inside the river is raging.  If anyone were to fall in at any point in this river, they would be absolutely done for.  Whether or not this is true, I don’t know. It was a beautiful river. 

We were supposed to go the next morning to a temple. The most famous temple in Guwahati, it is said that anything you wish for will come true when you are there.  Apparently this temple is supposedly a representation of ‘mother’s’ or ‘mother earth’s’ vagina.  I know it’s a bit strange sounding.  They even close the temple 3 days in the year to allow for the ‘temple’s’ menstrual flow.  Whatever that actually means, I don’t know, but apparently they figure it out with complex astrology.  It’s all very interesting.  I was told that inside the temple there is nothing, it is barren.  My husband looked it up, and found pictures of menstruating goddesses, in rather provocative positions with painted red all over.  Seemed a bit intense.  The last straw that really made us uninterested to visit the place was the continued presence of sacrificial killings of animals.  Goats often were the subjects. 

I made up my mind, no way would I be interested in visiting such a place.  Sorry, cultures have always fascinated me, but I can’t seem to wrap my head around why sacrifice is still such a big thing. I understand to an extent, many people live in fear of the unknown and of the future, of the wrath of gods and bad luck.  Anything that has been done by the ancestors, must have worked right, since the people are obviously still there.  How do you respect a people yet not support their practices? 

I’d like to see the age of man, where we no longer are bound by our fears but we are living in trust of life, and in respect of all beings on Earth.  This respect would be given to them because of their innate qualities, not for the qualities that are often used and exploited by humans.

I realized this too late, but only 1 hour from where I was staying was a wildlife sanctuary.  If I had been familiar with this sooner, I would have planned a trip there instead but as it was, didn't happen.  Maybe on the next journey :)

Yesterday we made it to Lanka, about a 3 hour journey from Guwahati.  It’s a much slower paced place, much more greenery than the average city in India.

I’ve been sneaking fruits to the goats who live next door to the guesthouse I am staying in.  Their pasture is unfortunately completely eaten to the bone. I have no idea how these animals are actually surviving.  The people who are ‘herding’ them seem to move them around often, however there are hardly other places that have grass or food available for them.  Anyway, I’ve been happily sneaking them grapes and apples. I’ve been doing my best to be discreet about it, never fun getting in trouble, good news is, I’m obviously a ‘foreigner’ to this place and the only advantage to not speaking the language is in playing dumb. 

I actually haven’t seen anyone who isn’t Indian in this place as of yet, I think for the most part ‘foreigners’ aren’t allowed in these parts of the country because of the political unstability of some of the places.  Now that I have a PIO, none of it really applies to me.  A PIO though doesn’t exactly change your skin or hair color, so the fact that I am not from here is all too obvious to most.  At the museum it was funny to watch how the people reacted to me.  They were sneaking pictures and sometimes forming crowds.  In some of the places in the south, they explained to me that often many of the people from smaller towns had never seen a white person before, the only place has been on television, so their first assumption when seeing a white person is that they must be a movie star.  In the south, the difference is in some of the villages that they will actually come up and ask for your autograph. 

Anyway, I find it all kind of cute and amusing. 

India is a very rich country, both culturally and ecologically.  I recently read in the paper about how the new prime minister wants to make it as easy as possible for business and industry to acquire land and make work very possible and easy here. It’s pretty disheartening to see the leaders of this country, basically say to India,  I don’t care about your health, longevity or happiness. I don’t care about your wilderness, your greenery or beauty.  The moment we throw all else out the window for the sake of development, pollution and business and the majority of the population doesn’t seem to bat an eye at this?  It’s a very disheartening time.  I hope to see people radically standing up to such claims with vehement enthusiasm to withhold from such kind of economic development.  It serves no one in the long run. Short term profit is a political joke.  A very sad state that our leaders have made us believe is the ultimate goal in life… but in reality it means nothing, just the degradation of our beautiful land and beautiful nature. 

At our last guesthouse, I was on the balcony admiring the trees and all, from the corner of my eye it looked like a white flower in the tree, I turned my attention to it, only to find that it was a crumpled up napkin. How did the napkin get into the tree?  A further inspection was that the tree was actually covered in floss, napkins and wrappers. They had been taking the trash, our trash from our rooms and throwing it over the balcony.

How can you be more at one with nature at the point? You can’t.

I immediately stopped using napkins.  In fact, I really would like to overall cut my use of products that generate waste, either because of their creation or disposal. I know this can be a difficult thing and requires that many thing to be used, ought to be made from scratch, from whole materials, grains, fruits and vegetables that don’t require packaging. 

The challenge that I would have is using a car as well as my computer.  Which is relatively needed for school. It would be possible to mitigate my use of my car perhaps, and opt for the bicycle more often. 

Let’s see how it goes. 

I think this is why I have such an immense appreciation for India.  The lessons it gives you through these extremes, you really wouldn’t otherwise get.  You can cognitively understand and ‘try’ to be a good person who uses limited resources, however your actions and repercussions are so disconnected from your life, how then do these lessons sink in?  I don’t think they properly can. 

So I am sitting here, in this nice guest house, listening to the village music which typically will permeate through an entire town. Not sure how they manage to get such an efficient sound equipment.

Last thing I wanted to share is that recently my brother in law and father in law in Pune, wrote to me. There was something about soil in the paper. 

Apparently much of India suffers from micronutrient deficiencies in the soil such as iron and zinc.  This is because there is so little emphasis on organic inputs in most conventional operations, the emphasis is on nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus, however over time this creates problems.  The article mentioned how this is having huge health repercussions; people aren’t getting the nutrients necessary for good health from eating from these lands. 

Awareness is certainly getting it’s way around.  I was also recently contacted by an NGO just outside of New Delhi. They have 1 acre, where they grow many fruits and vegetables for 30 children who have AIDS. They also have an animal shelter, and place for the residents who take care of the place.  The gentleman who contacted me is in charge of composting on site, he has learned a method of composting that takes only a couple of weeks for the nutrients to turn over.

He was curious to know if there was a way to make the system more productive, sustainable and healthy.  He was interested in soil tests and making sure there were no contaminants on site.  I did a little bit of research, since in USA soil tests for contaminants is pretty pricey, I quickly found out that it's no different in India.  Most of these tests cost about $ 10 per contaminant per sample which can easily add up to over $100 depending on what all tests you are wanting.   

I told him we could investigate his property’s history and understand what soil tests would be most relevant. 

I'll be visiting his farm in a  few weeks, and I'll be sure to update again and post some pictures, especially as they are doing a lot of great work and are very interested in permaculture and sustainability :)

All the best 

 Esther

PS

We also had the chance to drive by a wildlife sanctuary, it has the highest per capita number of rhinos in the world!

This picture is a bit blurry.. but it was so amazing to see the rhinos especially with their young.

What loving the self, could look like.

 It's common that many spiritual teachers, praise the idea of 'loving the self'.  Of course there are many benefits to this sort of phenomena, for example self confidence and perhaps even happiness in ones own skin.

It is definitely one of the most interesting things of the human experience.  Although, despite people's attempts to love themselves, it becomes more a badgering than actually a self discipline.  "I need to love myself, why don't I love myself? Why is it so easy for others to love themselves? What is wrong with me? Something is wrong with me? I am pathetic, I am useless, it's hopeless, I am hopeless"  It turns into a self sabotaging mission at best, in some cases, which is quite ironic and contradictory to begin with.

It might be that 'self love' is something that perhaps we are conditioned to do as children, how we perceive others' relationships to themselves, and how we often mimic that.

 The past 6 months have been a bit of a roller coaster ride for me in terms of a mix between my personal life and just essentially non-stop to-dos and work for school.  And sometimes the focus on math and science, is a little hard, for the self-identified artist within me. The colorful adventurer, humanist and empath.  I'm getting through it, and it's definitely a learning experience, but it doesn't mean that there are always no rocks to stumble over on the way.

Two days ago I decided to start a gratitude journal -- I feel like its one of those things you know is always a good thing to do, but for whatever reason, its not done,  not sure what  shifted this time, but I finally committed to it.  And, surprisingly I can see already such a big shift in the way I view my current reality.

My gratitude journal was started by watching this video  http://www.ted.com/talks/shawn_achor_the_happy_secret_to_better_work?language=en

I committed to writing for 21 days, 3 new things to be grateful each day, and 1 journal entry about a happy event that happened in the day.  I noticed that I had fallen into this thought trap -- "Once I'm done with school I can start my life, and then I can be happy."  -- although I have done that my whole life, ... "Once I start school I will be happy, or once I do this or that then I will be.... "

Yesterday a realization suddenly hit,  "what am I doing?"  Big things, can never actually make us happy.  They are merely the (thought/ephemeral) container(s) for the experiences we have on a day to day basis.  It's the small things on a day to day basis that make us happy.  A realization, an interaction with a sweet animal, a smile from a stranger, a clean home, fresh food to eat.   It struck me, that I've been living in this world of --- 'If only I was this way,' or 'if only I could do what I wanted' or' go where I wanted' or start 'this' or that.'

Yet, even when all those things are in order (if ever)... I'll still have a daily schedule... I'll still have to dos,  I'll still have mornings and evenings... and shared moments and alone moments.. nothing really changes.

The present is the only thing that we can base our truth and happiness after. Everything else is just a thought. Even the 'self' to some extent is a seemingly temporary structure that seems to have varying degrees of boundaries, identifications, expansiveness and contractedness -- all of which seem to almost be haphazard, as to how we feel and what we have energy to learn and do and create. I'm coming to think its also just a container for the truth -- which is actually only the present moment. 

War torn.

  For the most part, I feel so numb when I hear about war.  It's always on the news, always in the paper.  Yet, it seldom strikes a chord. Maybe because it feels so out of reach, surreal, and renders me completely helpless in what I can do to help. And sometimes, something shifts, and a chord is hit. Sometimes a single picture is enough to penetrate the emotional callouses I've developed over the years, and I feel something, I feel heavy.  I've somehow been given a life, where bombs and physical devastation, aren't a part of my day to day reality.  For so many beings, this isn't the case.  I wish there was something I could do.  Right now.  Sometimes I wish there was just some button that could be pressed... to pause life, just long enough, to set it all straight.  What are we doing? Why are we living like this?  Why do we care more about our iphones and tvs shows than we do our fellow companions on planet earth?  When did humanity become so separate from each other? How did we grow so much hatred in our hearts?  I do believe that we have such capacity to love, and such capacity to forgive.. can't we just turn it on... can't we just get over ourselves and our opinions.. and maybe stop the destruction? Or even better lend a helping hand.  Isn't that what being human is all about-- our capacity for intelligence and caring... and if it's not, can it be changed? Can we change? Praying for peace.

New blog

I have a new blog dedicated to vegan rebuttals.  I found myself often getting into conversations, where I would say the same thing basically over and over and over.

I continuously adding to this, and continuously adding more categories, it's such a nice thing though to have them all just in one go to place.

A lot of the questions actually have come from Facebook.  So if some of them seem like I am responding to a very specific question, it's because I am :)

Anyway, but my latest post was on protein, and meat substitutes, it has a ton of links to youtube videos :)

http://veganrebuttals.wordpress.com/

And I also have a blog dedicated to what I eat on a regular basis -- lately it's been really quick meals, because I'm always on the go --

Hopefully soon I will have more time for cooking and more involved creations :)

http://theveganfooddiary.blogspot.com/

Interesting discussion thread

http://www.veganforum.com/forums/showthread.php?5614-quot-We-have-great-respect-for-the-animals-we-kill-quot

I retrieved the following off a discussion board, someone had asked about the connection Native Americans had to the land, and how they killed animals-- and whether that was hypocritical even though they seemed to connected.  The following was a response.  I've also read, if you google native american and vegan -- you'll see articles on how actually many tribes were mainly vegetarian.  

 Atticus

The person brought up native Americans and how connected and grateful they were to the earth and all its creatures, yet they ate meat and hunted for their various needs.

If I would kill and eat you, do you think anyone who would say that I were connected and grateful to you/respected you? The Native Americans had a lot of rituals and ceremonies claiming that they had respect for other creatures, but unlike some Eastern ethnic groups/religions, who actually practiced what they preached, and did not kill animals for food, many of the Native Americans said one thing but lived in a way that clearly showed that they did not respect other living beings' right to live. The way Native Americans treated animals (and in many cases, humans) were more barbarian than lots of other ethnic groups we know of. Ie. they didn't just kill their enemies, they chopped their heads off afterwards and put it on exhibition, so to speak.

To write, say or sing that you you respect another being's right to live doesn't mean that you actually do it. If I respect you, I simply don't kill and eat you. If I kill you, I don't respect that you, and not I, should decide wether you should die or not. If you have decided that you want to live, and I kill you, I don't respect you, neither am I deeply connected to you, because if I were, I wouldn't end your life. 

All the Western cultures that has attacked, killed and exploited so called primitive cultures in other parts of the world throughout history has done it in the name of God their own religion/God. Prayers and religious ceremonies are often used in association with wars/killing of others, in all cultures, and Native Americans are no exception. 

I have the feeling that some brutal warrior tribes - in all cultures - 'insert' some rituals and ceremonies into their brutal actions, only as an attempt to try to hide how brutal their actions are, because deep down they know that what they do are against their own ethics. Maybe they're only trying to fool themselves, but manage to fool others as well. 

If you see a person or animal and kill him to satisfy your need for food or other products, you look at this creature as a 'product', just like factory farmers look at 'their' animals. Or - you look at it as a living creature and respect it until you are hungry or want it's body parts for other purposes, then that creature is just a 'product'. 

If a potential murderer see a rich man and kill him because he needs his money, he wouldn't get a way with explaining that the guy he killed didn't grow up in a 'human factory', or by telling the court that he lived a free life until he was shot. When it comes to humans, we know that killing is killing, and no person, Native American or not, would get away with theories about respecting the person, being connected with him or which rituals he had performed before he shot him. IMO, it's only habitual thinking that causes some humans to think that an Native American who kills an animal for food is doing something less unethical than a murderer who kills another human being for money, food or other selfish reasons.