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Ecovillage Design Education - EDE - Week 4

3/16/2013

What mochi (pounded sticky rice) must see before the hammer falls...

Today was our last Saturday off, but we were all busy every single minute. We are having a farewell party on Monday. My classmates and I are cooking dinner for 120+ people and putting on a variety show too. It should be amazing, based on the amount of work we have put in. Please enjoy a few pictures from this week, while I tie up my last three projects before I fall asleep tonight...

I helped present on ecovillages vis a vis disaster relief. The class brainstormed solutions for Ajishima. Thank you classmates!!!

We got some hands-on green building experience this week too!

Envisioning the future. (Source: Konohana Family)

Brainstorming Energy Use Reduction via Open Space Technology. (Source: Konohana Family)

Pounding rice, the old fashioned way. Then stuffing our faces with sticky gooey goodness!

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Ecovillage Design Education - EDE - Week 3

3/9/2013

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Happy Birthday to Me!

My birthday was at the beginning of this week. I think the best birthday present I could give myself would be knowing who I really am in the deepest recesses of my heart. Once I know who I am, I can work on who I will become.

Homemade air filter for the price of parts.

The cockroach shuffle is more relaxing than it sounds...

Melting beeswax to make a polish for wooden furniture and flooring

Breaks are rare here, so fifteen minutes under the sun on a pile of straw was heaven-like!

The view from my room. Those magenta buds just appeared

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Ecovillage Design Education - EDE - Week 2

3/2/2013

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I walk between two worlds.

I went for a solitary walk after lunch and found my self deep inside a dark pine forest. All of the sudden the scenery changed and I was surrounded by bamboo bigger than I could wrap my hands around. The two distinct ecosystems butted up to one another with only a few encroaching bamboo shots on the pine side and the rotted trunk remnants of a few pines on the bamboo side. I sat and listened to the clacking sound of the high bamboo branches swaying in the wind, and watched the dappled light trickle through the canopy. The first thing I noticed was that change, progression and succession (in the sense of one plant species overtaking another in the forest) were both inevitable and irresistible. For me, the personal change I seek with be challenging, but once I set my mind to it I know I can achieve it.

The second thing occurred to me as I started my way back. I realized that I was walking between two worlds. Literally, I was on the edge of two mutually exclusive forest types, experiencing all the sensations of both while not inhabiting one specific zone. Reflecting back, I can see the pattern in my life of living between two, often times many, different worlds: from being the smart football player in high school, to the American exchange student in Germany, to the vegetarian chef at a steakhouse all the way to the introverted team leader, and to the self-centered outsider trying to found an ecovillage community in Japan.

I believe I have the ability to see things from an outside perspective. And, I feel that I have gained insight from this pattern. However, neither world ever really accepted me nor did I feel at home in either. That could be the reason I have moved around the world so many times and tried my hand at so many jobs. I also think this is both the cause and effect of my most overwhelming character trait to turn inwards and shutout the outside world and everyone in it. I am totally comfortable alone, I do not feel the necessity to rely on others nor do I pay much attention to their needs.

I had a meeting later on with Isadon and Yoko-chan which basically confirmed all of this for me. I do not have a connection to community, and I struggle to make change happen on my own. While I do walk between two worlds, the balancing act is getting tiring. I do not really want to fall onto the side of forever alone. So to find my way to community I have to listen to, trust and share with others. This will help me with my marriage, with founding an ecovillage and even in raising my spirituality.

And now some for some lighthearted pictures...