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Well it’s been two weeks, I’ve showered 7 times total, haven’t received smell complaints, have been vegan other than some cheese that needed finishing, some cookies, chocolate chips, and brownies, oh and some hot sex. The first week I did half of a “day of silence”, this week I did a half-assed day of silence. I used my phone a couple of times, once to ask my roommate who was at the store to get me some chips (organic) and the other to ask a friend if it was a good time to come over to fill up a pitcher with beer (probably not organic) that was left from a kegger two nights prior. Could I have lived without tortilla chips and beer? Maybe. All I know is that I had some chips and some beer and I’m alive now. I can’t confirm that those things weren’t crucial to my survival. I also got on my computer two hours before my 24 hours was up, but that’s only because I had soooo much to blog about that I just couldn’t hold it in. Next week I’ll try to adhere more closely to the tenets of my day of silence, even if it means risking death by lack of fried, salted corn. Organic corn that is.
The other day I went grocery shopping and just splurged on organic produce. I dropped over a hundred bucks. Some of the highlights of my trip were: kale, spinach, shitake mushrooms, grapefruits, avocados, beets, various beans and nuts, peanut butter, salsa, roasted garlic hummus, various frozen fruits, and brown rice protein powder, along with several more plain-Jane items. I opted for organic with most things, unless the option didn’t exist or the price difference was outrageous. For example, organic apples, oranges, grapefruits, and celery are all comparatively priced to their non-organic counterparts, but an organic green bell pepper cost over five times the price of a non-organic one! ($2.69 vs. $0.50). As far as I know almost everything I bought was a product of the U.S. with the exception of organic Mexican avocados and some frozen fruit from Peru, Chile, and Costa Rica. Apparently they don’t grow mangos and pineapples locally. So I didn’t do extremely well as far as locality goes, but for pretty much the first time ever, I didn’t buy bananas since they are usually from Guatemala or even further south. I also bought honey from Hanover, KS. Honey is a controversial topic among vegans since it’s technically an animal product. Some people who call themselves vegans openly eat honey, which they know full well promotes insect slavery. Others who are “veganer than thou” think this is an atrocity. I am not on that level, nor do I ever hope to bee.
On my day of silence, which was a beautiful day, I wanted to go meditate in nature. However, I was busy from the time I woke up until about 7:30 PM with a performance that lasted half an hour. Since I had missed out on all the daylight, I decided to go to the tightest place to hang out after dark, the cemetery. I biked around there for a while. It was very dark, slightly spooky, and brimming with homeless people and high-schoolers cheesing. Okay I made that last part up. I found a comfortable spot near Roy and Eva Kiser, bless their souls, where I could lay down and see some stars and stayed until my feet were uncomfortably cold. It gave me time to recall, digest, and reflect on all the events of the day and previous couple days. It also gave me time to unwind and just think about nothing while watching the stars or closing my eyes. It was a very peaceful and rejuvenating experience. When I returned home, I found myself in a far greater mood than when I had left. I was transformed from stressed out and tired to upbeat and energetic. I would highly recommend it! I went back the next day to explore the trails at the far end of the cemetery, very cool area. Totally chill.
Ttyl.
Peace
I have now presented my poster to the class about my window farm. Thanks to everyone that stopped by to learn about window farming. Showing my window farm to people gives me an opportunity to educate others about creative gardening and producing/buying local organic food.
I was asked many times today about what I was going to do with window garden now that the class project is over. My garden will live on so do not worry. My window farm will be moving with me to a Boy Scout summer camp that I run. There it will hang in a window in the dinning hall. With this prime location I will have around 1500 people walk by it during the summer and I am sure that many of them will stop to take a look.
The possibility of having 1500 people learn about local food is an exciting idea that I cannot turn down. Exceptionally sense most of that 1500 will be middle school kids. Teaching kids at a young age is the easiest way to make meaning life changes.
And after camp the garden is moving with me to Chicago where I hope to expand it.
I hope that many of you are think about making your own window garden, and if you do please let me know. Here are a few things that I have learned from making my own can could help you.
First, herbs are the best to plant in a window garden because many of them do not grow to big. This style of gardening is not good for large plants. Also herbs allow you to continually harvest them without completely killing the plant.
Second, do forget to water them. The bottles themselves are not very big and with that they cannot store a lot of water. I have to water my garden every two days or it will quickly dry out. I learned this the hard way and my lettuce has not fully recovered from it yet.
Last, come up with a design of your own. You could simply build one close to mine or you could be creative. Being creative with your garden makes this project such a fun to do. A good friend of mine is now making one out of old sections of plastic plumbing of different sizes. Some of the pipes even have right angles in them so he can be even more creative with the design. He is planting wild flowers in his.
Over all this has been a fantastic project. I have truly enjoyed designing and building my garden and learning about environmental issues at the same time in class.
As many of you heard during my poster presentation I was unable to get a garden started at my targeted school. I explained that the reason for this was that this particular school is dealing with budget cuts, like all over public schools in the state, and they are trying to consolidate with another school in the area. For these reasons the topic of a school garden was not something they were ready to discuss this year at least. Hopefully with the few people I have discussed this idea with, they can reintroduce the school garden ideas in the years to come.
I have learned a lot during this semester about the way we look at food as a nation. We are successfully eating ourselves to death by eating this cheap food that comes from our overproduction of crops. If we take away some of the corn fields and replace them with vegetable fields or fruit orchards we would eat better food and not be so dependent on other nations for our fruits and vegetables. I feel if more people knew the facts about our food system and how little our government is doing to help they would be willing to start a true food revolution.
With all this information I have learned I the need to share it with my family and friends. Also I would like to continue researching and working towards getting more edible schoolyards in our state. If we can teach student to do geometry and chemistry we can teach them how to grow, cook, and eat healthy safe food. As Joel Salatin said in Food, Inc., imagine if we measured success by having less people going to the hospital this year than the year before, that is a noble goal. Shouldn’t that be our goal?
Here is all the information from my poster if anyone is interested:
The Problem:
The US Food System:
The way we eat food in this country has changed drastically in the last 50 years. We can now grow 200 bushel per acre when we could only grow 20 a hundred years ago. This is due to genetically modifying seeds as well as pesticides and herbicides.
We can now also “grow” chickens twice as fast as 50 years ago. And since white meat is what is in demand chickens now grow with larger breasts, so large in fact they can’t take more than 2 or 3 steps with out plopping down. With pork and ground beef we can feed them subsides corn very cheap which makes them fat and the meat prices go down. The average American eats 200lbs of meat a year. And a few companies control the beef, pork, and poultry industries. Four companies control 80% of the beef market. Tyson is the largest meat company in the world.
As a result of feeding cows corn a harmful strain of E coli has developed. Studies show that if a corn fed cow is allowed to eat grass for 5 days they can lose 80% of the E coli in their stomachs. But this is not done, they find new ways to “wash” the meat with chlorine to kill the E coli. So we get cheap beef from corn fed cows. Now the more than 12,000 McDonald’s and 7,500 Burger Kings can sell food extremely cheap which then leads to health problems.
The biggest predictor of obesity is income level. Today, 10% of income spent of food in the US, half the amount that was spent 50 years ago. More than sixty-six percent of all Americans are considered overweight, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Body Mass Index over 25 = obese). One in three children born in the 2000s will have early onset diabetes, 1 out of 2 in minority children. Twenty-five years ago, the average American consumed about 1,850 calories each day, now over 2,150.
What is the government doing?
Between 1995 and 2004 the US government paid $144 billion in agriculture subsidies. So they are spending money on agriculture practices that produce surplus grain that we feed to cows that could make us sick. If a plant is sending out contaminated products whether it is E coli or salmonella, the FDA does not have the right to shut them down, even if they repeatedly make people sick.
The government also gave companies the right to patent seeds, which is essentially patenting life. Over 90% of the soybeans grown in the US are Monsanto soybeans, which contain a patented gene. In 1996, it was only 2%. Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas, was a Monsanto attorney. He also helped with the passing of the bill that said a company could patent a seed. Now if a farmer plants his own, non-Monsanto seeds, and those crops become pollinated by his neighbors Monsanto seeds, Monsanto can sure him for seed stealing. And Monsanto has millions of dollars and powerful attorney’s and more often than not win these battles or force the farmers to settle out of court. They then can blacklist the farm from using their products, which are basically the only products left to buy in the market. So they take his money in court then his livelihood by not allowing him to purchase seeds needed to farm.
Both the Bush and Clinton administrations had close ties to Monsanto, whether it was donations or former high up employees. Our government is filled with those who used to work for companies which they now should be regulating.
The Solution:
Edible Schoolyards
In 1995 chef Alice Walker had the same idea and applied it in Berkley, California. As she walked past the same school everyday she began to think it was abandoned, the principle of this school then asked her to come and try a garden there. Two years later most of the asphalt was gone and in it’s place there was green. It was at King Middle School in Berkeley that the first Edible Schoolyard (ESY) was started, on one acre or land. Middle school students were not only taught about gardening but about history behind gardening and the science of cooking food. In the early years of this project there were after school cooking classes as well as cooking meals twice a month for their class. A summer class was offered in the Edible Schoolyard. From interviews you will find that the kids in this school want to take this class. They also find they like the food that is being made with fresh, organic produce that they themselves labored for.
ESY NOLA
Edible Schoolyard New Orleans, was created using the original schoolyard in Berkely, CA. ESY NOLA came about after Hurricane Katrina. The students at two public schools, Kindergarten – 8th grade, learn cooking and gardening by hands on weekly classes. The foods cooked there are specifically meant to teach the traditional style of New Orleans.
REAL School Gardens
REAL School Gardens based in Fort Worth, Texas, serves more than 40,000 children and 2,300 educators in 66 North Texas schools and 15,000 more teachers and students in the San Francisco area. REAL stands for The Rainwater Environmental Alliance for Learning. Their website states “Our goals are to create safe outdoor spaces to engage young children, to use nature to enhance student learning, encourage family and community involvement in schools, and to create vibrant, sharing networks of educators and partners who commit to putting school gardens at the heart of urban neighborhoods.” Founded in 1996 REAL gardens not only teach students how to grow and eat healthy foods, it helps build a since of community with the families of the students as well as the community.
Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution:
Jamie Oliver is a well known British chef who, at age 34, has done some pretty remarkable things. Jamie was born in England and started working with food at a young age at his father’s pub. At age 16 went to Westminster Catering College and spent time in Frances honing his culinary skills. After working under many chefs his first big brake was a TV series where he was known as The Naked Chef. Oliver then channeled his fame and cooking skills into working for the greater good. In 2005 Jamie made a four part documentary called Jamie’s School Dinner’s where he worked to improve the quality of Britain’s school lunches. This was part of a larger program in the UK called Feed Me Better. This program was successful in getting government money to improve school kitchens, more culinary lessons for cooks, and overall better school lunches. Oliver is very passionate about food and about teaching kids where it comes from and getting them to cook and love fresh nutritious food.
Now he is taking on America. His television show Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution takes him to Huntington, West Virginia to try and change with way this town eats and he focuses on school meals. The series is over now but he had some success in changing the way that community looks at food.
The Project:
Bern, KS
This small community would be ideal for a edible schoolyard project. It is a small farming community and there is no shortage of land for this project. I have spoke with some members of the community who show interest in this project. Since the other schoolyards I have researched are in warmer climates there would need to be activities to fill up the fall and winter that would have to do with the garden. Students could then learn about preserving food and cooking with the preserved food. Also they could research fruits and vegetables they are interested in growing and then be able to plant them in the spring. This is a basic outline of what this project would entail.
The cons to this project is that it is a farming community and they could show resistance to organic farming practices. Budgets are another con, this school is in the process of consolidating with another school in the area. This is because of state budget cuts and that takes up the majority of there meetings. They do not have a lot of time to think about projects like this. The seed has been planted in the minds of the community now, hopefully in the next year this idea will build steam and hopefully we will see a garden in the Bern, KS school in the next few years.
In Overland Park, Kansas an edible schoolyard began almost 2 years ago at the Hiersteiner Child Development Center. This center is associated with Johnson County Community College and the college advocated for the edible schoolyard. JCCC was given $21,218 from the Sunflower Foundation and another $13,000 from a private donor. The Sunflower Foundation works to improve the health for all Kansans. Unfortunately I could not find much about this center, it is a daycare, not a school and I believe it serves the children of JCCC students and well as JCCC employees. I’ll have to do some more digging and hopefully find more edible schoolyards in this area.
Check out a video about the Hiersteiner Child Development Center’s edible schoolyard HERE
This is one thing I didn’t really think about for this project. I do need to do more research about finding out if this is possible for public schools and where to get the money to start a program like this. If the state is willing to fund it that could be a big way to get schools involved. Many if not all of the public schools are facing budget cuts and would welcome funding. This funding could go towards those who would be teaching about the garden and helping in it, so additional funding could save teaching jobs.
Since we are not in California and produce does not grow year round there needs to be other activities for students while there is no planting, cooking, harvesting, preserving, etc going on. A few of my ideas include researching fruits and vegetables that students have an interest in growing. The older students can become the overseers of each of these crops and teach others how to take care of them . Also students of all ages can learn about the benefits of eating local and organic. They can research global environmental issues, as well all know that in the future and now this information will be vital. In the late summer and fall upper level students can be taught how to preserve fruits and vegetables so they can be eaten year round. And with this preserved food they can learn to cook with these local, organic ingredients and learn about healthy eating. As a video I posted on a previous blog said, this generation of kids are expect to live a shorter life than their parents. They are expected to die of heart related diseases as well as diabetes.
I have all these good ideas, at least I think they are good. I feel that is what I am good at. I can come up with great plans and ideas but I have a hard time being able to implement them. For that I must turn to those in the community where I want to propose this edible schoolyard. Lucky for me, one of those people include my oldest sister. She is a outspoken voice in the community. So my goal over Spring Break is to talk to some of these people and see how they feel about this project and see what they may want to bring to the table. In the case of the first edible schoolyard in Berkeley, they had many community volunteers that helped make their garden a success.
Does anyone have any other suggestions of what to do during the off season in schools while nothing needs to be done outside?? All ideas welcome 
The idea of school gardens is nothing new. In 1995 chef Alice Walker had the same idea and applied it in Berkley, California. As she walked past the same school everyday she began to think it was abandoned, the principle of this school then asked her to come and try a garden there. Two years later most of the asphalt was gone and in it’s place there was green. It was at King Middle School in Berkeley that the first Edible Schoolyard was started.
Middle school students were not only taught about gardening but about history behind gardening and the science of cooking food. In the early years of this project there were after school cooking classes as well as cooking meals twice a month for their class. A summer class was offered in the Edible Schoolyard. From interviews you will find that the kids in this school want to take this class, it is not a have to take it. They also find they like the food that is being good with fresh, organic produce that they themselves labored for.
The kitchen for the school was renovated so proper cooking classes could be held in it for the students. Many volunteers were vital in helping keep up the garden and teach about it for the students. I find this awesome that people would give their time to be a part of this but it does not really surprise me. They say kids born in the 2000′s are projected to live shorter lives than their parents. Many of them will get diabetes and some will get it before graduating high school. I feel like this is a cause I would be willing to give my time to and I am sure many parents and community member feel the same way.
I am hoping for the same reaction in the community I want to start this program in. My oldest niece will be a senior in high school there next year along with her 2 brothers (ages 14 and 9) and sister (age 12) hopefully they will be as excited about the project as I am. The community I am looking at is Bern, Kansas, a small community in northeast Kansas. It is a very small school who are facing budget cuts and I feel a program like this could not only get you grant money but could also save you food money in the long run. I am sure there will be some resistance and it will not be a year round experiment because unfortunately we cannot grow year round like California. But there are good people in the community that will hopefully help me carry out this vision. I guess we will see.
Hello, once more, gentle readers. This is my final, reflective blog. It seems really sudden that I should be done with this project. I definitely feel like many of my views have changed as a result of this project. Firstly, I now no longer believe in the infallibility of the certified organic label. This mostly comes from the readings we did in Katz, but also from the changes they are trying to make for the certification process. I believe, as a result of this project, I will now begin to buy more local products, and shop at the co-op more than I did before. Secondly, my practices in buying products have changed. Before, I generally just bought what was most affordable. But researching companies, I have found that there really are socially conscious, environmentally-aware ones out there, that provide good products. Sure, they might be more expensive, but if you take into account the costs to the environment, it really evens out. I believe that, by being mindful consumers, we really can make a difference, and this has also made a big change in my outlook. Before, I was always pretty hopeless about the changes I could make, but I realize that through discipline and by being educated, we have the power to affect positive change in the world.
Overall, I feel like my project was successful, because it really taught me a lot. Even though it was incredibly difficult to stick to it, I think the difficulty was as much a lesson as the project itself was. It isn’t easy to break habits we have had for essentially our entire lives. But breaking those habits are worth it, in my opinion. I know that as a result of this project many of my habits will change. Although I am sure that I won’t go to an all-organic diet, many foods, such as milk, are better for you – and in most cases for the environment – when they are purchased organically. So although this project didn’t change my entire life, it did change aspects of my life, and that’s all I could have asked for.
Dear Gentle Readers,
As you may recall, last week I had commenced with eating only organic foods inside the home, and was continuing to desist in eating non-organic food outside of the home. Well, let me tell you, eating 100% organic food is NOT an easy feat. Granted, I have only bought groceries at Dillon’s, where the selection of organic foods might not be as vast as someplace like People’s Grocery or some of the other places you recommended. However, I was able to get quite a few things – enough to last me a couple of weeks, at least. I got quite a few certified organic packaged products – such as shells and cheese and some different rice packages. I wasn’t able to find some basic things that were organic, though, and I was pretty disappointed. For instance, I wasn’t able to find organic bread, tortillas or rice, which are pretty much staples of my diet. I was also disappointed by the amount of organic fruits and vegetables they had – none of which i could find that said they were USDA certified organic. This is something I am going to have to scout around for. There were, however, some packaged crudites, as well as some frozen broccoli that I plan on making with non-organic rice. I was incredibly frustrated just because I felt like most of what I bought needed additional ingredients that I couldn’t find in an organic variety.
I only spent about $100 on groceries, which is comparable to what I would be spending on two to four weeks worth of groceries if I weren’t buying organic, so I really didn’t find it was that much more expensive. Granted, I couldn’t buy all organic items, but I generally tried to sacrifice for partially organic products – for example, Newman’s Own has a variety of cookies (okay, so I have a horrible sweet tooth) that contain organic wheat and sugar, so I bought those, and they’re almost exactly like Oreo’s! Hah. Okay, I was excited about it. Something else everyone should be excited about! This weekend was my best friend and roommate’s birthday, so I was cruising the liquor store looking for some good beer. New Belgium Brewery is one of my favorite varieties, and as I was browsing, I noticed a kind I had never tried before, called Mothership Wit, a USDA certified organic beer! Although someone else who tried it claimed it paled in comparison to other Belgium Wit’s, I was very pleased with myself. In fact, I believe I told everyone at the party that I was drinking organic beer.
This brings me to why this week was such a hard week. Not only did I find it difficult to buy all organic foods, but I also found it difficult not to go out to eat because of my friend’s birthday. I found I didn’t want to skip her birthday dinner just because I was eating only organic food, and then everyone went out for lunch the next day and I didn’t want to be left out either. So I failed on both counts there. I just wish I could find an organic restaurant in town – does anyone know of any? That way I could recommend it next time anyone asks me to go out!
In connection with class, this past weeks reading kind of got me disillusioned with my project, and how beneficial it would really be toward the environment. I just don’t know how much you can trust the USDA Certified Organic labeling system. I still believe that eating organic foods is healthier for people, and is therefore beneficial to the home environment and standard of living, but if huge organic operations spring up, and they are all run in monocultures, how beneficial for the environment can those be, even if they don’t use pesticides? It seems like either way you lose, because you don’t necessarily know that just because something says it’s certified organic that it actually is completely organic, but if you don’t at least TRY to buy organic, how do you know what goes into the process of making your food? Even if you buy locally from farmers at the Farmer’s Market, you still can’t be sure. It seems like our system is flawed – in many ways I’m sure – and through the reading and my experiences in this experiment, I am starting to realize that. I still think it is important that I continue with my project, but I am incredibly disheartened. Let’s hope that through the next couple of weeks, I can find something more hopeful. Thanks for all your comments, by the way, and I will let you know how it goes with finding organic toiletries next week!
