Adamama

Since arriving in Israel nearly four weeks ago, I have been sightseeing, exploring, and visiting with my family.  I was lucky enough to have spent the first two weeks traveling with my mum.  We had a great time together getting lost, sharing falafel, and meeting the family here.  Unfortunately, she had to fly back to her normal life, so she left Israel on December 27^th. 

My Alfalfa Patch

The day after she left I started volunteering.  For the previous two weeks I had spent every available moment searching the web and asking friends about volunteer opportunities.  I was picky; I wanted to do something environmental or political and I wanted to be a part of a community.  I didn’t want to be working on a project that could be happening anywhere.  I wanted to be able to experience Israeli culture. 

I even found a place that fit my exacting criteria.  Adamama is a small educational farm in a Moshav called Nir Moshe.  “Educational farm” means that their main goal is to demonstrate permaculture and green building practices, rather than to produce food.  People come from around Israel to get tours of this farm to learn about composting toilets and grey water systems. 

My PVC Creation!

As well, a community of about 10 people live here permanently.  This particular community has been here since September exchanging work on the farm for their right to live here.  I know it must be hard for them that volunteers flow in and out of their lives.  For instance, we even change the daily patterns of who makes dinner.  However, everyone has been very welcoming of my presence here.  I instantly felt like another member of their extended family.  I have never lived as part of a commune before and I have learned about cooperation, sharing work, and how everything is decided basically without a discussion.  This took me a while to get used to.  I didn’t know that I would have access to such a wonderful community, but this was exactly what I was looking for.  I have made many friends here and I will miss everyone when I leave. 

The Chicken and Geese Enclosure

During the day I have been doing a variety of tasks.  Every morning I feed the chickens by dumping boxes of dirt and worms in their enclosure.  I have also been planting alfalfa seedlings (adorable), weeding, and constructing a recycling organizer from reused PVC pipes. 

The food here has also been entirely vegan vegetarian.  Not eating cheese took some adjusting, but now I love the diet.  Every meal I eat is made entirely from scratch, with a large focus on greens and dried legumes.  Interestingly, I feel very different with this diet.  These aren’t quite the right words, but I almost feel cleaner and lighter.  I definitely want to keep this feeling after I leave, but I am not quite sure how.  I’ll sleep on it.