Real Organic Farming-ing-ing-ing

When the four of us FINALLY made up our minds back in September to unite as a team and work with John as the “organic farming internship group,” I don’t think that any of us knew exactly what we were going to be up to over the following 3 and a half months. If anything was for certain, it was that we would be doing a fair amount of organic farming.. Right?!.. Well, as the very last day of October has commensed, and I look back over the past two months, it turns out that this past Monday was the first day that we actually trekked up to John’s farm to do some actual weeding/trimming/mulching. Ok fine, there was that one day when we picked Okra for about 20 minutes, but that was too abrupt and straight forward to classify as “a day on the farm.”

With our face-to-face interviews out of the way and the readily availability of our mentors, Monday was an excellent opportunity to be on John’s farm and learn a little bit about the practicalities of farmwork. John, Peter, and Mel taught us, (mostly by their actions), which plants were really weeds, what needed to be chopped and turned into mulch, what needed to be picked etc. The day was quite enjoyable, minimally strenuoius and very relaxing. Much of the morning was spent continuing our on going discussion of morals, values, thoughts, ways of thinking- always interesting. Previous posts from Hayley and Jo articulate these conversations in a very accurate mannor. It has been very refreshing to constantly be challenged into thinking about things that a most certainly important in a world littered with so much nonsense.

Just as we were finishing up in the field, before we braked for lunch, a few minutes of silence were followed by an encore of sing-a-longs. I think we all learned something new… hah.

As we ate lunch under the tree by the farm, we discussed the agenda and other details for the upcoming workshop which will be held at Bellairs on November 10th. Everything seems to be falling into place nicely. We expect the workshop to be extremely effective in asigning roles within the future business to both seedling growers and farmers. The event will also give everyone the chance to meet face-to-face and address any questions or concerns. So far we have contacted to majority of the people who will play an important role at the meeting and we are really looking forward to it!

Talk to you soon, cool?

-Jesse