Each seed sown is a step to Island Sustainability
The fresh Kula breeze passes and the air is still. The clouds that so often hug the peaks of the West Mauis decide to take a break from the sky this late afternoon. The view to the west is pristine. An ocean clean and pure, with great distance separating this island chain from other large landmasses. Infinity in every direction. Though this appears daunting to most animals, we aren't worried and we are not alone. We feel warm, invited, humbled, enraptured by the beauty of the land and the aloha of its inhabitants.
I still am in awe of the process of this landmass forming , being found and cultivated. This did not happen overnight. This is millenia upon millenia and guiding stars and benevolent currents and in a kukui shell, destiny.
Take a gander east up the mountain and you witness the outline of Haleakala. Magnificent, majestic, grand, beautiful. As the elevaton climbs up the mountain we view the landscape change as the vegetation becomes stronger and more tolerant to colder nights, extreme heat and harsh elements. We learn from the plants and our past that if we live somewhere long enough, not only do we adapt, we learn to thrive. Humans have inhabited these islands for over a thousand years and have sustained life in mostly a peaceful manner. Our last 200 years have been the most unpredictable. Hawai'i is now on the world map as a destination. The islands have ben introduced to foreigners, invasive species, religions, economic influences and wildlife. There have been accidents and intentions and some negatives (namely the mosquito and the mongoose) and lots of positives.
Though the world is shaking in new vibrations, Maui's goal and direction has never been more clear. We are steadfast and focused in our goal of islandwide sustainability. The idea of food security is now on the table, and we are hungry for it. There will always be surprises. But with this awareness of a growing universal understanding, compassion and dedication to achieving sustainability, we have the potential to unite and grow a more resillient Maui Nui. Where else would we start but with the children, the future.
So here I am, at the Omaopio Greenhouse, made available to us through kindness and reciprocity. Taking in the scene, reflecting on how I arrived here and the various towns on this island that I have worked with the aina. I tend to agree with Michael Pollan, as he writes in the Botany of Desire, it is the plants that cultivate our paths and not actually our own devising. I walk back into the green house, take a deep breath, and smile at this gift, this opportunity. Thank you Maui. Thank you Community Work Day. There are plants growing everywhere. Natives, Flowers, Vegetables, Herbs, Beneficials, Fruit Trees. My mission: to keep them healthy, to create more plant material, to send them on their way to school and community gardens throughout Maui Nui (Maui, Moloka'i, Lanai).
I work for Community Work Day. An organization dedicated to keeping Maui healthy, strong, beautiful. They partner with organizations like Keep America Beautiful, Habitat for Humanity, Maui School Garden Network. They are the behind-the-scenes group that does not boast about the work they do. They organize beach clean ups, pickups for recycling appliances and tires and batteries, and establish community gardens throughout Maui Nui in areas that are otherwise being neglected. In each garden they create a classroom setting for the youth. They do highway cleanups, island beautification, wetland restorations. They see beauty in people and places that no one else sees and then they prove that beauty exists everywhere in everyone.
I have been with CWD since October and what beckoned me to begin writing now was my experience this past weekend. Before this weekend my involvement with CWD was contained to the green house and the baseyard in Puunene. I have been busy organizing, transplanting, uppotting, seeding, fertilizing. I have been watching plants come and grow and leave and my relationship with these plants was limited to knowing they are finding good homes throughout the island. This weekend I went to KHAKO, Ka Hale A Ke Ola, the homeless resource center in Wailuku, where I witnessed how strong the community of Maui is, and its true potential for change and growth when laulima (many hands) come together.
What CWD has already done there:
Rebekah, the garden coordinator/supervisor for CWD, was told to walk away. She consulted soil scientists, permaculturists, and farmers. They all agreed. You will NOT be able to grow here, they warned. She was looking down at a drainage ditch filled with sand. There were few if any beneficial nutrients in the ground and the 'soil' was predominantly sand. She was near tears, questioning her promise that she already made in her heart to making this garden possible, when a young, eager to help, cheery eyed girl no older than ten runs up to her and says "Auntie, Auntie! What are you doing, how can I help?" Rebekah explained to the girl, holding back tears, that she was trying to put a garden in here. "What a great idea! What do you want me to do?!" the girl exclaimed. The twinkle in her eyes, the childlike divinity to really affirm that anything is possible if we imagine it, was a beacon of light for Rebekah. Rebekah asked, "What's your name little angel?" And the girl smiled humbly and whispered, "Destiny."
A year and a half later, after building the soil with compost, manure, coffee cherry, nitrogen fixers, rotating cover crops, and heavy mulch, the garden is thriving. You enter this other dimension when you walk down the hill to the garden. There is no grass growing, only beneficial plant material. As I walked down into the gardenfor the first time with a few keikis to trim comfrey leaf, the temperature dropped a few degrees, and I felt as entering another realm. The children spoke my mind, it was there first time in this garden, "This is a playground!" An edible playground to be more specific. The fence on the backside is hardly visible through all the fig trees, tsurinam cherry trees and liloquoi vines. Following that line of plants are banana trees with full healthy racks, papaya trees, and interspersed plantings of pigeon pea, nasturtiums and comfrey. On the other side of the enclosure are vegetables, natives, and a newly established herb hill. Not to mention the 250 pound sweet potato harvest this past fall.
Rebekah reminisces to when people told her nothing would grow here and she smiles a knowing smile. A strength and will that can only come from an inner child, and a girl name Destiny.
What is currently being established:
This garden just described is in the back of KHAKO. At the front, there has been no budget or initiative to improve their dilapidated playground. There is money in private schools to help improve their facilities and there is a lot of neglect in low income areas. CWD aims to balance this. They see no reason why some children should be more entitled than others with a different set of opportunities.
Melissa Connely works with the kids in KHAKO every Monday in the garden in the back. They cannot wait until Melissa shows up to play and learn and be inspired by nature. She works with keikis in the morning and high school kids in the afternoon. She loves the garden and has done an incredible job keeping it thriving. Now she shares her vision for the front with all of us.
Melissa aspires to turn the front playground, filled with divots ripped up by chickens and a grassy unhealthy landscape into an interactive garden to stimulate the children and the island by proving what is possible with vision, drive and a common goal. The vision is this: Earth bag walls (mostly sand and a little concrete into canvas or burlap sacks), around the front sign filled with flowers. Plants all along the painted walls on the side of the building, cut flowers, fruit trees, natives. The playplace in the front will be weedmatted and then filled with garden beds catering to the five senses. Think of an interactive experimental science museum for kids, and change that walled in setting to the gardens with an open blue sky. Funky and colorful plants to see, spiky and smooth and scaly plants to touch, super fragrant plants to smell, instruments to make and seeds to shake, and wonderful leaves, flowers and fruit to taste. There will be buried pipes to create underground communication across distances of the playplace, and liloquoi vines growing up the fences.
On Saturday, January 19th, we made headway on this project as 50 volunteers helped make progress on the vision. Rebekah shared her knowledge of building soil to a group of those interested, as we prepared planting zones. Justice led a team of strong men to help build earthbag walls. Melissa organized left and right and helped set up a painting station for rocks and signs and mosaics. I helped a team of people level out the playplace and lay down groundcloth weedmat. We played with the kids and taught them and learned from them. The adults I worked with said it was there first time doing this kind of work before and they thoroughly enjoyed it. I told them there is always gardening and outdoor and community work to do, and it is a wonderful hobby and occupation to pursue your connection with the land.
We all had a blast and it was great to see the environments that the plants go to outside the green house. It helps add new depth to my job.
If you are interested in volunteering with me at the green house, I am up there on Wednesdays between 10 am and 4 pm. This is where we start all the plants for the gardens throughout Maui nui and work on creating a sustainable property outside the greenhouse.
The green house is in Kula, at 3361 Omaopio Rd just above Surfing Goat Dairy.
Please feel free to email me @ mattk@cwdhawaii.org or call me @ 808 280 3244.
Or just show up! It's a lot of fun, music will be playing, people will be sharing their ideas and knowledge. There is always work to do in the outdoor garden, and seeding and propagating in the green house. You can work with whatever vibe you are feeling. And you can know too, that your volunteering up in the green house is making a huge difference to help Maui towards sustainability.
See you at the Greenhouse!
Mahalo and Aloha,
Matthew K
Next week: Ulu Trees!
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