Absolutely Perfect Next Step!

After haggling for the mayor and municipalities support (in order to apply for certain grants) for two weeks, daily and with nonstop optimism...being told to come back tomorrow a hundred times...I finally found someone to help me bypass them!

Let me backtrack: the municipality (here we just call it "la muni") promised a piece of land to me about two weeks ago, when I presented the project to them. They were 12 men, sitting in a half circle around me, laughing at me and talking in Tzutujil (the indigenous language) the entire time, but did I care? F-No! I got land! They can laugh all they want....And they did...when I returned the following day and the following day and the following day when they told me "manana, manana, manana"....Each day when I shut the door to their office after being told "tomorrow" again, I heard them laughing and it boiled my blood. Not good for the little egg inside :) I was feeling super defeated and my small room has turned into a greenhouse with plants going nowhere....

But! Today I did a second round on all the people/businesses/schools I had given a printed proposal to about a week ago and found that the director (a woman! YAY!) of the largest public school in town (a bit out of town, actually) was really excited and upset that I had left no contact information (no cell phone yet) on the flyer. She immediately agreed to the plan and gave me free reign over a large tract of land--even during the next two months when the kids aren't in school (they have two months "vacation," which is actually when they go to work with their parents). So not only do I have land, I have land on which to work unsupervised for the next two months! I have still to work on the design of the lot, consult with the permaculture institute nearby and start up the informative newsletter that will accompany the project!!

As far as design goes, so far I have a definate plan (and seeds) for only two beds. The first is a native species which includes medicinals such as cataria and mint and aloe as well as edibles such as chipilin and hierba buena. The internship with the permaculture institute helped me to learn alot about native species-their uses and significance both environmentally and socially. For example, because they are native to the region, they have survived on their own, they are low-maintenance plants. They're integral to the landscape and serve a purpose to the native environment (are either a vital link in the native food chain or serve as habitat for something else that is) plus they don't need any inputs such as chemical fertilizers, pesticides or water.

A number of native species have all but disappear from the table and homes of the Tzutujil people through the industrialization and globalization of food and fodder, which is a sad occurence. Perfect example is amarynth, an important flowering grass that has thrived here for..ever, was burned in large quantities when the Spanish conquistadors arrived to what is now Guatemala in the mid 1500s. They called it a weed and the people who ate it, filthy savages. In reality, the plant contains vitamin A, vitamin K, vitamin B6, vitamin C, riboflavin, and folate, and dietary minerals including calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, zinc, copper, and manganese and the Maya of this region were very smart to have been using it to make their tortillas from. The plant is used around the world for a grain, a vegetable, a dying component and as an ornamental...I'm guessing that the Spanish knew its potency and also figured that by debasing the food, they could debase the culture and own the people...

For some reason, multinational companies such as Wal-Mart and Procter and Gamble have been just as convincing these past few decades that there product is better than the one in the backyard and many people have run to the store, while their land is taken and developed into producing mass quantities of other things for that same greedy global market. The goal of the native garden is to re-emphasize the importance and utilization of the very plants that have sustained this lifestyle and culture for millinia.

The other bed I have already aquired seeds for will be planted with foods used in the school lunchs--common foods eaten here such as types of squash, root vegetables, corn and beans (of course!) The idea here is to offset the costs of the school having to purchase the foods and also for the kids to understand how to grow the foods themselves and possibly begin home gardens (especially when we go into our container gardening segment!)

Thanks for reading this quick update!
Emiy