ricoclime

greetings to all my friends, know and unknown. life here is picking up speed. i have recently returned from the kalimpong area east of darjeeling. for several days i visited a students/friends native village. this friend works for a ngo (one affiliated with prerna) and goes to various villages to teach and promote organic agriculture. in the last few years this ngo has started to include sustainable ideas, techniques and strategies in this. so as i am their teacher and they wish to put some strength behind some of these teachings a meeting/planning session occurred where i was the featured speaker. a sad truth that must be acknowledge here is that if a white guy gets up in front of these people and says, "blah, blah, blah", these people will accept these blahs as having more truth and strength than if one of their own says it. while there is a limit to this it is nonetheless a reality. there is also the somewhat conflicting reality, particularly strong in india, of our neocolonial world where some white guy stands in front of a bunch of nonwhite people telling them the way it is. this latter one is a common situation for me, one which i deal with with direct acknowledgment, liberal doses of humor, and specific and pointed comments that it is up to them to decide the type of india they what to create. However, the situation of this village meeting was a little bit newer for me, as well as being a little scarier in that these people had one of their own, whom they respected and trusted, telling them that i was some type of insightful teacher who was going to give them the answers to their problems. this last part i don't think was directly told to them (though i have some suspicion), but the situation was definitely setup in this way. well, in permaculture we have a principle, 'the problem is the solution'. it is a most favorite principle of mine and is very powerful when you are able to realize it to it fullest extent. so what to do when people look to you for brilliant insights and answers to their 'problems'? you give these right back to them. to often we are taught that the answers are outside of ourselves. i think this is one of the most disempowering aspects of the industrial model. we are taught to look to scientist, specialists, academics, governments, transnationals, and all other forms of suspicious characters for solutions, magic elixirs, or products to put a smile on our faces. it is no joke that we in the 'developed world' are the most disadvantaged and underprivileged in this regard. we have had our self confidence and self determination advertised right out of us. this is one of the unspoken processes that are now currently at work in the majority world under the banner of 'development'. what i am concerned about is not 'development' in and of itself (though i have issue with the usage of the word and what it implies), it is the neocolonial aspects and extractive practices that use this word as camouflage that concern me. so when i stand in front of people who even have a passing suspicion, hope, or desire that i can answer their problems i give it right back to them. i tell them that they know more about their land, people, and situation than anyone from the outside. that they are intelligent people who are fully capable and have far better understandings to create solutions and to deal with whatever situations they are presented with. what i have to offer are ideas, and techniques. it is up to them to decide what to do and how to do it. at this meeting i encouraged them to see the gifts and strengths that their culture, traditions, and ancestors have passed on to them. that without these to guide and ground them in their move into this globalized world they would become lost and weakened. i pointed out that the transnationals recognize this and if they did not preserve and protect these they could be lost to these global interests. i expressed my belief that by protecting and keeping their culture and traditions alive they were contributing to the vitality and richness of our whole planet. that in the not to distant future the world would recognise the gift they were giving use by keeping these things alive.