List of experiences: TOTAL RESULTS 67
By Pedro Monque
Children from the afterschool program at El Rincón del Saber in Cambalache (Ciudad Guayana, Venezuela) preparing a play. Photo credit: the author.
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the
beneficiaries?
El Rincón del Saber [The Knowledge Corner] is a grassroots educational initiative led by Andreina Guarisma in the neighborhood of Cambalache (Ciudad Guayana, Venezuela). Ciudad Guayana was established in 1961 to host large steel and aluminum industries that would become Venezuela’s insurance against oil export dependency. Cambalache, on the other hand, was not meant to exist. City planners in the 1960s designated the northwestern part of the city as an industrial zone, adjacent to the Orinoco River for easy riverine transport of imports and exports. At the time, Cambalache was populated by a few families that sold fish and vegetables to the early workers of the Orinoco Mining Company’s steel mill. As the city grew, the regional development corporation “CVG” attempted many times to evict the people of Cambalache, but enough of them stayed put so that, as the new city grew, so did Cambalache. Over time, Cambalache became a hotspot of environmental injustices, from the draining of bountiful lagoons to host bauxite residue in 1979, to the installment of an open dump that served as the city’s main waste disposal site from 1985 until protests by Cambalache residents in 2014 managed to shut it down. More recently, the people of Cambalache have turned things around, building an aqueduct in 2020 that delivers probably the best water in the city.
Picture of red mud pool nearest to Cambalache (below). Photo credit: the author.
It is within this context of struggle that El Rincón del Saber was born. The initial impetus came from Andreina’s concern that most children in the community lack internet access at home, and there is no library where they might do their homework. With the help of a local nonprofit, Buscadores de Libros, she turned her living room into a community library in early 2022. By May, Andreina and the author of this note began running an afterschool program in the front porch. The initiative has since grown, incorporating new teachers and an environmental education component centered on gardening. Because of Cambalache’s agricultural origins, El Rincón aims to instill in children a sense of pride in their community by teaching them how to grow their own food, compost, and raise animals. Yet, the cost and dedication needed to run a garden has limited its success, especially because it competes with reading, writing, math, and recreational activities.
How does this initiative engage with climate?
El Rincón del Saber engages the climate crisis indirectly at this stage, mainly through its twin goals of promoting food sovereignty by promoting gardening, and by developing children’s commitment to environmental caretaking. I, the author of this entry, am a close collaborator of Andreina on this initiative. Because I am in charge of programming for the afterschool program, it is my aspiration that we will deepen the environmental theme so that climate change is tackled directly. So far, our focus has been on environmental caretaking, which we incorporate into reading, writing, and math activities. Because the children of Cambalache grow up in close contact with a diversity of animals and plants, as well as the impressive Orinoco River, stories about people’s relationships to animals and trees work well for group discussion. We also use the plants at El Rincón to illustrate mathematical principles (for example, the notion of the average by counting flower petals). However, we have not yet had sustained discussions on climate change in the afterschool program. When climate change does surface, it is either as a way to convey the importance of food sovereignty to the city (a mid-term goal), or as a possible strategy to find allies and funding for the initiative (more of a short-term goal).
Children from El Rincón del Saber sowing (top). Deliannys shares a story she wrote (right). Photo credit: the author.
To an outsider, it might seem that climate change is a relatively low priority for impoverished communities with more urgent needs. Admittedly, most of our regular work on El Rincón does not mention the issue of climate change explicitly. Yet, when asked, Andreina claims that climate change is an extremely important issue. As a resident of Cambalache, Andreina has a strong sense of the consequences of pollution and environmental injustice on human life. She is aware that greenhouse gases are changing our climate and worries about local effects, such as changes in rain patterns, as well as the disasters reported in the news. So, if we take a more expansive view of what it means to be concerned about climate change, El Rincón del Saber’s focus on food sovereignty, environmental injustice, and active environmental citizenship can be seen as a contribution to climate justice and its toolbox.[1]
Throughout the Occupy Climate Change! 2023 Winter School, the idea of grounding climate struggle in local realities, of making it about more than planetary-level greenhouse gas emissions, was central. Whereas climate science has accurately diagnosed the main consequences of increasing global temperature, a key challenge remains to link climate disruption to local livelihoods and basic institutions like education, childrearing, and food—especially in the global south, where communities have little influence over key polluters or climate policy (at least for now). Yet, as Kyle Whyte (2017) has argued, climate disruption is not an unprecedented crisis for indigenous peoples and others who have felt the impacts of environmental racism, so the way that these communities respond to the environmental crisis can teach us something about what kinds of adaptations are important, even after granting that they are severely constrained by other urgent problems, and that they too have stuff to learn.
At the same time, I find it important to recognize that much more needs to be done to integrate the full insights afforded by a climate perspective to the work of El Rincón del Saber. In the first place, Andreina, like most people in Ciudad Guayana (including myself), has only a vague sense of what to expect locally from climate change. Moreover, none of the collaborators is particularly aware of the broader discussions on climate, the costs of a corporate energy transition, or the broader environmental crisis, happening at both the Latin American and global levels. A greater awareness of this topic could help make the case for Cambalache’s importance as a source of food and agricultural knowledge for the entire city, which is hardly recognized because local food production is not taken to be important by most people. So, in addition to the work of developing incipient models of small-scale food production that could be replicated in the rest of Ciudad Guayana, Cambalache could help enact a deep cultural transformation that would change nothing less than the meaning of rightful residence in this industrial city through the act of growing food. El Rincón del Saber could play an important role in this transformation, but it will need to develop its political reading of our current situation and communicate its vision effectively to potential allies.
In sum, Andreina has expressed a commitment to aligning actions that address immediate needs (like malnutrition and educational deficits) with those that would make Cambalache and Ciudad Guayana more resilient in the face of climate change. I therefore see considerable potential in this initiative to become a locus of climate and environmental justice action in a city where few organizations address these issues. Yet, achieving this goal will require ongoing support from people and movements devoted to climate justice who can orient Andreina and her collaborators. Moreover, sustained funding for initiatives connected to climate and environmental justice seems crucial if those dimensions of the initiative are to consolidate. One of the most promising directions for linking current priorities in Cambalache with climate change is through the theme of food sovereignty since both Cambalache residents and the larger city of Ciudad Guayana would benefit greatly from local food production.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
El Rincón del Saber’s immediate aim is to enhance Cambalache children’s wellbeing through educational and recreational activities. Particular attention is paid to children suffering abuse or neglect, which are themselves the consequence of broader economic and social injustices that have defined Ciudad Guayana for decades.[2] At the same time, there is a broader social and environmental vision animating the whole initiative, which Andreina describes in this way:
I started working for an NGO called Alinca in Cambalache. We would give talks to families about gender-based violence and positive parenting. We were surprised when we entered the homes and immediately observed the violence of the parents towards the children. That motivated me to continue my work with more strength. Not only to go investigate and make a report, but to take action so that the children of the community could recover values like respect for themselves and others.
Here, people can be very rude and intolerant. They struggle to accept people as they are and love them that way. That’s why I am how I am: I’m a humble person who isn’t looking for defects in others, because everyone has their defects and virtues. And I love everyone, okay! [She laughs]. I’m a person with a lot of love. And that’s what we have to instill in children one way or another: that they accept people as they are. That they cannot bully others just because they are not like me, of the same social class, or because the other person is black and I am white. Those things should not exist in children.
The reality is that there is an enormous task to undertake in the community, and those of us who live here can see that better. In my three years with the community promoters at Alinca, we would get sick from being in the sun and rain so much, diving into the heart of the community’s issues. Now I have my own space to transform those situations I saw. Look, here I am, supervising the construction of this roof and a new bathroom so the project can continue growing. Here again I have to thank Mariela for having found the resources, and I remain hopeful that other organizations, like Alinca itself, will be encouraged to actively support El Rincón del Saber…
I would like to see in the future that the children of Cambalache… as well as other children who join, become professionals. It would make me proud to see them develop into whatever they want to be: athletes, engineers, farmers, fishermen, whatever they want, but that they are trained and develop their abilities to the fullest. And then that they become spokespersons for other children. That the project does not stay just with them, but that they change their way of thinking and also join in the rescue of values.
The people in Cambalache have been taking up farming, fishing too, but especially farming. People are growing their own food: all kinds of vegetables and fruit trees. I wouldn’t trade this for a house in the city. Here I feel free, without pollution, even though people say it’s polluted.
This area really is coveted by city people, and sometimes we don’t realize the wealth we have here in the community. We have the river nearby that could become a tourist area. We have vast stretches of land to grow whatever you want, and even to raise animals for food and sale. We have the fishermen.
I am in love with Cambalache and would never think of returning to San Félix [the eastern half of Ciudad Guayana]. I spent 13 years there and I’ve been here for 25 years already! (Monque 2024, 59)
In addition to the educational and wellbeing goals of the program, I would highlight that its environmental themes arise organically from the semi-rural character of Cambalache. As mentioned earlier, the people of Cambalache are engaged in a struggle to redefine the meaning of the place: from landfill to riverside garden, from classist associations with poverty and ignorance to agroecological abundance and expertise.
One of the key challenges for Cambalache to overcome is its association with waste. As Marco Armiero explains: “some people and places have been transformed into dumping sites, sacrifice zones for the well-being of others and the purported common good of the nation” (2021b, 427), and, elsewhere, “Waste as a relation (wasting) produces the targeted community rather than solely selecting it as the ideal place for an unwanted facility” (2021a, 2). In other words, racist ideologies produce sacrifice zones while justifying their ills or blaming the victims. Recognizing this, many in Cambalache take fostering local pride and a strong sense of belonging as a crucial precondition for creating a culture of caretaking. For Andreina, whose family used to work recycling materials from the landfill, a personal sense of pride and self-worth is fundamental to recognize the proper value of recycling and growing food, activities that have traditionally been associated with poverty but should not be. So it seems that the human and ecological wasting of contemporary capitalism can be fought, at least to an extent, by community-level processes of revalorizing place and questioning racist framings of the good life.
In my view, Andreina’s initiative exemplifies how place-based attachment can harmonize social and environmental values. (This kind of place-based politics is being called elsewhere in Latin America la defensa de los territorios or the “defense of [subnational] territories.”) It is my hope that El Rincón’s approach to environmental education—through composting, recycling, growing food, and raising animals—eventually gives rise to sustained discussions and programming on environmental injustice and climate justice for Cambalache and the entire city. I believe that the people of Cambalache, including the children, have a lot to say about how to tackle climate and environmental justice in the area. However, there is still a need for spaces (educational, artistic, literary) where the Cambalache perspective can solidify.
Andreina Guarisma teaching drawing to the youngest students, and new teacher Yajaira Moreno in the back teaching Spanish to the older students. Photo credit: the author.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
The initiative began in early 2022, with the afterschool program beginning in May. Our curriculum has developed considerably since the start. At first, I would read environmentally-themed stories to the children and followed with philosophical discussion about them: the ethics of relating to other animals, the value of life and diversity, etc. We also made a point of including games that foster teamwork. The next addition was mathematics education linked to practical tasks, like counting plants and distributing garden plots to grow different things. Then we started growing things with the children. The plan is to start teaching how to cook with the food they grow and how to raise a variety of animals. Andreina raises rabbits and wants to build a chicken coop, and I have proposed developing vermiculture to sell worm humus. After an exchange in June 2023 with Atilano Azuaje, the leader of an agroforestry program called La Cosecha in Santa Elena de Uairén (a town about six hundred kilometers south of Ciudad Guayana), we discussed the possibility of taking the kids there for a visit. El Rincón is eager to form networks with other food sovereignty projects.
According to Andreina, the most important change has been in children’s attitude: they seem happier and treat each other more respectfully and kindly. They have also improved in reading, writing and math, and they stay fully engaged during lessons. Sometimes they leave us in shock. One day they were begging for an extra day of afterschool that week, so I announced solemnly that I could only return the following day if we had a math day. They jumped in joy, screaming “yaaaay, math!” More recently, however, attendance has fluctuated. I have had to suspend my weekly visits to focus on dissertation writing, but the explanation shared by current teachers is that this is in part because of some children’s work responsibilities (e.g., in street recycling or “trash picking”, landscaping) to bring an income home, but also due to the natural ups and downs in interest. We believe that a stronger recreational component and an income for teachers would allow El Rincón to organize events with the families that could make attendance more consistent.
After the children and their families, the ones who have benefitted the most from this program are certainly Andreina and me. Andreina has grown more confident in her leadership and has been interviewed about her initiative at local radio stations, a local magazine, and was featured in a documentary. I have learned a lot about the community’s valuation of nature and their struggles for environmental justice. The next sphere of influence has been on visitors to the program who have been inspired in different ways. We are currently cultivating relationships to local food producers in the Bicentenario area of Cambalache, and with other community organizations. As these relationships strengthen, we hope for the program to become a referent on children’s rights, food sovereignty, and environmental education for the city.
Who are the actors involved? What are their backgrounds?
The initiative’s leader is Andreina Guarisma. She is a mother of two and used to work as a health promoter for a local NGO. Before that, she used to work in urban waste recycling alongside her parents and siblings. Currently, Andreina works informally from home and cannot take a job in the city without forgoing care for her younger daughter.
Mariela Mendoza has collaborated with Andreina for years on a sister project, Juntos Hacemos la Diferencia, that brings youth from Cambalache into the city for educational activities. Mariela directs her own small nonprofit, Buscadores de Libros, which promotes reading by, among other things, helping create small community libraries like the one that got El Rincón del Saber started. Mariela is the main force behind material improvements, such as the roof on Andreina’s front porch to hold activities there.
Yajaira Moreno, Alvis Fuenmayor and Frank Lara are the new teachers. Yajaira is a local resident of Cambalache, she has teaching experience and superb organizational skills because of her work keeping the tabs at a well-known restaurant in front of the Orinoco River. Andreina hopes that collaborating with another woman from the community will help consolidate the initiative and provide crucial emotional support. Alvis is from the city center, in his twenties, and is passionate about sharing his love for poetry and literature with the children. Frank, the newest addition, is an enthusiastic college student doing a community service project required by Venezuelan universities.
I, Pedro Monque, have been curriculum coordinator and teacher. While Andreina works with the children under 6 years old, I work with the older ones. In addition to curricular planning, I seek partnerships with other organizations. I participate in this initiative while finishing a Ph.D. in Philosophy at the CUNY Graduate Center. My research focuses on environmental philosophy in connection to issues like racism, sexism, LGBTQ oppression, and colonialism. I am also part of Latin American educational collectives like Jóvenes sin Tabú and Empoderando a Latinoamérica.
Andreina Guarisma and the author. Photo credit: Andrismar Vivas (Andreina’s daughter).
Which limits (institutional, physical, social, etc.) does it encounter?
By far, the greatest limitation we face is lack of funding. The initiative is run entirely on volunteer labor. For Andreina, especially, it would be transformative to receive a monthly income that allowed her to devote herself more fully to the initiative. Andreina’s household makes around 100 USD a month in a country where covering basic needs for a family of four easily exceeds 500 USD a month. Given Andreina’s precarious economic situation, the fact that this initiative exists at all is remarkable.
We have also had difficulties finding teachers from the community, as well as enlisting active parental support for the initiative. Because the initiative specifically targets vulnerable children, parents often do not have the time or emotional wellbeing necessary to help. At a personal level, Andreina’s reliance on my support and my own lack of time have made progress slower than we would desire. However, the addition of Yajaira, Alvis and Frank have been transformative for the project, and we are all working on diversifying Andreina’s support network.
Despite these financial and institutional difficulties, we have found many groups willing to collaborate. Local farmers from the Bicentenario area of Cambalache are open to visits and sharing their knowledge. A volunteer group from the city, Arepa Sonrisa, has visited to do recreational activities and share a meal. Atilano Azuaje, the leader of La Cosecha, has offered his help and counsel. The local mining company, Minera Volcán, has agreed to supply construction materials. Pediatricians from the city have volunteered medical services. My guess is that, after surmounting the relatively modest goal of funding Andreina so that she can fully commit to directing the initiative, many opportunities for deeper collaboration with local actors will open up.
Our vision for this initiative is to progressively realize the following goals:
- To secure financial compensation for Andreina and extra teachers so that the afterschool program runs at least three days a week.
- To consolidate a work team for the initiative that includes Andreina, afterschool teachers, and special collaborators.
- To start providing a meal at the afterschool program, and to source this meal as much as possible from our garden and local producers.
- To include cooking classes as part of our afterschool programming.
- To strengthen our environmental education component by including site visits and environmental monitoring as part of our afterschool program. We would visit local farmers, fishermen, the aqueduct, restaurants, local mining and recycling companies, the landfill, the bauxite residue waste site, and, especially, the Orinoco River and local lagoons where we want the children to learn how to test for water quality.
- To have bicycles that allow us to do site visits during the afterschool programs since distances are too long to travel on foot.
- To host more educational events on environmental issues (and other project-relevant issues such as nutrition or gender-based violence) for the community of Cambalache and the city.
- To get networked to other food sovereignty initiatives, especially those linked to cultural (re)valorization like La Cosecha, and to go on site visits and receive visitors.
- To become a referent on children’s rights, food sovereignty, and environmental education for the city and region.
- To thereby become a leading voice in the fight for climate justice at the city level by highlighting strategies for mitigation and adaptation that simultaneously address histories of injustice and urgent social needs.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
This initiative’s greatest challenge is balancing short-term needs for education, nutrition, and health with longer-term environmental goals, such as strengthening food sovereignty in the area and addressing climate justice at greater scales. Our conviction is that the more ambitious environmental goals represent structural solutions (even if partial) to the urgent needs that got the initiative going in the first place. However, striking a balance between the short-term and the longer-term is difficult even when their interconnectedness is recognized.
I do not think that this initiative is likely to have problematic effects. Rather, where it may fail is in fully developing its climate and environmental justice orientation. The children’s immediate needs are enough to keep the initiative busy while sidelining considerations of climate justice. Also, most anti-poverty work in the region fails to address root causes and ignores issues of environmental justice. Yet, to me, the focus on climate justice makes sense precisely because the initiative works with children.
If this initiative is to consolidate its climate justice orientation, it will need committed local collaborators who are knowledgeable about climate change and environmental justice. It will also need sustained funding from organizations that sponsor climate justice-based initiatives, and such funding will need to be offered alongside climate justice training for the recipients.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
This initiative is replicable in any place where community gardening is viable. More than any specific activities, what characterizes this initiative is its being based on the struggles and potentialities of the place.
The greatest lesson to draw from El Rincón is that environmental goals must be harmonized with immediate human needs at the local level, especially when working in areas subjected to marginalization and impoverishment. Discovering the links between some local reality and climate change takes time. It has taken time to connect the dots from children’s wellbeing to climate justice. Indeed, only time will show how (or if) climate justice organically becomes a core element of this initiative over the years. My bet is that it will, and that the passing of time will only make climate change more pressing for El Rincón.
Another key lesson is the importance of local leadership in developing an organic interest in climate justice. Especially in impoverished communities, it is often the case that projects are executed while ignoring the agency or existing concerns of beneficiaries. Likewise, communities will often accept aid on strategic terms without identifying with broader goals. This means that projects whose goal may be to address climate change while targeting a local need (for example, planting fruit trees) might be executed by a community without thereby creating any deeper awareness of the climate crisis. So, fostering an interest in climate justice on the part of local leaders in places where such issues are not salient takes time and effort. In my opinion, there is no substitute to providing thoughtful support to an initiative for an extended period of time and helping trace the connections between existing concerns and climate change. Many aspects of the climate crisis require zooming out from a local perspective, so local leaders can really benefit from the point of view of solidary outsiders.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes (law, institutional arrangements, long-term sustainability or community preparedness, etc.)? If yes, which?
This initiative’s most immediate effect would be on community preparedness to climate change. A considerable amount of the food consumed in the city is produced outside of the region, and climate change is expected to damage Venezuelan agricultural production, so promoting food sovereignty would increase the resiliency of the community of Cambalache to food shortages. Because Cambalache is currently zoned as an industrial area, this initiative could support local farmers in achieving a re-zoning of the area, especially if El Rincón serves as the educational and planning hub for such a campaign. The re-zoning idea emerged during a tour of Cambalache I organized as part of a public environmental philosophy seminar for Ciudad Guayana I gave in the spring of 2023.
More ambitiously, we hope that El Rincón can support broader transformations in Cambalache, such as the establishment of a farmer’s market, the creation of artisanal food processing industries, and the development of Cambalache’s touristic potential as a site for river tourism, water sports, and mountain biking. The stumbling block for these projects is not just money and classism or racism but a lack of community cohesion in Cambalache that El Rincón del Saber aims to ameliorate.
References
Armiero, M. (2021a). Wasteocene. Cambridge University Press.
Armiero, M. (2021b). The Case for the Wasteocene. Environmental History 26, 425-430.
Blanco, F. and Moncrieff H. (2012). Los niños recuperadores de basura en Cambalache: studio etnográfico en un vertedero en Venezuela. Centro de Investigación Social CISOR.
Ponte, L. (Director.) (2004). Cambalache: Memoria Histórica [Documentary]. Cooperativa Manojo de Ideas. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp7QcUuB4pM&t=905s
Monque, P. (2024). Entrevista a Andreina Guarisma. Cárcava 15. https://revistacarcava.wixsite.com/
Peattie, L. (1968). The View from the Barrio. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
Peattie, L. (1987). Planning: Rethinking Ciudad Guayana. The University of Michigan Press.
Observatorio de Ecología Política de Venezuela. (2018). Caso: El vertedero de Cambalache en Ciudad Guayana. https://ecopoliticavenezuela.org/2018/01/18/mapa-de-conflictos-socio-ambientales-el-vertedero-de-cambalache-en-ciudad-guayana/
Whyte, K. (2017). The Dakota Access Pipeline, Environmental Injustice, and U.S. Colonialism. Red Ink 19(1), 154-169.
[1] I thank Hanna Musiol for raising this point.
[2] For an illuminating history of socioeconomic inequality in Ciudad Guayana since its beginnings, see Peattie 1968 and 1987. For the specific case of Cambalache, see Ponce 2004, Blanco and Moncrieff 2012, and Observatorio de Ecología Política de Venezuela 2018.
Dian Indrawati
General
After the 1800s, the grassroots community’s environmental movement is blooming under a new ideology: conservation (Prize, 2022). As the public becomes more aware and concerned about water and its problems, conservation has become a new spirit for the grassroots movement, especially seeking to harvest the rainfall efficiently.
The euphoria of the conservation idea, which resulted in rainwater harvesting through grassroots activities, also occurred in Indonesia. As a result, a people’s movement aimed to keep water as long as possible became popular. One of the primary organizations which promoted this idea is Indonesia Rain Harvesting Movement (GMHI). Next, GMHI resulted in “Saleuwi” and additional rain harvesting movements in Indonesia.
Implemented area of movement
Rainwater harvesting has uncomplicated technology which can be applied in numerous countries, in both developed and developing ones (Velasco-Muñoz, Aznar-Sánchez, Batlles-delaFuente, & Fidelibus, 2019) (Sadia Rahman, Din, Biswas, & Shirazi, 2014) (Dwivedi, Patil, & Karankal, 2013) (Awawdeh, Al-Shraideh, Al-Qudah, & Jaradat, 2012). Along with the scarcity hazard due to intensifying climate, rainwater harvesting has become a favorable option because it can be executed even in communities with low technological and institutional capacity.
After more than a decade, GMHI has spread almost all over Indonesia, even scattered. Recently, this movement has grown to include more than 10 (ten) cities, namely: Sleman, Klaten, Sukoharjo, Purwokerto, Brebes and Semarang (Central Java); Malang and Jombang (East Java); Cimahi (West Java); Padang (West Sumatera); Buton (South East Sulawesi); Ternate (North Maluku); and Manokwari (West Papua).
Promoters and beneficiaries
Dr-Ing. Ir. Agus Maryono, a lecturer from Gadjah Mada University (UGM), became the man behind the Rain Harvesting Movement for Indonesia (GMHI). Even though sporadic, this activity was successfully implemented and developed in more than 25 communities due to rain harvesting technology and allied fields.
GMHI is very beneficial for both users and their environment and downstream area. This community successfully provided clean water for households and reduced the runoff.
People used clean water for drinking water, garden watering, toilet flushing, laundry usage, replenishing domestic pools or spas, car washing, supplying the hot water system, thermal buffers to insulate houses, ventilation for building, and protecting homes from bushfires (Tanks, 2022). In addition, reducing runoff from upstream will defer the amount of water and directly reduce peak discharge downstream.
Climate change engagement
Based on an interview with Dr. Agus Maryono, the founder of GMHI, the project was born because he was concerned about the drainage systems in Indonesia. At that time, Indonesia’s drainage approach mostly drained the water from inundating locations as soon as possible. This concept addressed two significant problems.
First, the downstream area collected large sums of water from the upstream. Therefore, it leads to expensive infrastructures and maintenance, especially for urban areas such as Jakarta, Semarang, Surabaya, and Palembang, because a large amount of water downstream needs high-cost and complex technologies for management. Unfortunately, the Government of the Republic of Indonesia, especially the Ministry of Public Works and Housing, has a limited budget due to drainage system development.
Second, runoff water did not have enough time to infiltrate upstream during the rainy season. This action causes upstream areas to suffer from water scarcity during the dry season.
Furthermore, as Indonesian development increases, multiple factors have decreased water quality both on the surface and sub-surface. People tend to consume clean water provided by the government or private companies instead of using water directly from its sources.
Due to those problems, Dr-Ing. Ir. Agus Maryono introduced a new system called rainwater harvesting. The system has been applied in developed countries, such as the US, Canada, Australia, and Germany, and successfully managed the rainfall and runoff in the river basin.
Along with climate change, when rainfall intensifies, runoff becomes a new monster because of the large amounts of water in the system. This monster haunted every rainfall occurrence and is not explicitly associated with the rainy season. Another problem due to climate change phenomena is that the dry season sometimes becomes more prolonged than usual. Taken together, GMHI provided an excellent wave to manage rainwater carefully.
Therefore, this movement not only deals with drainage systems in normal conditions but is also very engaged with climate change phenomena.
What are the main objectives?
The main objectives of GMHI are reducing the runoff from the minor scale: household and other roof building; and providing clean water for households, as previously mentioned.
What are the main values?
The central values of GMHI are scaling up people’s awareness regarding water treatment and management, especially rainfall, and tackling climate change through simple but reliable actions.
What is the timeline?
GMHI started conceptually in 2005 but first was developed in 2010 at Gadjah Mada University (UGM), Indonesia, especially at Engineering System Building (MST) building at Gadjah Mada University. In 2014, Dr. Agus and his colleagues in the water harvesting community created a WhatsApp group, and by 2018 the first congress of GMHI was held. Lastly, the 4th congress had carried out on 5-6 March 2022.
Source : courtesy Dr-Ing. Agus Maryono, 2022
Figure 1 The #4 congress of GMHI
In 2022, GMHI has more than 25 communities scattered across Indonesia, i.e: Komunitas Sedekah Air Hujan Sleman, Komunitas Banyu Bening Sleman, Komunitas Kandang Hujan Klaten, Komunitas Tahta Air Langit Jakarta, Komunitas Air Hujan Jombang, Komunitas Air Hujan Buton, Komunitas Air Hujan Padang, Komunitas Air Makmur Sukoharjo, Komunitas Air Hujan Banjarmasin, Komunitas Banyu Bening Puspo Sukoharjo, etc. This organization has been formed and will be inaugurated soon in Purwokerto, Ternate, Manokwari, Malang, Brebes, and Semarang.
Are there already visible effects?
The GMHI successfully offers great benefits for Indonesia, which can be divided into short, medium, and long terms. GMHI successfully provides fresh water for applicant households and their neighborhood in the short term. For the medium one, they promote their success stories to their relatives, colleagues, and the media. And for a long time, GMHI has hoped to be able to escalate awareness among people in Indonesia about water resources, especially rainwater.
Who are the actors involved? What is their background?
One of the exciting parts of GMHI is that everybody who is involved becomes an actor. This scheme gives government officers, lecturers, and private company employees equal positions. So educational background isn’t a severe problem, as long as they are committed to the movement and can spend some personal time on organizational campaigns.
So far, 34 (thirty-four) water resources agencies (BWS/BBWS) from the Ministry of Public Works and Housing have participated in and applied the rainwater harvesting system. In addition, the Watershed Agency from the Ministry of Forestry (BPDAS) has distributed more than 100 tanks for people who live in the upstream areas.
In the educational sector, Universitas Jenderal Achmad Yani (UNJANI), Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), and Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) have become pioneers at each location and consistently spread the values of rainwater harvesting through their community service agendas.
Aside from them, more than 25 communities are involved, as previously mentioned. They come from various backgrounds, such as farmers, entrepreneurs, teachers, private employees, doctors, engineers, etc.
Limitation of the movement
Even before becoming a mainstream movement, the grassroots movements usually deal with several problems, such as local-specific yet widely-applicable; appropriate to yet transforming situations; project-based solutions yet seeking structural change; grassroots ingenuity; empowering inclusion; structural critique; and spaces for reflexive pluralities. (Smith, Fressoli, & Thomas, 2012).
Yet, GMHI also struggled with those kinds of problems. First, the technology of rainwater harvesting became very specific and must vary because of the environmental conditions of each area. Each location has its technology, which sometimes is not applicable in other places. For example, in Papua, the rainwater harvesting system only has a tank without any treatment activities. So, they have poor minerals compared with the system in Java.
Second, the implications and perspectives of the movement are also linear with the background and situation of the user. Some movements think they have different versions of GMHI, though they are also harvesting the rainfall. We believe many other movements have similar ideas to GMHI but refused to join and act personally.
Third, as with other grassroots movements in Indonesia, GMHI is generally sensitive to budgeting. People tend to refuse to spend money on developing rainwater harvesting systems in their communities. Only a few people are willing to invest money to build their rainwater harvesting. Based on a discussion with Dr. Agus regarding this issue, nowadays, we are waiting for a critical mass due to this program so that it will spread throughout Indonesia. In developed countries, there is an application for tax amnesty for the house or building which uses this system. That policy has been a critical point for a developing country like Indonesia.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible?
One limitation regarding grassroots movements is that we tend to ignore any newest innovation which can improve the technology. It also happened in the GMHI movement. So, most of the rainwater harvesting technology in Indonesia today was similar to the systems in place twenty years ago. Significant research needs to be conducted about this technology as happened in other countries, such as the US, India, China, South Africa, and the Netherlands (Velasco-Muñoz, Aznar-Sánchez, Batlles-delaFuente, & Fidelibus, 2019).
What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
Both Mr. Agus and I experienced no other problems with rainwater harvesting implementation.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
Indonesia has more than 17,000 islands, most of which are small islands with scarce water from rivers and groundwater but has an annual rainfall of about 3000-4000 mm per year. Therefore, Indonesia needs a system that can provide clean water with a minimum budget, mainly from rainwater. In addition, with our success stories from different environments, this system has the ultimate potential to be replicated and installed in other locations in Indonesia and around the globe.
However, the engineer should adjust the technology based on the natural characteristics and conditions of the specific location.
Conduciveness GMHI to broader changes in Indonesia
Nowadays, the GMHI becomes a machine to develop and combine similar actions due to rainwater harvesting as a people’s movement in Indonesia. Therefore, the project has an open-boundary system without formal bureaucracy, which is partially beneficial instead of limited.
For example, my colleagues and I in Universitas Jenderal Achmad Yani developed “Saleuwi” in the Cimahi area. This movement is part of an extension of GMHI like other similar communities, as mentioned previously.
The first time I had an intense discussion with GMHI’s initiator, Dr-Ing. Ir. Agus Maryono, was in about 2011 when I was a research assistant in Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB), Indonesia. At that time, Dr. Agus explained that rainwater harvesting technologies were already broadly applied in Germany, Australia, the US, and other developed countries and how this low-tech system successfully reduced runoff.
He also mentioned that he had successfully developed three rainwater harvesting systems at Gadjah Mada University (UGM), Indonesia. I remember that I was amazed at how the simple technology could provide fresh water and reduce runoff simultaneously.
At that point, I realized we needed to improve this technology to capture more rainfall and reduce runoff. On the one hand, rainwater harvesting needs a tank to keep rainwater, and it will require a larger tank for capturing heavy precipitation. But, on the other hand, the capacity of the tank is limited by area. Therefore, we need “something” to capture rainfall directly as well as to minimize the amount of runoff. I remember that I asked Dr. Agus about those issues, and he suggested using the bio pore, a hole or small tunnel formed underground resulting from the activities of organisms such as worms, termites, plant roots, etc. However, I think bio pores will only be effective for sand or granule soil. It will not work on clay or alluvium.
At that moment, I considered infiltration as well. I thought that before the water becomes runoff, we could capture it using a combination of rainwater harvesting and an infiltration well. And finally, we called it “Saleuwi”.
Saleuwi combines Sundanese collocation of “sa” and “leuwi”. “Sa” means one, and “leuwi” means water. So, saleuwi means capturing water with rainwater harvesting and its allies. Saleuwi not only captures rainfall for daily households but also recharges groundwater and reduces runoff. This technology resulted in many benefits for the users who implemented it and their neighbors with the same groundwater system.
In 2018, on behalf of the Universitas Jenderal Achmad Yani community service program, “Saleuwi” was successfully applied in a buffer area. The success story of “Saleulwi” is available on the youtube channel, especially https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX97nMZ1vSo&t=7s.
Figure 2 Saleuwi system
References
Awawdeh, M., Al-Shraideh, S., Al-Qudah, K., & Jaradat, R. (2012). Rainwater harvesting assessment for a small size urban area in Jordan. International Journal of Water Resources and Environmental Engineering.
Dwivedi, D. A., Patil, V. B., & Karankal, A. B. (2013). Rooftop Rain Water Harvesting for Groundwater Recharge in an Educational Complex. Global Journal of Researches in Engineering Civil and Structural Engineering.
Prize, T. G. (2022). How Grassroots Environmental Activism Has Changed the Course of History. Retrieved from https://www.goldmanprize.org: https://www.goldmanprize.org/blog/grassroots-environmental-activism/
Sadia Rahman, 1. ,., Din, N. B., Biswas, S. K., & Shirazi, S. M. (2014). Sustainability of Rainwater Harvesting System in terms of Water Quality. ScientificWorldJournal.
Smith, A., Fressoli, M., & Thomas, H. (2012). Grassroots innovation movements: challenges and contributions. Journal of Cleaner Production, 1-11.
Tanks, S. W. (2022). Rainwater Harvesting Australia. Retrieved from https://www.selectwatertanks.com.au: https://www.selectwatertanks.com.au/rainwater-harvesting-australia/
Velasco-Muñoz, J. F., Aznar-Sánchez, J. A., Batlles-delaFuente, A., & Fidelibus, M. D. (2019). Rainwater Harvesting for Agricultural Irrigation: An Analysis of Global Research. Water, 1-18.
Sethunarayanan Nagarajan
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the beneficiaries?
Tamil Nadu, one of the highly industrialized states in India, holds agriculture as its predominant occupation and it is considered an important coastal state in India with a coastline of 1,076 kilometers. Among the thirty-eight districts in the state, fourteen districts that share the coastline are Thiruvallur, Chennai, Chengalpattu, Villupuram, Cuddalore, Mayiladuthurai, Nagapattinam, Tiruvarur, Thanjavur, Pudukkottai, Ramanathapuram, Thoothukudi, Tirunelveli, and Kanyakumari. All these districts vary in several aspects like landscape, climate, flora and fauna, socio-economic development, business, and so on.
From Left to Right: Maps of India and Tamil Nadu (Image Credits: Google Maps)
Among these aspects, climatic change poses a great challenge and threat for the stakeholders at different timescales. It heavily impacts the lives and livelihoods of the people, who reside in the places and pushes them to transform their pattern of life at regular intervals. At present, the inhabitants of these places experience the visible consequences of climate change like intense drought, storms, heatwaves, and extreme flash floods. In this regard, the Government of Tamil Nadu (India) proposed three significant missions to combat climate change: (a) Green Tamil Nadu Mission, (b) Tamil Nadu Wetlands Mission, and (c) Tamil Nadu Climate Change Mission.The proposed missions are going to be implemented in different districts based on the landscape, challenges encountered by humans and non-human others, resources, and various other closely-related factors.
To implement the missions successfully in various parts of the state, the government has set up a special purpose vehicle named Tamil Nadu Green Climate Company (TNGCC). The TNGCC, with the support of the Tamil Nadu Infrastructure Fund Management Corporation Limited (TNIFMC), is given the responsibility to coordinate and monitor the proposed missions for the successful implementation. Some of the above-mentioned missions are furthered by multiple government departments, and private entities like educational institutions, industries, NGOs like Care Earth Trust and the Nature Conservancy India, along with the locals. Though beneficiaries, by and large, would include both humans and non-human others belonging to particular geographical locations and neighboring regions, it is difficult to evaluate their outcomes since all of these missions are in the initial stages and will take at least a decade to measure their results. Also, it would be important to include the inhabitants to identify the feasibility of the proposed missions, but there is no such sign as the missions are conceptualized and consulted largely with a team of educated individuals in governmental departments and NGOs. Neither the opinions of the locals nor their participation is considered critical for this establishment of the project. The insights of the educated individuals are heavily influenced by modern sciences rather than indigenous knowledge. Therefore, the outcomes of these initiatives are highly doubtful.
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?
Since there are three different initiatives, all of these initiatives cannot be viewed from a homogenized perspective but from a compartmentalized framework, based on the unique features and feasibilities that they can offer to tackle climate change. For example, the Green Tamil Nadu Mission, whichcombines both adaptation and mitigation measures, focuses on two major activities like restoration of degraded forest lands, planting trees species in places like farmlands, industrial areas, educational institutions, temple lands, public lands, and defense establishments to increase the green cover and to reduce the deforestation and land degradation. Whereas,the Tamilnadu Climate Change Missionis keen on introducing new technologies to build energy-efficient homes, develop electric vehicles, and create alternative sources of energy, which are apparent steps toward mitigating the Green House Gases. Such energy measures reduce energy waste and are cost-effective. Another initiative, the Tamil Nadu Wetlands Mission is an adaptive measure to grapple with climate change by restoring the wetlands, which can not only capture and store the carbon but reduce floods and relieve droughts. Plus, it supports biodiversity during extreme weather conditions as it serves as a habitat for birds, fishes, turtles, and other organisms besides stabilizing the shorelines and stream banks. The missions mentioned above, hence, carry both adaptation and mitigation dimensions to tackle climate change through various ways and means. The impacts of these missions can be understood holistically only when all of these missions are planned meticulously and executed within a short span of time coupled with empirical analysis of outcomes at periodic intervals. Also, the scale on which these missions are going to be executed is not only unpredictable but also a matter of concern; in other words, the qualitative and quantitative aspects of these initiatives in averting climate change have to be introspected from various perspectives. Apart from these, all of these initiatives share the responsibilities equally in engaging with climate change and addressing the issues with a wider and collaborative vision.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
Though all the three missions have exclusive objectives, in a larger aspect, all these objectives are intricately connected with one another to combat climate change. First, the objective of the Green Tamil Nadu Mission is to enhance the forest and tree cover from the existing 23.7 % to 33 % by organizing massive tree plantation programs of indigenous and diverse species to enhance the carbon sequestration potential on an average of 8 Mt every year. It may also reduce the risks that arise due to floods, droughts, landslides, and outbreaks of pests. Second, the aim of the Tamil Nadu Climate Change Mission is to create a smart infrastructure system to handle natural disasters, enhance the efficacy of public transport systems, develop educational courses, and encourage research related to climate change. Also, the important information to be noted is that all these missions are implemented in collaboration with private players like educational institutions, NGOs, and so on. Third, the Tamil Nadu Wetlands Mission plans to identify and map 100 wetlands in the state and ecologically restore them to serve as a natural sponge during flood and drought, and to protect the coastlines. All these objectives are collective and holistic to combat climate change. Though the objectives are different, their focus is to keep the emission of carbon under control.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
All these initiatives were proposed, recently, on 03.11.2021, during the Tamil Nadu budget session by the state finance minister. According to the Govt. Order No. 101, the timeline given for Green Tamil Nadu Mission and the Tamil Nadu Wetlands Mission are ten and five years respectively. There is no timeline given for the Tamil Nadu Climate Change Mission. Overall, most of these initiatives are only in the initial stages and a lot of discussion and planning should go into it before and during the implementation. In short, there are no visible effects till the present time.
Who are the actors involved? What is their background?
Major actors involved in these projects are private and public departments like Environment, Climate and Forest Department, Municipal Administration and Water Supply Department, Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Department, Public Works and Water Resources Department, academia, private sectors like industries, and NGOs, which foster a transition to climate-friendly platforms. Since NGOs, educational institutes, and many other organizations come under private sectors, they will be forced to work under political influence. Also, another significant problem typically faced in India is caste. The influence of caste can be witnessed in every aspect of governance, decision-making, planning, and so on. The members of the legislative assembly are mostly from the major caste group of the particular district and state. Although people who work in the government offices and laborers are from different castes and communities, the decisions are taken only by these representatives (MLAs) elected by the people, which mostly favors the people belonging to those castes. Sanction of loans, distribution of resources, subsidiaries, and offering of adequate facilities are challenged by the prevalence of the caste systems and caste politics. It is crucial to monitor both the distribution and utilization of resources for the successful implementation of these initiatives. Landlords may influence the local officials and get the resources required, especially monetary benefits, and later fail to meet the expectations and their level of awareness about climate change is also highly questionable. Therefore, the govt. should take necessary steps to identify the right people and educate them about the importance of these missions and empower them periodically.
Which limits does it encounter?
All these initiatives have some limitations in terms of infrastructure, financial support, feasibility, and socio-political influences. For instance, under the Green Tamil Nadu Mission, the Govt. of Tamil Nadu has planned to give materials for agroforestry to farmers to help them get additional revenue, which is believed to reduce the rate of deforestation and forest degradation. The challenge lies in how the govt. will identify the dedicated farmers and demarcate the boundaries of all those lands and monitor them closely. And to what extent does the govt. will extend support to those farmers apart from distributing the required materials like water will be a concern. Also, it has planned to increase the green cover on public lands for a ten-year duration. Now, the govt. has named educational institutes, temple lands, industrial areas, tank foreshore, and defense establishments for increasing the green cover. Excepting government-run organizations, all the other institutions are profit-oriented ones. The insufficiency of laborers to maintain those trees and places can affect the efficiency and outcome. Also, most of the family members of the landlords, and educational institutions run several other businesses. Therefore, the participation of such private players may hinder meeting the expected outcome of the missions. On the other side, some of the initiatives mentioned are already in action. But their rate of impact in tackling the challenge is highly skeptical as multiple factors play a crucial role, especially in helping people understand the urgency and required action to address the larger concerns. In short, it will have limitations at different levels – like functional, social, economic, and spatial.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
Yes. The major shortcoming is the way these initiatives are going to be taken to the public attention and consciousness and seek their support as these initiatives are at the fundamental level with clear and detailed long-term vision and planning. Also, the pace of implementation is critical as already we have started experiencing the impacts of climate change, but still, these initiatives are only in the planning and conceptual stage. The class and caste structures are widely prevalent and they dominate almost all sectors in a country like India. Another side, corporate mafias will show influence not only on the policies but on every decision made by the government. In addition, the nexus between the knowledge partners, policymakers, politicians, and the public is another great challenge because each of these stakeholders will have equal responsibility and challenge.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
Some of these initiatives can be implemented at any geographical location with some basic research about the spatial and temporal aspects of a place coupled with practical problems in terms of implementation and inside stories about the place. For example, before initiating tree plantation drives, it is important to examine the native species suitable for the specific location considering its geographical specificities like climate pattern, soil characteristics, and well-being of flora and fauna of the region. Also, it is important to understand and address the sustainability level of such projects in the given location and to conduct an impact level of those projects for a shorter and longer duration. In some contexts, better solutions may be feasible depending on the land, livelihood, and people, therefore, it is crucial to identify the functional and feasible solutions rather than adopting the initiative without any customization.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes? If yes, which?
No. First, the timeline of these projects spans about ten years and all these projects are only in the initial stages. Not only the outcomes and sustainability but the practicalities of these projects are unpredictable because other ongoing developmental projects and other proposed projects may challenge the new initiatives. For instance, wetlands are to be protected from encroachers, especially real estate mafias and industrialists, who will have planned to use the space for commercial purposes in collaboration with different MNCs. The state is also ready with plans to encourage rapid industrialization to generate income and improve the economy of the state, therefore to what extent these projects will be implemented considering the economic situation, and industrialization is debatable. Also how the government officials and public are going to be educated in terms of establishment, enhancement, and maintenance for a longer duration is doubtful.
| References: “Tamil Nadu: TN to Restore 100 Wetlands in Five-Year Period: Chennai News – Times of India.” The Times of India, TOI, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chennai/tn-to-restore-100-wetlands-in-five-year-period/articleshow/89979669.cms. Accessed on 25 April 2022. “Tamil Nadu to Set up Climate-Smart Villages and Rehabilitate Coastal Districts as Part of Its Climate Action Initiative: The Weather Channel – Articles from The Weather Channel.” The Weather Channel, https://weather.com/en-IN/india/climate-change/news/2022-05-20-tamil-nadu-to-set-up-climate-smart-villages-for-its-cimate. Accessed on 11 April 2022. TN Govt, Orders: https://cms.tn.gov.in/sites/default/files/go/envfor_e_100_2021_Ms.pdf. Accessed on 28 March 2022. Google Maps: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tamil+Nadu/@10.3149371,75.7168686,6.44z/data=!4 m5!3m4!1s0x3b00c582b1189633:0x559475cc463361f0!8m2!3d11.1271225!4d78.6568942. Accessed on 29 March 2022. |
José Mena
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By Sormani Daniele
After two days it* left the lair. The storm had passed. Its signs were evident everywhere: the barren ground soaked, almost muddy; traces of hail on the ground; rivulets of water running down the hill. The damage was not extensive, on the contrary: the land was no longer suffering the effects of the torrential half-yearly rains, nor wasting the great resource they constituted.
The woods were bright green, the colours brought to life by the rain. They had reclaimed the mountainsides, tree by tree, tempering the searing heat that now reigned for so many months of the year.
The rivers had taken back what had been taken from them by force: so many decades of human neglect and maintenance, coupled with the exceptional weather events that had now occurred almost two centuries ago, had caused the rivers to destroy those human-made riverbanks that were too narrow for them. The course of the rivers had changed over the decades, partly renaturalised, but not completely. The Adige no longer flowed through the centre of the city. The Fersina no longer flowed straight down, instead sweeping across the plain into the areas where human animals had once slept. Now these dwellings had become the homes of other species: as the forest advanced, birds came to nest, taking advantage of the presence of the watercourse, fish wallowed in the water, preyed upon by some mammals and birds. Some animals used the ruins of human houses for their dens, while others kept their distance as if fearing the sudden return of their now-extinct owners.
After this quick reconnaissance, it* headed for some foods, preferably some nuts, or some of the little fruit that still managed to grow in August, rigorously in the shade of the mountain. It* took the way for what the human animals once called GITAV. As it* walked, it* looked around, saw the mountains reinvigorated by the forests that had taken over the slopes that human animals had once torn up with ski lifts, a kind of transport based on metal rope that connected large bare trees; it* saw other non-human animals adapted to that torrid climate grunting in the woods, fluttering in the treetops, living their lives, unaware and perhaps consciously ignoring how much the human one had been canceled, along all the other species that had not made it.
The absence of human animals had changed the balance of species: with their disappearance, the cows, pigs, and chickens that had been kept in cages for so many millennia had dwindled to the point of near extinction, partly due to their now genetic weakness and inability to forage for food. Over the decades, those that remained had re-acclimated themselves to the forests, grasslands, mountains and hills, and by now had integrated with the other herbivores. The goats were the first to regain their stolen freedom.
In their place, the more hidden and less meek species had reclaimed their space. The woods were teeming with deer, chamois, and fawns; the riverbanks with beavers and marmots; the burrows of moles could be seen; not to mention the insects, reptiles, amphibians, and birds. Carnivores were beginning to return in large numbers after two centuries of slow repopulation.
They said that in the last decades the major effects of the Little Warm Age were easing, giving some respite to an exhausted Earth. But it* looked around, its eyes on the forests and non-human animals, and wondered who and what was exhausted: the Earth, or human rule over it?
The road to GITAV meandered around the river, then broke off and climbed slightly, then steepened in the last part. In that part of the valley, the beating sun could not penetrate the vegetation, and in the undergrowth there were berries and greedy acorns; where there had once been vineyards, there were now firs and larches, while the fruit trees had remained and even multiplied, given the influx of animals that had gone in search of food and, without perhaps knowing it, had scattered seeds.
GITAV was one of its* favourite places to forage. Collective memory said it had been created by humans two centuries before. The human animal had dug it out with ‘machines’, non-living creatures he controlled at will, made of those strange inedible stones. It had hollowed out one side of the mountain east of Trent, destroying the homes of many non-human animals and even a few humans, sweeping away the trees and undergrowth.
It was said that the idea was to create a kind of path inside the mountain, through which they would pass another machine, different from the others, in which they would put food and other things that humans used. This never happened. They had started, yes, but then more or less left it at a third, caught off guard by the onset of the Little Warm Age. With its arrival, heavy rains had destroyed the banks of the valley’s rivers and flooded the entire plain. The mountains stripped of trees had failed to hold, and landslides had added to the chaos. The human animal had abandoned the valley after a few years of resistance, finding it too difficult a habitat in which to live. Many other species had come to the same conclusion, including chamois, goats, and bears, followed later by wolves.
Wherever we stopped, it was incredible to hear the discrepancy: first of all, silence. It was said that in the time of the human animal, the most prevalent noise was that of its machines and tools. Now, however, silence could be heard. But as soon as one’s ears got used to it, one realised that it was not silence, but a very wide range of many different sounds, noises, and sounds. The sound of water from rivers and streams, the rustling of leaves, the breaking of twigs in the undergrowth as an animal passed by. And then the grunts, groans, moans, snorts, burps, cries, howls. A cacophony of sounds that together created an incredible harmony. And all this in the light of day, or rather to the ears of those who wanted to listen, who had previously been absorbed and dazed by a multitude of negative, dangerous, frightening, and intrusive auditory stimuli. Which was more or less the same way one remembered humans.
When humans fled, they left all their traces behind. Over time, we reclaimed their impermeable paths: mushrooms were the first to penetrate them with their spores, followed by perennial weeds and then, decades later, by scrubland.
The human dams, very different from those of the beavers, were destroyed by algae and rain, and the streams reclaimed their riverbeds. The quarries, on the other hand, remained as an eternal reminder of the wounds left by the human animal.
Back in GITAV, with their exodus, this path was left unfinished. According to the original plan, the water springs from the mountain would have been plugged once and for all. Over time, however, they had eroded the rock and entered this horizontal hole. The cave that was created was therefore full of water, and as the sun shone on it for many hours, a very strong humidity was created at the entrance, which was then diluted further inland. Plants grew in this habitat that could not grow outside because of the heat. In addition, most animals were afraid to enter the cave because of the high humidity. There was always an abundance of berries and wild fruits and great peace.
Had it not been for the sisterhood of the species, it* would probably have made its* lair there. It* would spend hours there eating, lying down and resting, never leaving. It* would arrive early in the morning, at first light, before the humidity could become too enveloping, and it* would not leave until the sky had turned orange, perhaps streaked with pink or violet. At that point, it* would roll in the grass, scratch itself* against the logs, smell all the essences that had changed since morning. It* runs, it* eats, it* urinates, it* grunts, it* growls. Then it* would slowly make its* way back to his den, to its* own kind, safe from predators.
In the silence of the cave it* had time to think, to let its* imagination run wild, to create futures, pasts, and presents. It* wondered what had become of the human animal. Had it become extinct like so many other species of animals and plants? Had it survived? Where did it live and how did it live?
When it had left the valley, the human animal had gone north, away from this increasingly tropical, increasingly dry and hot climate. At first, it was said, it had climbed higher, aided and abetted by the climate that made the Highlands more habitable, but soon it was gone, unable to live in so small a space and so impervious, used to having the world at its yoke.
Who knows what the North was like, what the climate was like, what the different species were like. Who knows what the North was like 200 years ago, or a few decades later, when the human animal went there in search of a future. Who knows what that future was like.
Who knows what the human animal was like two hundred years ago and now, if it still exists. It was said that it was a predator. The worst of all predators: they said it was predatory even towards its own kind, its peers, its equals. Who knows if it had changed. Who knows if it still lived on violence and pain, or if the collective pain had bent it, transformed it, mutated it. Who knows what interests the human animal had? Who knows if a human animal of today would be like a human animal of two hundred years ago and would want to turn its* cave into a path, or if it would want it to become its cave instead.
These thoughts and reflections were its* own; it* shared them with no one else. Leaving the cave and returning home, it* made no mention of them. Its* secret never revealed, its* treasure not shared.
Next day, same life.
By Stefanie Naoun
Screenshots taken from Ruge el bosque’s website. The artwork was designed by Clarisa Chervin, with permission to use the images by Dr. Valeria Meiller
Ecoteca is an experimental podcast recorded in Spanish available in Spotify. It seeks to preserve landscapes from the Southern Cone. The name derivates from the words eco and thèque. It is an archive of environmental degradation stories fighting to preserve the climatic, linguistic, and political ecosystems of Abya Yala/Afro/Latin America; all terms alluding to the same ground. Abya Yala refers to the New World in the indigenous language of Guna. These guided listening sessions are accompanied by sonic reverberations, ecopoetry, and city movements. The second episode focuses strictly on sacrifice zones in the locality of Quintero and Puchuncaví, Chile. The National Institutes of Health defines these sites as “hot spots of chemical pollution where residents live immediately adjacent to heavily polluted industries”. In other words, places where the community’s wellbeing is unjustly sacrificed purely for economic growth approved by the government in a disproportionate manner. These locals are frequently people of color and belong to lower socioeconomic statuses; demonstrating that capitalism’s inequalities affect racialized and marginalized communities. In 2018, a state of sanitary emergency was declared in Quintero and Puchuncaví due to the formation of a toxic yellow cloud arising from the industrial park. It contained substances such as methyl chloroform, toluene, and nitrobenzene, leaving more than a thousand inhabitants affected (Peña, 2019). Ecoteca’s episode braids together a script that delves into the manifold problems raised in the sacrificial zones of the Southern Cone by interlacing political ecologies with the work of three poets, Carlos Soto Román, Victoria Cóccaro, and Ana Gayoso with the percussionist Federico Orio, specifically commissioned for the episode. Ecoteca recognizes that environmental degradation is irreversible. However, it spreads awareness about climate change while visualizing cruel capitalist practices. Episode two lasts nearly 25 minutes; it is concise and persuasive.
Photograph taken by Anita Peña Saavedra (2019)
The image above shows the CODELCO (Corporación Nacional del Cobre de Chile) Ventana complex in Quintero-Puchuncaví, which is currently the largest power plant in Chile. It is a coal-fired electrical generating station that has erased nature’s color in the area and painted it literally and metaphorically gray. CODELCO focuses on copper mining while its Ventana complex ventures into thermoelectric power generation. The Quintero-Puchuncaví area has been the subject of environmental concerns due to these activities, leading to air pollution and contamination. However, this is not the only industrial facility threatening the bay. There are oil refineries, chemical plants, and ports. Its designation as a sacrifice zone reflects that the interest of economic development has taken precedence over the wellbeing of living and nonliving entities.
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the
beneficiaries?
Ecoteca is a subdivision of Ruge el bosque, an anthology series combining literature and ecology. The poems shared in the second episode belong to volume 1. The initiative’s main promoters are the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) and the University of Texas in San Antonio (UTSA). Ruge el bosque received the 2022 Ford-LASA Special Projects grant and UTSA’s INTRA 2023 research grant. The project director is Valeria Meiller, who is additionally part of the editing team. Whitney DeVos and Javiera Pérez Salerno are co-editors. However, the project has more collaborators such as graphic designer Clarisa Chervin and Celeste Precioso who is in charge of sound design. Frederico Durand is the podcast’s musician and creates minimalistic melodies. Analía Iglesias has created collages and Sofía Stel is the website’s proofreader. All individuals involved have written an ecobiography that can be found on the website explaining their proximity to nature and interests regarding environmental humanities. The podcast initiates dialogues among activist groups, artists, and institutions while acting as a grassroot scheme to avoid the erasure of biomes. Its founders believe climatic urgency requires a combination of strategies: ethos, pathos, and logos. The crisis requires the unity and action of all global citizens, in whichever manifestation possible, including the artistic field. Ecoteca is a subsection of Ruge el bosque seeking to initiate transnational and intercultural conversations about the role of Latin American literature in the context of the current climate crisis.
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation,
adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?
Ecoteca engages with climate by opposing the destruction of habitats and linguistic extinction. It strives for the harmonious kinship between humans, animals, territories, and nonliving entities.
This project aspires to reach diverse audiences; to call attention to the intersectional issues of the current ecological crisis from the power of poetry. It tackles both, the mitigation and adaptation dimensions of climate change from an indirect stance. It criticizes anthropocentric practices. In particular, extractive industries such as thermoelectric plants causing permanent and corrosive impacts on landscape, putting everything and everyone at risk. Ecoteca understands that these industries will not cease to exist. However, it desires the implementation of controlled practices; the problem is not necessarily the Anthropocene, and rather Moore’s idea of the Capitalocene. As for the mitigation part, by critiquing thermoelectric plants in the previously mentioned sacrificial zone, it promotes the transition to renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal power; hopefully reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Ecoteca’s implicit and explicit outcomes also include sustainable land use. In line with the adaptation element, the podcast (not limited to second episode) hopes for water management strategies, agricultural adaptation, and mainly, ecosystem conservation and restoration. This second episode explains how sacrifice zones disrupt communities, lead to environmental injustice, addresses its health impacts, talks about the economic dependance on polluting industries, and offers a voice for the residents of Quintero-Puchincaví and the environment.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
Its main objectives are to promote respect for the environment and lend it a voice for causes and communities that go unheard. Its central values are:
- Resilience: Authors, musicians, professors, graphic designers, and researchers united with the sole purpose of spreading awareness in a creative manner. Mixing auditory and visual senses to strengthen message reception.
- Advocacy: Every person involved in the project advocates for minority groups and their stolen territory.
- Awareness: Ecoteca makes visible environmental threats and demands action.
- Justice: The project wishes to aid in societal and infrastructural reconstruction. To witness regions not suffering from the disproportionate effects of climate change. Ecoteca fights for the wellness of marginalized groups.
- Coexistence: Living and nonliving entities from Abya Yala in peace. A relationship displaying values from commensalism or Jason W. Moore’s idea of ending cheap nature. Humans should stop appropriating nature’s gifts, reminding us that the problem is not the Anthropocene and rather the ‘Capitalocene’.
- Hopeful future: Aspiring to live in a society that takes accountability regarding the climate crisis and fights injustices. Ecoteca promotes imaginative exercises as well.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
There will be a total of eight episodes. Ecoteca’s first episode aired on April 13, 2023 while the second one came out on May 17. The release date for other episodes is still unknown. However, they will follow a similar pattern to the previous two. It can be speculated that a different episode will be released every month. Among its visible effects are reaching multiple Latin American individuals and spreading awareness about sacrifice zones in the bay of Quintero and Puchuncaví, Chile. The podcast is advertised on Ruge el bosque’s social media platforms (Instagram and Twitter) and it is available on Spotify. Every time an episode comes out, the link is shared on social media along with a post.
Which limits and shortcomings does it encounter?
Ecoteca and Ruge el bosque have limited funding and depend on their director to constantly apply for grants. Being realistic, they are not guaranteed to receive support. However, regardless of this shortcoming, the team is still willing to allocate time for researching more financial opportunities. Another limitation is that it is currently only available in Spanish. Although Spanish is among the world’s top five languages in terms of number of speakers and geographic extension, the lingua franca is still English. If this project could be translated, the audience reached would be much broader. However, the main shortcoming is that translating poetry turns into a difficult task. Rhymes, if any, tend to be lost along with puns or clever literary devices. The podcast should be kept as faithful as the original as possible.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
This podcast can easily be replicated in other regions. A climate issue in a city must be identified. In the case of Ecoteca, it follows the following structure:
- Episode one – destruction of wetlands.
- Episode two – sacrifice zones.
- Episode three – contaminated water.
- Episode four – the extinction of indigenous languages and its interrelation to habitat loss.
- Episode five – endangered species.
- Episode six – forests.
- Episode seven – grasslands.
- Episode eight – the city with an emphasis on e-waste.
Each episode targets a different city from the Southern Cone; a geographical subregion of South America typically covering Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay. In Spotify, there is a distinct graphic piece per episode, along with a description of the content, poets’ names, and a brief acknowledgements section. The podcast scripts must consist of an introduction, at least 3 poems relating to the issue, the author’s implications to the climate crisis, background music, and credits. Interviewing citizens living in the affected area and including their statements can also be beneficial. There is plenty of artistic freedom when it comes to a project like this. What is most important is devoting plenty of time to contact potential participants, selecting the appropriate content, researching, and setting the agenda. There are many tasks involved when it comes to creating a podcast. The team must be communicative, respectful, responsive, and most importantly, passionate about the crisis. Each poet is asked to read their selected materials and it can be recorded asynchronously. I invite all Spanish speakers to visit the website and listen to it. The creation of a similar podcast must require a pre-production phase, episode preparation, recording, editing and postproduction, revision, and promotion. Applying to grants, fellowships, and securing partnerships are important steps in the replication of the project.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes?
This podcast initiative can be conducive to broader changes in multiple ways. First, it can raise awareness by educating listeners about environmental threats while presenting well-researched and compelling information such as deforestation, habitat loss, extinction, and so on in specific areas of the Southern Cone. Secondly, the podcast can inspire listeners to take individual or collective actions. By showcasing these heartbreaking stories, environmental conservation, sustainability, and positive change can emerge as a result. Listeners can be motivated to adopt environmentally friendly practices, spread information, and support relevant organizations. Podcasts can play an influential role when it comes to policy advocacy. Perhaps, it can contribute to public discourse with audiences eager to propose new ideas and debate existing policies to prioritize environmental protection, sustainability, and improve quality of life. Policy makers could even listen to the podcast. Overall, it can be concluded that Ecoteca can reach wide audiences, raise awareness, educate, inspire action, facilitate dialogue, and mobilize individuals. Ecoteca seeks to underscore how the region’s poetic production shapes emerging politics, demonstrating that poetry can work as a way of preserving endangered ecosystems and even languages. Nature is constantly speaking; it is simply that we fail to hear it. That is why the podcast acts as a mediator or dare I say, interpreter. It is impossible to avoid anthropocentric discourse. However, the podcast would like to imagine that if nature could talk, it would verbalize its state and needs, even though it already does through climate change. Nature is the voice of the Earth and is hurting because its ecosystems are being disrupted.
References
Lerner, S. (2010). “Sacrifice Zones: The Front Lines of Toxic Chemical Exposure in the United States.” The National Institutes of Health. Accessed on May 20, 2023.
Peña, A. (2019). “Historic victory for citizens of Chile’s ‘sacrifice zone’.” OpenDemocracy.
Accessed on June 2, 2023.
By Lucia Tedesco
‘A little puzzle my dad taught me when I was ten. When is someone you will love still going
to be alive?’ What do you mean?’
‘You’re twelve years old. When will you turn ninety?’
They jot down on a piece of paper:
2090 + 90 = 2180
‘Now let’s imagine your ten-year-old grandchild, born in 2170: when will that person turn ninety? When
would they still be talking about you?’
They work out the sums.
‘Would it be 2260?’
‘Yes, can you imagine that? The person you’ll love most in all the world will still be alive in 2260!
Imagine your time. I was born in 2008 and you’ll know a person who’ll still be alive in 2260. That’s the
length of time you connect, more than 250 years. The time you can touch with your own hands. Your time
is the time of the people you know and love, the time that moulds you. And your time is also the time of the
people you will know and love. The time that you will shape. Everything you do matters. You create the
future every single day.’
– Andri Snær Magnason, On Time and Water
Seven days. Seven very long days since I found in my father’s secret hiding place the safe with my great-grandmother Emma’s things. Several times I thought of not opening it, of ignoring this discovery, but I felt the need for answers. I hope that this trip will not turn into a nightmare and that my stay here in Bologna will go unnoticed at home. I’ve been thinking for a long time whether or not to tell my father about this trip. In the end, the least complicated solution for everyone seemed to leave without telling him. I know it is dangerous, that nobody would think of going over the border at the beginning of the Crazy Season, but I am sure that for my father the answer would have been the same at any other time: “Ophelia, no, you cannot go”. Too many memories for him, I understand. Not to mention that in the Crazy Season the weather is extremely variable: some days it can reach 40 degrees and then suddenly there can be heavy rain for up to 72 hours straight. My grandmother used to say that it didn’t used to be like this. There used to be half seasons, periods of transition from too cold to too hot temperatures and vice versa. The Crazy Season, on the other hand, lasts 40 days and for the rest of the time the temperatures stay around 27-30 degrees.
Ever since I found that diary, I can’t stop thinking about it. I have fantasised for days about the idea of taking a trip to old Bologna, to the place where – according to my great-grandmother Emma – a city stood until not so long ago.
I have a hard time imagining a city. There hasn’t been one for so long that I couldn’t distinguish it from any other inhabited place. My grandmother used to say that they were born for the purpose of distinguishing human from non-human space.
My brothers and I did not understand at first: how is it possible to live while ignoring other species? How is it even conceivable to survive without being surrounded by greenery? I probably won’t understand – we will never understand – yet my curiosity is now uncontrollable. I feel that I can no longer put off this moment. I feel I must discover my roots.
I just arrived on the aerotrain. The sky here is strange, constantly changing. I have Emma’s diary with me, an acclimatising mask, and the satellite in case of emergency. I try to get my bearings with a map from 2023 that I found among Emma’s things, but it’s very difficult. There is tall grass everywhere, remnants of buildings from time to time, some clearly visible others less so because they are swallowed up by a strange form of ivy.
I open the diary and start reading again:
There is buzz in the city these days. 25 April is celebrated in a big way here. Via del Pratello is invaded by streams of people arriving from all over Italy. Few are the citizens of Bologna, many are the out-of-towners, mostly students. Friends from Florence came up. We sang “Bella ciao” in the square in chorus, as we do every year. Then we moved to the centre; at Pratello it was almost impossible to walk, talk, and breathe. We stopped in Piazza del Nettuno, still laughing at the statue’s hand thinking of Giambologna. They wanted to whisper things to each other under the vault of the Podestà, but I was too tired, so I headed home.
Looking around, I see a perimeter of a strange dark stone. What’s left of the marble, I suppose. I move closer to get a better look at it. I trample the grass to trace a path; I climb over the low wall and find myself in a pool. I begin to be more certain of where I am: it must be the fountain of Neptune, even though there is no longer any trace of the statue. Now that I have a point to start from on the map I can orient myself better. I pick up the diary again and continue reading at the point where I had stopped:
I avoided Via Indipendenza. Everyone knows that on holidays it is a jungle. I preferred to continue on via Rizzoli and go down via Oberdan. I will miss all the side streets, all the red bricks of the buildings. I will miss peeking in the doorways and looking at the inner courtyards. I will miss the taverns, the people in the streets, under the arcades drinking and talking. When I can, I will continue to enjoy this. There weren’t many people on Via Oberdan. Only a few tourists stopped at the Prosciutteria, unaware of the annual magic that is created at Pratello. Almost at the end of the street I noticed that the canal was full of water and the view was strangely crowded. People are usually unaware that Bologna’s canals are visible in several places, so they queue up on Via Piella to get a tiny glimpse. They call it the secret Venice, but it has nothing Venetian or secret about it.
I stop at this point, I want to get back on track. Above all, I am curious to see what a canal is like. The temperatures are beginning to rise. I look around for nearby shade, I don’t want to risk walking for too long in the sun’s harmful rays.
The streets are not so well traced and visible now, but I realise I have to go north because before leaving I read something about the morphology of Bologna and apparently the northern part of the city is lower than the one to the south. I spot a building with a tower and choose it as a reference point to shelter from the increasingly hot sun. I hear a noise, a strange thud in the distance, but I decide to ignore it. I admit that I am starting to feel a little scared, but I am used to sudden encounters where I live, and above all I have not travelled so many kilometres to run away at the first doubt.
I keep walking and arrive at the spot where my great-grandmother said there should be an overlook to the canal. Yet, of the canal, no trace. A wide clearing now opens up before my eyes, which I decide not to enter. At this point, according to my calculations, I should not be too far away. I consult the diary again:
Via delle Moline welcomes the university area. It still makes me strange to think that the canals have been covered over and that I live in a house that long before had been a mill. The first street on the left, leaving Via Oberdan behind, is Via Capo di Lucca. There, amidst new buildings and brick houses, my nest emerges. A mansard flat far too big for one person. I will never forget the first time I saw it, the sense of home I felt; just
as I will never forget when I no longer felt safe. That time when the rain came down for
three long weeks incessantly. That time I was forced to sleep on the sofa in the kitchen, the place most hidden by the skylights, fearing that I would end up with water everywhere, just as was happening in the bedroom. Everything that used to give me security, peace, serenity now frightens me, terrifies me, generates anxiety. I no longer feel safe even in my own home. I feel I will soon leave this city.
Emma’s diary stops here. Or rather, what remains of it. The tears make me suspect that there is a part of her story that I will never know.
I set off again, but after a few steps I am forced to stop: a not too large pond prevents me from turning into via Capo di Lucca. The pond is via Capo di Lucca. I look around to see which way to cross it. Among the reeds I glimpse a roof and something tells me that I am close to what I am looking for. Suddenly, a strange animal emerges from the water with a hairy, matted coat, a long tail that they wave slowly and gills on his sides. They become aware of my presence and remain motionless for a few seconds. You don’t see animals like that in my neck of the woods, so I can’t quite make out what I’m looking at. Something about them reminds me of a feline: their moving silently, their attentive, cunning gaze. Felines in my neck of the woods are not amphibians, so this confuses me. I keep looking around in search of a support to cross the body of water, and so I spot an old abandoned bottega. But as I try to make my way inside, the animal makes a dash for it and disappears back into the water.
The inside of the bottega is partly covered. On the uncovered side, the sun illuminates an object I havenever seen. I decide to curb my curiosity and concentrate on finding the stand; also because it is getting warmer and soon I will have to shelter in the shade for more hours. Behind me, I notice that the door is not quite firm. I try to pull it off with some force and, after a few attempts, I find it in my hands, heavy enough to make me lose my balance. I drag it to the shoreline of the pond and try to climb on it a little awkwardly. I try to push the water with my hands to move from there and realise that I make this gesture spontaneously. Tired and on the verge of giving up, I stop for a few moments, when again the noise from before calls my attention: there, among the reeds in the middle of the pond, I glimpse a small house half submerged. Again, instinct tells me that I am close to my destination. I am about to pick up the pace, when a force under the door takes over and pushes me there: I see its tail, I suspect that it might be the creature I encountered just before. I am frozen with fear, I cannot make a sound. When we reach the front of the dwelling, they stop. I breathe a sigh of relief. I try to figure out how to reach the interior of the strange island, but my heart is still pounding. At this point, the animal starts moving more slowly again. I have the feeling that they have not come to harm me and that, on the contrary, they want to help me in some way. Like a spirit guide. We pass through a semi-underwater arch and walk down the long corridor. With my hands I grip the raft tightly. Slowly we approach a more or less walkable staircase. I take courage and jump onto the first accessible step, hoping it will hold my weight. Now I can see my helper. Our glances cross. I nod my head in thanks, I’ve seen this gesture in some sci-fi movie, I’m not sure they will understand. They give me one last look and disappear beneath the surface again. I am alone again – I think. I start to move from step to step, avoiding the gaps and trying to feel the condition of the structure with my foot first. The temperature is different now: it is still very hot, but something seems to be obscuring the sun. I can’t see from there. I continue up the last three steps and at the sight of the floor, my stomach closes. I have the feeling that I have already been there, that I have already seen this place. I pick up the diary and hurriedly try to open the pocket inside the cover. I hear a loud bang outside, but I don’t let myself be distracted. I knew it. I could hear it. Among the notes stored in the secret pocket, a picture of Emma’s house pops out. The house she loved so much and then hated as well. I’m in the right place. Now I just have to look for something, to look for it. Now I can reconstruct my story. Her story. A heavy drop falls on my head. It starts to rain
Psychogeographic map of Bologna made by Ophelia
By Cecilia Pasini
The Great Plain was a land of cement and ash. The soil was once parcelled out into fields where rooted bipeds cultivated their food- They called themselves “humans”.
Water was constrained and flowed in canals. The bipeds decided when to release it and for how long. The plain, however, was interrupted by the smoke and concrete towers of the factory, where the bipeds entered and exited. They were like ants when seen from above.
Time, I have heard, was counted in hours, days, weeks and years and flowed like a line. Humans lived without thinking about the only thing that matters concerning time: death. They lived considering themselves, their artefacts, the cages they lived in, as endless.
They also thought that resources from mother Earth the Gentle were eternal.
Water was used to put out fires, to cool a world on fire.
The river Po was closely controlled, because humans were concerned about its power. Water was able to ruin the brick buildings they used to live in.
Humans used to venerate another kind of liquid: it was called oil, and they considered it as the “black gold”, because, apparently, gold was something precious, for them, and this oil was precious. And it was as dark as the night is.
Once, I met a seagull, they told a story that was passed on by their ancestors: this black gold travelled millions kilometres for the need of humans. It passed the oceans closed in huge floating junks to reach ports where it entered pipelines and, hidden, continued travelling underground.
It was impossible, indeed, to follow its journey from our perspective.
We could just inhale a part of it that was not liquid anymore. A pigeon told me that the black gold entered some strange buildings made of cement, then exited and travelled again towards places where it served to feed the humans’ means of transport.
You know, they were so slow when they moved, and they found all these means imitating the faster animals. It’s so lovely-dovey if you reflect about it carefully: humans were unsatisfied and always wanted to overcome their limits. They, poor unskilled animals, felt disappointed.
They condemned themselves, they approached their end.
And it happened. Earth was suffering, everyone was. The whole multitude of living beings felt thirsty, flushed, hungry. Moribund. Mother Earth said: Enough.
Enough.
Earth asked her siblings to help her. It was time to free ourselves from humans.
Free.
Release.
Rid.
Relieve.
Too much suffering, too much pain.
And then it happened. Suddenly water exited every row it was constrained in. She took everything and everybody, she destroyed, ruined, crashed, demolished, wrecked.
I can’t lie: it was force, power, and violence. Something you can’t –and shouldn’t- expect from the Gentle Earth and the floating Water. But they could no more stand and see the suffering and pain. Enough, it was enough.
But then.
What remained was peace.
And silence.
And everything started all over again.
But humans weren’t there anymore.
At that time, water was everywhere, and she was able to introduce her two souls to each other: saltwater met freshwater, they barely knew each other from the estuary of the rivers and the rain, especially the torrential ones. Now they met and covered the planet. And our plain. Everything appeared…What did they call it… Sure: swamp. Or wetland. It was wet, indeed. For most of us it was heaven: trees, shrubs, bushes, grew wildly. Insects found their place and proliferated. And for us…I cannot describe the joy, the feeling of deep fulfilment.
Finally, it was home.
Earth became, again, home to everyone.
Of course, these are just tales of things I have never seen and I am not definitely sure they really happened. It can also be that humans never existed and parents tell us this story to make us respect Mother Earth and Sister Water.
These are legends whose origins are lost in the mists of time, and today it seems hard to imagine a land in squares, water obeying a master, the plain interrupted by concrete towers catching fire.
Nowadays water, water is the only Queen. It could not be otherwise in a world where everything flows. Water is everywhere: it produces and reproduces life. I think that humans, if just they could have understood anything at all, would have called it “the transparent gold”. But what is gold? We don’t sell or buy anything, the preciousness of metals has seen its twilight together with those humans.
Seen from above, the territory, that is land and water, does not seem to have a past, not least because past and present have no meaning for those who inhabit it. The only time that exists is that of the seasons: it is a circle, reborn each spring to slumber in autumn. Death’s power is recognised, anyone understands it and no one fears it. It’s nature: things begin, things end.
Nobody is interested in speed anymore: moving fast is a way to approach death. We do respect death, but we are not impatient to meet it.
My time is not even cyclical, it is geographical. Such is the time for herons: we fly to change the season. I fly and I can travel and see the world as it is, from above.
References
Alliegro, E.V. (2012). Il totem nero. Petrolio, sviluppo e conflitti in Basilicata. Roma: CISU.
Brennan, S. A. (2016). Public, First. Retrieved from: https://dhdebates.gc.cuny.edu/read/untitled/section/11b9805a-a8e0-42e3-9a1c-fad46e4b78e5.
Clément, G. (2002). Éloge des vagabondes. Herbes, arbres et fleurs à la conquête du monde. Paris: Nil éditions.
Dal Gobbo, A. (2022). Energy and the ethnography of everyday life: A methodology for a world that matters. Ethnography, 0(0), 1-22.
Dennis, K., Donnelly, J. (Writers) & Munden, M., Yip, W., Garcia Lopez, A., Donovan, S. (Directors). (2013). Utopia. Wilson, K., Featherstone, J., Kelly, D. (Executive producers). Liverpool, England: Kudos.
Reclus, E. (2005). Storia di un ruscello, Milano: Elèuthera.
Sepulveda, L. (1996). Historia de una gaviota y del gato que le enseñó a volar. Madrid: Planeta.
Monika Didžiulytė
“September in Šilainiai Gardens” by Vytautas Paplauskas (2022), URL: https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai/photos/pb.100064754194218.-2207520000./5883427801667742/?type=3, used with permission from the initiative
Šilainiai Gardens.
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the beneficiaries?
Šilainai Gardens is a public urban garden located in the Šilainiai neighborhood of Kaunas, Lithuania. The Šilainiai neighborhood is a so-called “sleeping neighborhood,” primarily consisting of residential apartment buildings. It is home to approximately 50,000 residents, mainly senior individuals and families with children.
Established in 2018, the Šilainai Gardens project aims to preserve and continue the traditions and practices of the local community, which has been actively involved in gardening and greening the area since the interwar period.
Currently, the project is supported by the Lithuanian Culture Council, Kaunas city municipality and a public enterprise called the Kaunas Fort Park. The Šilainai Gardens is managed and supervised by Evelina Šimkutė – garden’s project coordinator.
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?
The Šilainiai Gardens project is contributing to both mitigation and adaptation efforts. The project’s vision identified its benefits for people and the city. City utilities, city assets, and sustainability are particularly relevant in this context. The document argues that composting eliminates organic waste, significantly reduces the need for packaging, alleviates pressure on waste collection and transportation, and decreases illegal dumping. Additionally, the project as a whole contributes to sustainability by reducing the heat island effect, slowing down water flow to increase infiltration, rehabilitating the soil, and enhancing resilience in the food system. Importantly, the document aligns with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) established by the UN (Šimkutė et al., 2018).
More specifically, the garden managers prioritize environmentally conscious practices and organize lectures and educational activities to teach responsible and effective gardening methods that minimize harm to the surrounding ecosystem. For example, lectures on non-chemical methods of pest control, such as dealing with slugs, have been provided. Additionally, participants and attendees are encouraged to use reusable containers and be mindful of their environmental impact during events (Šilainių Sodai, n.d.).
Furthermore, Šilainai Gardens serves as an educational and resilience-building space. Various lectures are held, covering topics such as permaculture and biomimicry, which introduce participants to sustainable and nature-inspired solutions for urban gardening. The project also regularly organizes tidy-up days, contributing to the protection of the environment and the preservation of the area’s natural beauty (Šilainių Sodai, n.d.). Ultimately, Šilainai Gardens cultivates resilience, a sense of community, sustainable cohabitation practices, and offers an alternative to more harmful food production practices.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
The values of the Šilainiai Gardens project encompass the preservation of traditional practices and knowledge, sustainable social and agricultural practices, sustainable cohabitation of people with flora and fauna, biodiversity, resilience, and more.
The primary goal of the project has always been to meet the demand of urbanites for gardening spaces. The area’s residents, particularly senior citizens, have already utilized areas for gardening purposes and have greened the neighborhood by planting trees and bushes, enhancing the aesthetics in the Soviet-style modern architecture in the area. The project has provided the community with a space where they can practice traditional, sustainable, and safe gardening, while also fostering a sense of community and cultivating resilience among its members (Šimkutė et al., 2018).
The initiative’s coordinator, E. Šimkutė, emphasizes the importance of harmony between nature, humans, and heritage. By involving artists and scholars, the project has facilitated learning about the ecosystem itself and sustainable solutions for effective and safe gardening practices. The community has discovered over 300 different species, and through sustainable gardening and tending to the green areas, the space has become friendly and inviting to animals and birds, including foxes, newts, frogs, thrushes, blackbirds, nightingales, and bees. When working in the gardens, consideration is given to the cycles of birds, bees, dragonflies, and butterflies, and efforts are made to disturb them as little as possible (Javaitytė, 2022).
Coordinator Šimkutė also highlights the importance of preserving traditional knowledge. The garden serves as a space to share and pass on the knowledge about growing food. Senior gardeners, particularly those with rural backgrounds, play a significant role as natural educators, frequently assisting urbanites with their crops and stepping in to help rectify mistakes (Javaitytė, 2022). This involvement of senior citizens is particularly significant because Soviet-style apartment building areas are predominantly occupied by them (Burneika, Ubarevičienė & Baranuskaitė 2019).
Image 2: A photo of a bee in Šilainiai Gardens by Vytautas Paplauskas (2021) https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai/photos/pb.100064754194218.-2207520000./4500489259961610/?type=3, used with permission from the initiative Šilainiai Gardens.
Senior citizens involved in the project share that gardening is now their primary activity since retiring. The project provides them with a safe and natural space for engaging in pleasant physical activity and relaxation. It offers easy access to nature, allowing them to enjoy its tranquility, grow their own crops, and harvest fruits, vegetables, berries, and greens. Many of these residents have been gardening since their childhood or youth. Hence, working outdoors, enjoying the fresh air and growing food themselves is important to their lifestyle and identity (Šimkutė, n.d. -a).
Finally, the garden values community. The coordinator emphasizes that the garden is is first and foremost an informal community engaged in shared activities. The community consists of over 100 people, and their plots range from 1 square meter in raised beds to larger traditional plots. It not only aims to bring neighborhood residents together but also encourages and welcomes anyone interested to participate continuously or as a guest. The place is open for visitors to take harvest from shared farming beds with community signs, indicating that anyone can come and water the plants or taste the produce (Krapavickaitė, 2021).
Image 3: ”June in the educational beds of Šilainiai Gardens” by Vytautas Paplauskas (2021) https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai/photos/pb.100064754194218.-2207520000./4361511580526046/?type=3, used with permission from the initiative Šilainiai Gardens.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
The Šilainiai Gardens project has its roots in the interwar period when residents first began engaging in gardening activities in the area. The project is situated within the Kaunas Fortress, which was originally constructed to protect the Russian Empire’s western borders. Like many military and imperial heritage sites, it carries a controversial and often negative historical and social meaning. Despite this, locals managed to repurpose the area after World War I, utilizing the tunnels as natural refrigerators for storing and preserving their harvests (Šimkutė et al., 2018).
In 1984, the Šilainiai neighborhood was established, and apartment buildings were constructed. Many residents of the newly built neighborhoods, originating from rural areas, continued gardening activities in the area. The newcomers took the initiative to clean the run-down and overgrown territory of the VIII fort, which was covered in bushes and infested with Sosnowsky’s hogweed. They planted trees and plants, creating a community garden that, by 1999, was already well-established (Šimkutė et al., 2018; Krapavickaitė, 2021).
Image 4: ”Spring in Šilainiai Gardens” by Vytautas Paplauskas (2021) https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai/photos/pb.100064754194218.-2207520000./4239055472771658/?type=3, used with permission from the initiative Šilainiai Gardens.
In more recent years, as many original residents of the neighborhood entered retirement, gardening has become one of their main activities. However, there has also been a rise in robberies and instances of destruction. These incidents have led to heightened levels of physical and perceived insecurity, resulting in a demand for increased supervision and administration of the area. Formalizing activities through the Šilainiai Gardens project has played a crucial role in providing a safe environment for senior residents to continue their traditional practices (Šimkutė et al., 2018).
In 2018, a transformative project was initiated by the residents and volunteers, with the support of various partners. The project aimed to revitalize the area and promote sustainable gardening practices. The Kaunas Fort Park enterprise provided the land for this initiative, creating a dedicated space for the Šilainiai Gardens project to flourish (Šilainiai Project, 2019). The project has also been supported financially by the Lithuanian Culture Council. The Council provides funding for materials and tools necessary for enabling educational communal activities, which include clean-up events, workshops, lectures with naturalists and gardening experts, seed exchanges, grass mowing and more (Šilainių Sodai, n.d.). From 2020, the project has also received support from the “Initiatives for Kaunas” program of the Kaunas municipality (Krapavickaitė, 2021).
Since the inception of the project, Šilainiai Gardens have grown into a thriving community-driven endeavor, attracting over 100 members and fostering a sense of togetherness among the residents. The community holds gardening meetings every Wednesday from 18:00 to 20:00, organizes clean-up events on weekends, and hosts workshops on Sundays (Krapavickaitė, 2021).
Image 5: A photo of participants involved in the outdoors furniture making workshop by Vytautas Paplauskas (2020),
https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai/photos/pb.100064754194218.-2207520000./3440968382580375/?type=3, used with permission from the initiative Šilainiai Gardens.
Who are the actors involved? What are their backgrounds?
Evelina Šimkutė is an artist and cultural producer who specializes in socially engaged art and creative place-making practices. She graduated from the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in 2012 and is currently based in Lithuania. Since 2015, Evelina has been leading the ‘Šilainiai Project,’ a creative platform in the Šilainiai housing estate in Kaunas. Evelina is a coordinator and an active initiator of the Šilainiai Urban Gardens initiative, focusing on long-term strategies for a sustainable city and community development in the neighborhood. E. Šimkutė is an actor organizer and participant of all the events, whose genuine and active involvement in the community is evident. Evelina is active on social media communicating and sharing events and achievements of the community (Šimkutė n.d. -b).
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic
issues can arise from its implementation?
It is difficult to critically evaluate the implementation of the project. It would perhaps require comprehensive research, such as an anthropological study or a survey of participants and neighbors. However, from an amateur outsider’s perspective, the project seems to have proven itself as a long-term, needed, effective, and practical initiative. I would attribute its success to the project managers and initiators drawing from the community’s traditional practices, which were already in place and are now supported and amplified through the project’s more formal structure and funding.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
Considering the significance of multiapartment buildings in Lithuanian architecture and their predominant occupancy by individuals often as old as the buildings themselves, it is reasonable to assume that this initiative could be replicated throughout the country. Considering that over 60% of Lithuanians reside in multiapartment buildings, with more than 70% of these buildings constructed before 1991, it is evident that many neighborhoods share similar characteristics with Šilainiai in terms of architecture, urban planning, and sociodemographics (fi-compass, n.d.; Renonbill, n.d.; ). These neighborhoods and their elderly residents could benefit from access to community and safe spaces promoting comfortable and active lifestyle essential for health and well-being. Consequently, in Lithuania, the Šilainiai Urban Gardens model could prove effective in promoting resilience, and a certain level of autonomy among senior citizens. However, it’s worth noting that some neighborhoods may not have access to land resources similar to what Šilainiai Gardens in Kaunas Fort Park offers, which could be seen as a primary limitation.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes? If yes, which?
The Šilainiai Gardens initiative can be considered conducive to broader changes and has the potential to impact various aspects of the community and its surroundings. The support and recognition from the city municipality, as well as the involvement of diverse non-governmental social enterprises, highlight the effectiveness, visibility, and versatility of the project.
In terms of broader changes, the initiative promotes social and environmental sustainability. By preserving traditional practices and knowledge, fostering sustainable social and agricultural practices, and promoting the cohabitation of people with flora and fauna, the Šilainiai Gardens project contributes to a more sustainable way of living. It encourages sustainable gardening practices, the use of non-chemical methods for pest control, and the cultivation of biodiversity, all of which have positive effects on the environment.
Additionally, the project promotes community preparedness and resilience. Through its emphasis on community engagement, shared activities, and the involvement of senior citizens with rural backgrounds, the initiative strengthens the sense of community and cultivates resilience among its members. The gardens provide a safe and natural space for physical activity, relaxation, and the sharing of traditional knowledge. By involving educators and naturalists, the project also promotes learning and encourages the passing on of knowledge to younger generations.
Institutionally, the support from the city municipality and the involvement of social enterprises indicate recognition of the importance of community-driven initiatives and the value they bring to the neighborhood. This recognition could lead to the developing of more supportive policies and institutional arrangements that encourage and facilitate similar grassroots projects in the future. The project’s success and its positive impact on the community’s well-being could inspire other neighborhoods or cities to adopt similar initiatives, further contributing to long-term sustainability and community preparedness.
In that regard, it is important to note that the Šilainiai Gardens initiative drew on experiences of overseas urban gardens. The project vision initiators overviewed Battery Urban Farm in NY (US), Lasnaidee Laagna Garden in Tallinn, and Aleksandri Community Garden in Tartu (Estonia) (Šimkutė et al., 2018). Moreover, representatives from Lasnaidee Garden visited Šilainiai Gardens, sharing their success stories and holding a workshop. The Furniture workshop, in particular, was an activity adapted from the Estonian friends (Javaitytė, 2022). This indicates cohesion among urban projects and the potential for the diffusion of these models.
Overall, the Šilainiai Gardens initiative goes beyond its immediate impact on gardening and community engagement. It has the potential to catalyze broader changes in terms of social, environmental, and institutional aspects, fostering a more sustainable, resilient, and prepared community.
References:
Burneika, D., Ubarevičienė, R., & Baranuskaitė, A. (2019). Soviet housing estates in Vilnius, Lithuania: socio-ethnic structure and future (-less?) Perspectives. Housing estates in the Baltic countries: The legacy of central planning in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Urban Book Series, Cham: Springer, 247-270.
fi-compass. (n.d.). Energy-saving renovation: good for the planet…and for the wallet. Retrieved June 14, 2023. https://www.fi-compass.eu/f/the-beacon-winter-2020-2021/energy-saving-renovation-in-lithuania/
Javaitytė S. (2022). VIII forto slėnyje įsikūrę Šilainių sodai – žydintis rojaus kampelis mieste. Kas vyksta Kaune. https://kaunas.kasvyksta.lt/2022/05/15/video/viii-forto-slenyje-isikure-silainiu-sodai-zydintis-rojaus-kampelis-mieste/
Krapavickaitė D. (2021). „Šilainių sodai“ laukia naujakurių! Kauno diena. https://kauno.diena.lt/naujienos/kaunas/miesto-pulsas/silainiu-sodai-laukia-naujakuriu-1025166
Renonbill. (n.d.). Knowledge sharing. Retreived June 14, 2023, from https://www.renonbill.eu/knowledge-sharing/the-residential-building-sector-in-lithuania?briefings=on&factsheets=on&infographics=on&language=any&reports=on&tools=on&page=1
Šilainiai Project. (2019, August 19). ŠILAINIŲ SODAI 2019 – Ilgoji versija [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnzkfjO54_Y&t=512s&pp=ygUOc2lsYWluaXUgc29kYWk%3D
Šilainių Sodai (n.d.). Posts [Facebook page]. Facebook. Retrieved June 14, 2023, from https://www.facebook.com/silainiusodai
Šimkutė E. (n.d. -a). Šilainiai Urban Gardens. Retrieved June 14, 2023, from https://evelinasimkute.com/portfolio/Šilainiai-urban-gardens/
Šimkutė E. (n.d. -b). About. Retrieved June 14, 2023, from https://evelinasimkute.com/about/
Šimkutė E. et al. (2018). Šilainiai Gardens: Military Land Reclaiming Process Through Communal Gardening.
Ysabel Muñoz Martínez
[20.07.2231]
Hey, sorry for the noise… the boat is fully booked, and you know how chatty we can get. You will probably get this message later because I’ve heard that communications are still a problem when entering the Caribe land, something about electric interference, they are saying here on the boat. May is doing alright, but I think she is a bit anxious about getting the hormones she needs in Trinidad. Other passengers recommended we travel to Santiago to get the rest of the pills in case we want to stay longer in Cuba, we’ll see. I know she’s trying to hide any signs of concern from me because I am so excited, she says I’m a little girl again. Everyone else on the boat, especially the Cubans, is excited too. Can you imagine? The CariSun Festival is not only in Cuba, but in my hometown! I guess they are really taking seriously the decentralization of everything this time, LOL… it seems like all the criticism paid off, and the R2.0 (2nd Cuban Revolution, updated in 2180) is really going somewhere.
I am just a bit tired with all the travelling, but I am still grateful we got a spot on the boat. It might take a couple of days to get there since we didn’t qualify for the flight even with my condition. It’s okay, really, my knee doesn’t hurt as much, and I think that besides worrying about the pills, May is fine. I am happy the flights are reserved for those who really need to be there or can’t endure a trip this long… It is hard to even conceive how people were flying so much back then, especially to the Caribbean every other weekend off just for a holiday. I’ve heard cruise ships were popular too, but nobody would travel to the island in one of those. To think their casual visits were in fact contributing to destroying our islands’ beauty…
This boat is relatively small, but the 46 people on board are making everything work so efficiently. Speaking of which, we are on kitchen duty tomorrow, so I will probably not be recording any messages, but we’re almost there, so I’ll send you another voice message when in Trinidad. Remember these aunties love you!
[27.07.2231]
Oh, my Goddess! The Sun! So bright, so strong! My skin sensors are showing crazy readings, but the locals say it is normal this time of the year, but they are still recommending staying outside just long enough to recharge one’s battery. They have planned the recovery and organization activities for the early morning or late afternoon, but there is not much more to do, to be honest. We met a volunteer from Boriken, and he said Cuba suffered a bit more from the hurricane Atama, but the response was so quick from the island, its neighbors and nationals in the diaspora who –like us– came soon as they could, that everything was almost completely back to normal in less than a month. In the mornings we are attending the food garden Mama prepared in the neighborhood’s corner, and thanks to her contacts we got nice shifts at the local Archivo descolonial y ecofeminista checking if the documents were damaged by the humidity left by the hurricane. We are actually having so much fun it hardly feels like work, but the archive is so big that you come across with the most different materials, from a 400-year-old newspaper clip announcing the sale of a slave, to a picture album with the latest festival of the queerafrocaribbean collective. Bodies in pain, and bodies in joy, they are all part of the archive now.
The best moment of the day is the afternoon, no doubt. With a milder sun and soft breeze we sit on the stairs in the old city, under the bougainvillea tree. It is so perfect! This is the only fruitless tree that has been permitted because the entire place is supposed to be covered with native fruit trees to provide free edibles, but the flower is so iconic in the city that people agreed on having them in certain places. I have been watching a music video filmed almost a century ago, and that particular spot doesn’t seem to change. They keep playing that electronic version of Compay Segundo’s Chan Chan and it gets me so sentimental every time. We just sit there and relax, catching up with anyone who passes by and wants to join. We’ve learnt so much about the festival, and how challenging the preparation has been, but everyone agrees this is going to be one of the best ones in the last decades since Caribbean cities started hosting this celebration in 2194, honoring the forces of nature, both the energy from sun and the cleansing chaos of the hurricane.
[29.07.2231]
I was expecting some security in the streets because Teja Salomon should be arriving soon. For being one of the best well-known minds of the century one would assume it would be a great fuzz, but I always forget how the quotidian and extraordinary walk hand by hand on these islands. I have seen some zines and pamphlets about the super scientist circulating around though, their research in human body transition led to such an impressive discovery regarding our own bodies’ capacity to harness energy from almost everything, especially from the sun. What I like the most is how the information was more focused on how the discovery changed forever the way we perceive energy consumption: we use that which we ourselves produce, and the surplus goes to your nearest community.
I can’t believe how there are still people trying to make money out of socellar technology, because commercialization is heavily penalized, but you know how we humans are… (rolling my eyes). Salomon is now retired, but thankfully they have made sure nobody can put a patent on this technology, so the greed of both individuals and big corps has been temporarily kept at bay. The problem now has been how to approach the migration situation since many people want to come to Caribe land with tempting offers to the government to export energy. Voting starts next week, but Mama told us Trinidad has already chosen not to open the city, at least not to westerners. Most people here resent them due to the old histories of colonialism and tourism, others argue this is nonetheless discriminatory. In any case, the sun is still the treasure of the tropics, and many celebrate these days that we have been harvesting its energy long before socellar technologies came into the picture.
[01.08.2231]
I can’t believe that the day has finally come, and the festival will start in only a few hours! May and I were so excited this morning that we decided to put on our wedding suits because they were still in our old wardrobe, and all our other white pieces are dirty until next week, when it is supposed to rain. Everyone will be in white today, the intention is twofold, for maximizing the energy harvest and a reverence to our Santeria heritage. Can you hear the music in the background? They have been playing this anthem all day and we just can’t stop smiling and moving our bodies to Bob’s rhythm. We’re going out now, everyone is on the streets… Wait, May wants to sing a bit for you…
Sun is shining, the weather is sweet, yeah
Make you wanna move your dancing feet now
To the rescue, here I am
Want you to know, y’all, can you understand?
here I am
Want you to know just if you can
(Tuesday evening) where i stand
(Wednesday morning)
Tell myself a new day is rising
(Thursday evening) get on the rise
A new day is dawning
(Friday morning) here I am
(Saturday evening) want you to know just
Want you to know just where I stand
When the morning gathers the rainbow
Want you to know I’m a rainbow too…
Paola Tásai
Introduction
The historical conception of Western society is based on linear time. The original peoples of Abya Yala conceive of time and space in many different ways. In this sense, thinking about past, present and future time as something that is in a constant spiral is something that is repeated in the worldviews of many of them. This creative writing is based on and felt from that notion. These are small thoughts about how I imagine the future in three significant places at different moments in my life: Ignacio Zaragoza, Chihuahua in México, the town where I grew up, where I locate my roots, the city of Chihuahua, México where I spent my adolescence and early years of professional life, and the city of Granada, Spain where I am currently studying a doctorate in History and Arts. These three places are connected by something more than my personal history, they are places that speak of the rural and the urban, the periphery and the center, but they are also places that reflect in their daily symbolism the colonial history that, from many places we are working on from a decolonial approach. To heal that historical wound. This is a contribution to it.
Ignacio Zaragoza, Chihuahua, Mexico
The town where I grew up. In northern Mexico. It is the year 2200 and Hortensia, a 10-year-old girl rides a bicycle in the streets of the town center. Her family works in the collective garden that provides the population with food, as well as in the vegetable proteins factory. That day at school her homework was to explore the town doing her favorite activity, which is riding a bicycle. Hortensia’s classroom, nestled under the shade of ancient trees, was a sanctuary of shared wisdom. The stories of the bear day had been passed down through generations, a reminder of the strength that lay within each individual when united by a common goal. The tale was etched in the minds of young and old alike, a beacon of hope and inspiration. In the heart of the town, a statue of a bear reaching for the sky served as a perpetual reminder of their capacity to overcome adversity.
That day she even rode until the house for her grandmother, with whom she spent hours talking and she told her that in the first decades of the 21st century the town went through a very complicated situation where groups of armed people, drug traffickers and hit men almost destroyed the town. Many people suffered then, but around the year 2030 there was a great awakening among the population that intelligently put a stop to the situation and managed to rebuild the peace they had before this violent process began. It got dark, Hortensia realized that she had a lot to tell the next day at school, she looked at the starry night sky and felt at peace. What a fortune to have a place to breathe fresh air, drink clean water, ride a bike safely.
The year 2200 found Ignacio Zaragoza bathed in the warm embrace of transformation. Streets once marred by violence now teemed with life and purpose. With each harvest, the townspeople remembered the lessons of their ancestors, fostering a bond with the land that sustained them.
Chihuahua, Mexico
The capital city of the northern province of Mexico. The Sister of Hortensia lives in the City of Chihuahua, although learning is no longer limited to attending universities, because in Ignacio Zaragoza there are, since the people managed to be reborn from the tragedy, places of common study, where the ancestral knowledge of the region is transmitted. There, people build their identity and discover how they can gradually improve their relationship with each other, but above all, how to keep the town in harmony with the environment. Teresa is 20 years old and wakes up in her student apartment with a beautiful view of the self-sustaining park that is located in the complex. Her first class of the day is on the history of the early 20th century. She´s interested on Intercultural humanities studies of the 21st century. Since she was little, speaks 5 languages: Rarámuri, ódami, Pima, Warijó and Spanish and is learning English and French. To get to her class she transports herself in an individual capsule that works with solar energy. Teresa grew up in Ignacio Zaragoza and wanted to move to Chihuahua for study in the free University where she could have free access to a big complex of digital and physical papers of knowledge. As Hortensia realized that day, Teresa learned about the process of revolution of 2030 in Ignacio Zaragoza. The people in 2200 called “the bear day”, because everything started with a bear in the center of the town trying to go high in a three, a lot of people arrive to know the animal, and then, naturally, they started to talk about the scary situation about the town. The “bear day” was celebrated annually, not just in Ignacio Zaragoza, but throughout the region. Festivals brought people together, reinforcing the values of unity and resilience. Folklore and history intertwined, creating a tapestry of identity that honored both the past and the present. Teresa’s fascination with this tale led her to study the interplay between history and collective memory, a subject that resonated far beyond her classroom.
The forests surrounding Ignacio Zaragoza contain ancestral wisdom that was then hidden from people who lived under constant siege by violent groups. Many lives were lost due to the chaos caused by the struggle between criminal groups to control the illegal sale of narcotics. The peasants were weakened because their ability to produce food was reduced at the end of the twentieth century when bad governments led to the decline of the economy of the region this combined with international treaties that only benefited the neighboring country to the north. Faced with such a scenario, that day, that bear as a carrier of ancestral energy transmitted the strength that people needed to defend themselves. Five people traveled to Chihuahua city from that time and they got some training in human rights, they got strong knowledge for defend themselves and also created a new way to kick out the criminal from the town. It was not an easy struggle, but with the passage of time they managed to build what was thought impossible, a quiet place to live in harmony and peace with nature. Thanks to that day the intercultural teaching started, and she can talk 5 languages.
Granada, Spain
Far away from México, crossing the transatlantic ocean, the capital city of the province where the Catholic kings signed the capitulations with Christopher Columbus that would give way to what is known as the colonization of America has an anticolonial museum in the center of the city where all the symbols that remained from that past were placed. The intercultural city is connected by green spaces where you can walk car-free and there is a plant and animal integration system that allows a biocentred coexistence. Adela, Hortensia and Teresa’s aunt lives in Granada. Part of his life interest was to know what was on the other side of the sea and understand a little more of the history, understand how people in Europe in 2030 managed to overcome green neo-fascisms, these currents that sought to make energy “sustainable” by filling peasant lands with solar cells and extracting lithium from Latin America as well as Africa for electric power batteries. People in Europe were also very brave when they had to face the colonizing project that at that time had been just over 500 years old. Power groups consumed natural resources under the pretext of economic growth that was leading the planet to self-destruction. Adela deeply admired how the people of Chihuahua and Granada faced racism and the annihilation of migrants. Adela was proud to speak the ancestral native languages that they managed to rescue at that time and also speak the Andalusian language, a mixture between Spanish and Andalusian Arabic.
In Granada, Adela’s journey of self-discovery paralleled the city’s commitment to healing and reconciliation. The anticolonial museum stood as a tribute to the pain of the past, a space for reflection and transformation. Adela’s research delved deep into the annals of history, uncovering stories of resistance and revival. She marveled at the parallels between Ignacio Zaragoza’s journey and that of communities across the world, their struggles and victories interconnected by a common thread.
The interconnectedness of these three places went beyond their narratives. It was a philosophy, a way of life that transcended borders. They had embraced a resource-based economy, recognizing the fragility of Earth’s resources and the urgency of stewardship. Communities flourished by valuing quality over quantity, forging connections that transcended material wealth.
The people in this three places has something in common: they live in peace with nature and they can adapt to the needs of the movement and cycles of the earth. They don´t want to reach other planets but respect the local spaces. The monetary system doesn’t exist anymore. They changed for an economy based on resources where every community use only what they need and spend quality time with the people they care. Nobody knows if this will stay like that always, but at least in this beyond utopic thinking (because this actually can happen), it is a reality, like the spiral time where the past and the future are here.
As the years marched on, the spiral of time continued its dance, bringing the past forward and propelling the future into the present. Ignacio Zaragoza, Chihuahua, and Granada had become more than physical places; they were embodiments of humanity’s potential for growth and renewal. The generations that followed, inspired by the stories of these places, carried their spirit forward, weaving new chapters into the tapestry of existence. And as the sun dipped below the horizon, casting a golden glow upon these lands, the promise of a harmonious future seemed more attainable than ever before.
By Dishannesha Mukherjee
I
The hunger of the river- talks of it were afloat in the air even before this generation was born. Their forefathers had seen the signs, but were unable, perhaps even unwilling to face the music. You see, it was but a landmass populated by insignificant outcasts, so, why would it not be insulated from the bad of the world as it was from the good? You see, they had made the land theirs through the toil of centuries, surely they can keep a hold on it. They had fought with a multitude of enemies- one of which was always inevitably the river and its roaring tides. However, paradoxically, the river was their lifeline- they felt in its waves an extension of the constant throbbing of the blood which flowed within their veins.
Their connection was undeniable which made these people the people of water. It was a divine river, vested with the powers to wash away human sins, so surely its holy powers would not fail in eradicating the looming evil. Its waters were brought into the earth from the heavens for this very purpose. Here, where the river divided herself into uncountable channels to rush towards the sea, the land was ever moody. Sometimes, it evaded sight, sometimes it showed itself. That is why when the men first decided to claim the land from the tides, they had to create embankments to mark their territory.
The river wasn’t too pleased with it and always communicated its displeasure by trying to wrest the land back into its belly. Hence, the constant tussle. In a vicious, yet ironic twist of fate, the actions of humans all over the world disgruntled the oceans. The displeasure channelled itself into this riverine estuary via the waves of the rivers. The holy droplets of water were polluted with human greed which turned it to poison. Its heart corrupted with the venom of rage, the waves danced to the tune of devastation. Even in the thinnest of its extensions, one could feel the rejuvenated strength. Anger, and a desire to conquer back the snatched land surged with its waves. Water. Water. Eating away at the fading landscape. Finally, everywhere. Where do you go when your home refuses to house you?
II
Tushi was ten years old. Her family were fortunate enough to live in an area which withstood the river’s plundering, for now at least. However, the slow land erosion did not safeguard them from the other dangers of the watery invasion. Destitution and diseases hung like miasma over the remaining land. It rained from the clouds and blew with the cyclonic winds. Tushi and her family still clung to their homestead, or whatever remained of it after the annual floods receded. The land was a ghost of its former self, unable to support the dreams- or the corporeal existence of the hordes that claimed kinship to it. You see, even in its heyday, the delicate and complex ecosystem of the land hadn’t been able to yield enough to sustain the population. With the bounty of the forest, the people had somehow made it through, but with almost the entirety of the forests gone, that was no longer an option. The remaining mangrove warriors were too battle-weary to provide protection against the regular onslaught of cyclonic storms.
Even then, Tushi and people like her had clung to the land, for as long as they could, as there wasn’t any other alternative. Cyclones and saline swells ravaged their dwelling, uprooted the homestead, and rooted hopelessness deep in their hearts. Tushi saw the river every day. It was an integral part of her life even in the days it benignly floated her father’s boat. The family depended on the murky tides for sustenance, so the river was almost like a family member, always at the hearth, ever present even in absence.
However, it was impossible to cling to the illusion of safety now. Their village had become uninhabitable. If they wished to live, they must move. Packing wasn’t all that difficult, a few rag tag clothes to cover their bodies, some utensils to fill their stomachs when they could manage to procure food, her parents and younger brother- Tushi was ready to go. They must leave before this year’s monsoon winds enter the delta.
The journey started.
III
Over the years, just like the hungry river that flowed through the land, the city of Kolkata had also slowly but surely encroached on the periphery. Such seamless integration made it rather difficult to demarcate its boundary. It was like the Cretan labyrinth, populated by hordes of ashen faces, each more troubled than the previous. To Tushi, it was like looking into a mirror. Everywhere she looked, she saw an image of utter destitution- like herself and her family. But, even in alike appearances, where was the kindred spirit?
Tushi and her brother Montu took care of each other during the day as their parents were roaming the city, searching for work. Initially, the siblings were intimidated by the strange environment. The only thing that stood out to them about their new home was the filth that laid all around. The “home” they were staying in was a ramshackle one room structure they shared with another family of four in one of the newest and dingiest slum-mushrooms that had cropped up on the body of the city.
In this potpourri of unfamiliar currents, Bashir Ali became the only island of familiarity to Tushi and Montu.
Bashir was the same age as Tushi and belonged to a family which, just like Tushi’s, was one of the last to leave their village behind. Even though they hailed from different villages in the same region, now they found themselves struggling side by side for survival in one of the many, many slums of a city which was populated by many millions. What are the odds! In life, poverty proved itself time and again as the greatest equaliser- making people of all creeds and castes and religions brethren in the struggle to live.
While Tushi’s family worked the river, Tariq, Bashir’s grandfather worked the forest. Mauley– honey gatherers is the name for their profession. With the government becoming stringent regarding who gets to rightfully enter the barely surviving mangrove forest, these professionals went almost extinct (just like the tigers!). They believed that the humans and tigers in the delta were brothers who shared the same fate for they were the children of the same mother- Bonbibi1. The animals and the humans of the delta shared the same fate, so it is only right they share the same mother.
In the sweltering heat of the summer noon, Tushi, Montu and Bashir gathered around Tariq Ali to listen to the stories of bygone days. This was how it has always been. Tariq had learnt all he knew sitting at the knee of his elders and now in turn shared with the future generation his patrimonial wisdom. Oh how magical those stories were! Tariq spoke of his lost home, his childhood, the forest, the rivers, the people and the bygone days.
He told them stories of how they lived back in the days when the river wasn’t so vengeful. He spoke of journeys into the forest, of encounters with tigers and crocodiles, of how their ancestors came and wrestled with nature to win this home-land that was now gone. He spoke of Bonbibi and Dakshin Ray2, celebrations and festivals, and the brotherhood of men that are no more. As he recounted the stories his voice was embittered by the recounting of losses. Tariq spoke with nostalgia but the children heard only love.
The trio sometimes listened mesmerised and sometimes assailed their Dadu3 with a plethora of questions. Tushi and Montu kept whispering these stories to each other as they laid in the darkness waiting for sleep to come, beside their exhausted parents. Bashir, Tushi and Montu would often in the afternoons meet by the black-watered canal that flowed behind their houses. Here was a place that was completely their own. It is here they would imagine many answers to the supplicatory “Tarpor?4” of every story Tariq told them. It is here, miles away from their delta home, where three displaced children formed a connection to their original home.
IV
Anil, Tushi’s father had been gloomy for some days. Whenever Tushi and Montu asked him about it, he avoided answering them. This bothered the siblings greatly as their father was one of those people who always looked at the silver lining. Although Anil kept mum, the children heard something from the discussions of the adults around their home.
The gist of the matter was already familiar to them. The city of Kolkata was also besieged by the river just like their old deltaic home. It was bursting at its seams due to the explosive rise in the number of migrants. It simply wasn’t sustainable. The systems of the city barely functioned due to the influx of people. Coupled with that was the constant expansion of the river into the city. Hunger and poverty old companions, but along came disease. It became increasingly evident to everyone that not all of them could continue staying here. In fact, those who had the means had been on the move, but for those who didn’t, a decision remained to be taken.
Leaving is easy for two types of people- one, who have everything, and the other who have nothing. For people like Tushi and Bashir, the ones who had something, rather an illusion of something, it was a dilemma because hope and care is what kept them rooted in their current place.
“We will lose all that we have right now”, said Anil. “What exactly do we have that you’re so worried about losing?”, asked his wife Sandhya. Anil did not reply, and kept looking out of the door. “At least we will have the chance to have something”, his wife added in a softer tone.
This is a scene that has been recurring in Tushi and Montu’s home for almost a month now. It has been a year since Anil and Sandhya came to the big city with their children. None of them had been able to find steady work or a means of bettering their lives. They had been able to barely survive due to the solicitude of neighbours. The condition of the city itself was also rapidly worsening.
It was at this moment the announcement was made. There was a land far, far away here where there was space for them- these displaced hordes. There, the people would have a place to live, and food to eat, and work to do. Actual homes, not dingy slums. Actual food, not just scraps. All you had to do was register your name with the government and wait. Once your turn comes, you’ll be transported there with your family and the other registered people. Some people jumped at the first chance while some people, like Anil, were hesitant. Once burnt, twice shy.
Bashir, Tushi and Montu would meet at their secret place and imitate the discussions of the elders. “We will have a place to live”, Montu would say, “But, we won’t be together”, Bashir would counter. “It is a foreign land far, far away”, Tushi would add. The three would be silenced by the solemnity of those words and the ominousness of the unknown.
V
The entire colony was suspended in this dilemma when Tariq Ali called his neighbours for a discussion late one evening.
Tariq was respected in the community not only because of his age, but also because he was a relic of better bygone days. Some people answered his invitation, his next-door neighbour Anil and his family were one of them.
In a soft, low voice Tariq began his address. “I, just like you, heard about this relocation business some time ago. I was deeply anxious to hear it… I felt the same helplessness that I did when I left home with Bashir. But, during this time, many of those that lived with us have moved and that got me thinking. I am poor and illiterate, I fear the big world out there. I wanted to spend my days in the mangrove forest but that wasn’t possible, Mother Nature herself refused me- us that privilege,”Tariq’s voice moistened as he spoke these words.
He carried on. “When I-we simply couldn’t stay, so we moved here. I often thought to myself why this place? When I could have gone to any other big city with my family. I got an answer to my question as I told the stories of the life I-we lived to these children” he pointed out Tushi, Bashir and Montu among the group of listeners. “It was because I didn’t want to be far away from what I called home even when I was already exiled from it. I wanted to look at the river and pretend it’s the same. I wanted to pretend this is the same…” Tariq gestured to his ill-lit, dingy room and broke down crying.
After a few moments, he recollected himself. “As I was telling my stories I also slowly realised something- just because I moved away from the land I called home doesn’t mean I’ll have to abandon my home. I will keep it alive here” he gestured to his heart. “I moved to give Bashir a better life and I cannot do it here. So, I must move. Just like my great grandfathers had to in order to give me the life I am pining for right now. So, I’ll take my family and go to this new land. No matter how far it is, it is still under the same sky. There, we will forge a home. We will build it with the best of the home we lost.” There was a firm ring of conviction in his voice. “I will not lose my home, instead, I will just transport it elsewhere, where it will be safe.” He had composed himself by now, “But, my forefathers couldn’t have done it alone, they managed to defeat the river and the tigers because they were together. I called you here to ask for help- let not me, or any of us, go friendless to face the dangers of the unknown and the uncertain.”
That night, Anil came back home late. As soon as he did, he sat down beside Sandhya and said, “You were right… we came here to live, and this is no way of living. It will be difficult, but let’s go together. My grandparents created the homestead I pine for, and we will together create a new home for us to thrive in. At least let’s take the chance, whatever be the outcome.”
Sandhya clasped Tushi and Montu to her chest, and turning towards Anil she said, “The first step is the most scary. Alone, we might not have made it, but together, I believe we will. We will somehow manage- just like we are doing now. Our people fought the hungry river and the bloodthirsty tigers, we can do it.”
They rested that night in anticipation of tomorrow. It was an anticipation pregnant with hope, unlike their usual worries. There were a lot of preparations to be made for it was no longer only a measly number of four people who would be travelling.
Thus, the journey started.
- A forest deity exclusive to the Sundarban region. She is worshipped by the Hindus and the Muslims alike.
- Another forest deity of the Sundarbans. He is believed to be the adversary of Bonbibi though both are venerated together and share power over the region
- Bengali, Grandfather
- Bengali, “After that?” is usually a question asked by listeners to urge the storyteller to continue the story.
Balint Kronstein
The warm winter sun blazing down on Áilu’s back made her especially uncomfortable with wearing her ancestors’ thick-layered gátki. She could not wait for the moment to step inside the NEA3 biodome – or how it was called officially by the Northwestern Bothania Sámi-Swedish Republic: Northvolt Ett Arctic Artificial Area – to finally get rid of her air-filtering device and all the equipment reminding her of the “outside” world.
Skellitta-Skellefteå had one of the few green-industry-turned-biodomes, or how the policymakers liked to call them arctic artificial areas, where the original climate after the Tipping Point was preserved and being upkeeped by the joint effort of those who survived. People fleeing to the area generations before Áilu was born, the indigenous people of Sápmi and the descendants of those living in Norrbotten and Västerbotten.
There were always signs that the point-of-no-return might happen, but society disregarded, repressed, or just simply did not care about those who spoke up. Did not matter if they were scientists, climate activists, religious fanatics, average civilians or capitalists seemingly going insane and wanting to destroy their own empires.
“I do not understand how people can survive out here for more than half-a-day” exclaimed Áilu annoyedly when the metallic gates of what once was the biggest battery manufacturing plant on the European continent started to materialize in front of her eyes. That unique matte glow was so familiar to Áilu. The European continent – once the center of colonial powers and the heartland of the European Union – now an almost uninhabitable land engraved with several seas and megarivers. Lowlands in Turkey, Greece, Western Europe, and Iberia all underwater. Southern Italy almost disappeared, similarly to the flatlands of the Balkans, Eastern and Central Europe. Those places that were still relatively habitable were all laid North from the Baltic Sea or located in the higher areas of the former continent, such as the Alps or the Pyrenees.
In the years after the Tipping Point – which Áilu heard so much about from the bedtime stories of her grandfather who was an archaelogy professor specialized in the history of the sustainability transition at the International-Swedish University of Skellitta-Skellefteå – many tried to stay put and fight the natural forces unleashed by Gaia. Most of them perished and those who did not simply had to flee from their homeland and leave everything behind to restart their life somewhere higher or Northern. “Probably the first time those people realized what it feels like to be indigenous and constantly being pushed out from your motherland” thought Áilu several times before. The same idea crossed her mind as the enormous metal gates to the stabilization area – the passageway between two worlds – opened up in front of her after the bioscan identification granted access to enter.
She liked “being one with the Arctic” – how Oula always referred to being born inside the biodome into a herder kinship –, but from time-to-time she could not help it. Somber thoughts took over her mind. “Not much better than those Native American reservations before the Tipping Point. Ugh… wonder when they will start to reduce the area of the dome… it already started… slowly but surely! I hate those ideas of the Renew Gaia project… sure, other cultures and biomes deserve a chance to survive… or a revival. But why at our expense? Why the same things happen again? And again? Always…”
She felt trapped and free at the same time during these journeys when she needed to run some errands in the “outside world”, as she liked to refer to it in her head. Felt free both by realizing every time how exceptionally lucky she is that she can live the life that her ancestors lived hundreds of years ago. How fortunate to see the grandiose radiance of snow hit by the first shimmering light beams of the sun on a winter morning. And for living in a time when the “outside world” is an improved and more equal place than it was ever before. Yet, happiness and joyous moments aside she could not help but worry. “Like a kingfisher with damaged wings longing after the heights of the sky.” Worry about the dome. Its boundaries. The limits to survive. Worry about people growing distant and indifferent about past disasters with the relentless advance of time. Worry about civilization’s hubris. Humans repeat the same mistakes all over again.
She arrived back from a trip. Visiting distant kin in the Hybrit dome a few hundred kilometers North. These journeys always took days, but drained physical and mental energy to levels as if she would travel for months. The emotions, the thoughts, the different climate she experienced with every single step outside of Northvolt.
Living in the city of Skellitta-Skellefteå was one thing. The road from there to other settlements and domes was another. It was not especially dangerous, or at least the dangers were non-human. An acid rain or a desert hailstorm – even the slight chance of it – meant that the chargeless hovertrain service did not leave the shelter of the mid- or end-stations. These events made the travel times impossible to know, but people get used to the new normal generations ago. “You get there when you get there” Oula always said when Áilu complained about the transport.
Life was slower after the Tipping Point. In Skellitta-Skellefteå you could have lived the accelerated lifestyles of those who came before, but simply people did not want that anymore. The extensiveness of virtual reality for work, leisure, socializing and culture, the artificial nature created in general biodomes, digitalization and above all the local hub – a new form of societal organization based on the Sámi kinship idea and guided by the Árbediehtu – made terms like rush-hour, multi-tasking or burnout obsolete and unfamiliar. Skellitta-Skellefteå, one of the bigger cities of the North, led by the democratic council of the local hubs’ leaders was a living paradise. “Must be somewhat like Eden, I suppose” told Áilu to an “outsider” friend once. Truly, it was an oasis on the border between the calmness of the Baltic Sea and the roughness of the Great Northern Desert.
As Áilu passed through the stabilization area unrushed and entered the small connection chamber – the final stop between home and the “outside world” – a sudden harsh feeling heavily pressed on her chest. “What if it will all happen again? Yes, Renew Gaia might succeed. We, or… they? Might win back territories to extend the habitat… might not… but even if it does, do we need it? Why do we always want more? Why? And why does wanting more means taking from others? Why Northvolt must play the role of a laboratory rat. Will the herd survive that? Will we survive it?” She had so many questions in her mind. And very few answers. “Why do I feel it is happening all over again? Why cannot we just be happy about what we have right now? We have our hubs, our domes, kin around us. We stopped worrying about what does not matter. We are finally equal. Yes, equal in hardship and equal in a world which is almost uninhabitable for our kind… but… finally equal. Our words, our ideas, the Árbediehtu final leads and governs. Everyone is welcome in our city, in our living quarters, in our life. Why cannot we stop craving for more?”
As the door connecting the inside of the dome and the chamber split the late afternoon sunlight blinded Áilu for a moment. “The biodome is life. But it also disregards the will of Gaia. It is not meant to be… this meant to disappear. And why? Because those in charge did not listen… by the time they did… by the time they understood the difference… by the time they started celebrating distinctiveness and realized we should not be another colonial project of equalization driven by white guilt… by that time it all was too late. The only thing they managed to do is this… captive life under a glass cover. Mom always says I should be happy that we have all this and the other domes… she never tells me how.” Her eyes begun to sense the world around.
A light breeze of familiarity reached Áilu as she was stepping into the snowy landscape of the dome. “Perishing. Yes… perishing without a trace is what I am afraid of” a voice remarked in her head. “To disappear… me, the parents, kin, Skellitta, the domes… everything that I know and those things that I am yet to know… some which I do not even know to exist. Perish… like the Azure Window… those during the Tipping Point… or Heike and Lemma.”
When her eyes finally got used to the light after the darkness of the chamber she noticed a Snowdrop blooming below a snow pile under a peaceful and sheltering Norway spruce. And the realization came as sudden as the fear. “Perishing is a part of the circle of life. Death as much as birth. The important thing is that we make out as much as of our life as we can. This is what we all should live for. To prevail regardless of harsh environments and circumstances. To think and feel together with kin, society, and Mother Nature. To not to make the same mistakes again. For making Gaia a better place together.”
By Giulia Baquè
The Book of Histories
“Once there was city built on water. A city that stood against the tides and built its strength and power on its domination of the sea.
Once there a was a city vibrant with life and colors, where the aromatic scents of spices mixed with the morning aroma of fish raising from the canals.
Once there was a city that became too eager and lost its track. A city that slowly saw its inhabitants leave one after the other until there was no one left.
Once there was a city that had been betrayed by its waters and its canals. A city that had coexisted with water and its whims for centuries. The high tides came and went, but when the water started rising too much, the water became frightening. Until one day it came and didn’t recede anymore.
Once there a was a city, and now it is no more”
Year 2223
The sun was shining and the temperature was hot, almost unbearable. The journey from the northern territories had been such a long one that Maaike was wondering why she always allowed her curiosity to get the best of her. She should have thought this through more and maybe she would have realized that this trip so far from home could not have been an easy one. She was not going on holiday, what was she expecting? Nice weather and places to relax and sunbathe?
She had started her trip in the north, in those territories that were once known, a couple of centuries ago, as the Kingdom of The Netherlands. Now there were only some independent cities left, trying to survive at the edge of a Northern Sea that was warmer and coming dangerously closer with each passing year. And now, because of her damned curiosity she was traveling south, across barren and arid landscapes, where the heat was higher than she had ever experienced. For what? She should have stayed home and be content with the dusty pictures she found in the library, instead of wanting to see it with her own eyes. But now it was too late to go back. She knew she was almost there. If her group kept a steady pace, they would have reached their destination before heat peaked at midday. Her clothes were too warm for the southern climate. She should have changed into a more practical outfit when she had the chance during their last stop. But she didn’t want to linger for too long. Despite her many doubts, the only thing she could think about was reaching her destination as soon as possible. She had heard and read so many wonderful things about the long lost city of Venice that she immediately volunteered for this journey when the opportunity arose. The library where she worked was trying to salvage as many books as possible to prevent further losses. Already the world had lost so much because of the consequences of climate change that books seemed to Maaike a good way to save the past from disappearing completely. And books could also help preventing further losses; by understanding the mistakes that were made and transmitting the knowledge of what could be done better, maybe it was possible to build some kind of future. Maaike had hope. And that was why she was traveling south. She hoped that this research journey, could give her stories to bring back to the library; stories about what was lost; memories that could be preserved and could be accessed to move forward in a different direction. Her purpose was to record as many stories as possible about Venice and then transcribe them, so that the library could have a record of what happened to the city that drowned so many years ago and that was almost fading from memory despite its great history.
It was at the library that her fascination with Venice had started. Right when she was only an intern doing menial tasks to help the staff there. She had seen the few old books – those that survived the rising seas, the fires that raged across Europe, and the various raids that had destroyed several cities when the first governments had begun to fall – with beautiful depictions of Venice; a colourful and crowded city, full with people coming from across the world in the days of carnival. She had seen faded pictures of the once famous calli and campielli. She had heard stories handed down from the first refugees coming from the south when the seas first started rising; the high tides in Venice started to get higher and higher, until they stopped receding altogether. Now, she was almost there. Her journey was almost over. Her guide, a muscular man in his forties, halted raising a hand. The entire group came to a stop.
“We are there” the guide sighted, almost with a hint of sadness in his voice.
Maaike was barely able to contain her excitement. Even though she was exhausted by the heat and the long walk, she sprinted to reach the guide on top of what looked like a small hill.
She had to shield her eyes with her hand, it was so bright. For a moment she could not see a single thing. Then her vision adjusted to the bright reflection of the sun on the water. And then her heart sunk. What was in front of her was not what she expected. The water extended as far as she could see.
“How can we be here? Where is the city? Is the guide wrong?” thought Maaike dazed.
“We must be in the wrong…” she started saying but the guide started pointing at something in the water. With such a bright light it was difficult to make out shapes and objects and the water was such an intense blue that all the other colors seemed to be drowning in it.
But then she saw it. Of course they were in the right place. Some shapes were emerging from the water. It looked like a bell tower but from such a distance she could not be sure. “Let’s keep moving, we can’t stay under this sun at this hour”, said the guide.
And he signaled to the group to follow him. He started descending towards the water, there was what looked like a small camp, and in the distance, it was possible to see older buildings, maybe from a couple of centuries before, high constructions with what probably must have been windows and balconies. Now they were all completely empty and the people seemed to be living closer to the water in makeshift housings. When they entered the camp a crowd of children immediately came to meet them.
“Maaike, the elders will see you later, after sundown, so you can ask them your questions”, informed her the guide with a polite tone. “I will be there to translate for you”, he continued with a smile.
***
The afternoon had been agonizing, both because of the heat to which Maaike was not used, and because of the sense of anticipation and curiosity that had devoured her since they reached that small settlement.
The library she worked at in the northern territories owned a couple of old books about a beautiful city built on water. The pictures had fascinated Maaike for so long that she could not stop talking about how amazing it would have been to once go and see it. So, when finally, the library could obtain some founding for research from the Council of the Free Cities, it was decided that the money would be well spent on a research trip to find more details about the lost city of Venice. Not only because of the wonders that city seemed to have had, but mostly because understanding the fate of such an ancient city could help in finding solutions to prevent even more cities to be lost to the rising waters; Maaike of course was the first to volunteer for the trip. And now she was finally here, waiting to meet the elderly of the settlement, those who, according to Carlo, the guide, still retain some first-hand memories of the city.
“They are over a hundred years old so they are a bit deaf, please be patient with them”, Carlo told her before they entered the tent of the elders.
The light was dim inside but the air was fresh, it was a pleasant sensation after the heat of the sun. Maaike could see four figures sitting on carpets at the far end of the tent. Two women were discussing something in low voices while drinking water that was frequently poured to them by a young girl in attendance. The other two seemed fast asleep, with their heads lowered on their chest and their breath regular and calm.
“Benvenuta” said in a low voice the elderly woman sitting on the left, “my name is Daniela.”
“She welcomes you, she is Daniela, she is over a hundred and twenty years old. No one knows their exact age anymore” whispered Carlo.
“Carlo, is this the girl coming from the north?” asked suddenly one of the two elderly Maaike thought were asleep.
“Yes, she is the one who wants to hear your stories, Sofia. She traveled all the way from the north just to see you” replied Carlo.
“Sit down dear”, said a third voice, with a gentle and kind tone. “We are not that young anymore so our memories might be a bit confused, but we will try our best to answer your questions and tell you our stories.”
“Memories are the only way we have to preserve the past. And by sharing them we can somehow learn to live with the guilt of not having done enough when we could and the shame of not being able to preserve our world for the generations to come”, said the fourth voice who had been quiet until that moment. She spoke with an authoritative tone but the sadness in her voice was clear.
“What do you want to know?” asked the gentle voice.
“Everything you can tell me! I want to know how it all started!” said Maaike almost out of breath from the excitement.
“This is going to be a long story”, replied the woman.
“I will start, my grandparents were there when it all started, so I heard their stories,” said Daniela.
“It wasn’t sudden you know, there were signs for a long time, people knew that the city would disappear, that the sea would devour it but it always seemed something far away in the future. The previous generations did not understand how our actions can affect the future. They only lived in the moment, thinking only about the short span of their lives.”
“Venice was a city of colors; my grandmother always told me. It was a city full of life and beauty. In the summer evenings, you could see the lagoon and the bell tower of San Marco turn red at sundown. You could hear music and singing in improvised concerts, mixing with the chirping of birds and the cries of seagulls. Dogs barking would suddenly be heard in the quiet of the night and the voices of elderly people sitting at bars and speaking in the Venetian dialect would fill the hot summer air. It was a city full of life, but also silent and peaceful; at night you could walk in small calli and campielli hearing only your footsteps. You could breathe in the soul of Venice. Its unique way of living, at its own pace and with its own small idiosyncrasies. But to this beauty there was a dark side. Venice had existed for centuries in a very delicate and complex environment, but when this balance broke, Venice was doomed. Plans were made to develop the mainland, huge factories and shipyards were built, but in order to do so, canals were interred while new ones were dug to channel the water and dry some part of the land. Those areas however lost their soul. Birds, fish, and insects died. The water was polluted. The lagoon became silent.”
“Oh come on Dani, while all your stories have this poetic tone? I bet this young lady does not care about the ‘soul of Venice’” said mockingly Sofia. “She wants to hear the facts! How the generations of our great-grandparents allowed the big cruise ships to sail through the Canale della Giudecca, of how the tourists would crowd those cramped calli sometimes even preventing people from walking at all. I have heard that sometimes it looked like everyone was queuing around the entire city from how full the city was with tourists.”
“But didn’t the city drown because of the rising seas?” asked Maaike confused.
“Yes it did” said the fourth elderly woman. Her voice sounded younger than the others but her tone made clear that she was probably in a position of authority.
“Her name is Rosa” whispered Carlo, “she is the head of the council.”
“But as Daniela and Sofia said, the lagoon was delicate and in danger all along. The previous generations did not think about the consequences of their actions. They wanted to build shipyards and factories at the edge of the lagoon, and they did without thinking how this would affect the rest of the ecosystem. They did everything in the name of profit. Profit was their goal and as long as they reached that end, they thought they could solve all the problems. It was the same with the rising seas. Not only Venice, but everyone knew that people’s desire for profit would bring about catastrophes, but they did not do enough to prevent any of it from happening. The worst was always to come, they pretended not to see that the end was nearing already, creeping up on people at fast speed. They were blind, they wanted to be blind and ignorant, pretending that nothing was changing. But everything was different.”
“People forget too easily.” Continued Rosa “one time, before Venice disappeared, there was a flood; it was not a normal high tide, one of those to which the people were used. It was an extraordinary one; the water was so high that it was called aqua granda, the great water. It was a tide so high and unexpected that left the city prostrated. So devastating that people kept remembering it, pieces of art were created to preserve its memory and the effects it had on the city and the people. But then again, everyone forgot. People did not worry anymore about the signs the lagoon was sending. The lagoon was suffering, and with it the rest of the world, but no one wanted to listen.”
“Come”, said Rosa, “Let me show you something”
The elderly lady slowly got up and walked outside the tent. Maaike and Carlo followed her surprised. Rosa was walking quite briskly for her age and she reached the shore, where a small rowing boat was waiting. The three got on and the boy sitting at the oar began to row.
Slowly, the buildings slightly emerging from the water started to get closer. The sun was almost setting and now the heat was not that unbearable anymore. It was almost pleasant, thought Maaike, and the view reminded her so much of home. The old Kingdom of The Netherlands partly occupied territories that were under sea level, they had built a complex system of dykes, pumps and sand dunes that made up an extremely sophisticated anti-flood system. But not even such an advanced planning saved the old kingdom. The cities closer to the coast such as Den Haag had been abandoned and people moved further inland. The central government broke down but cities managed to create a system of self-governing cities that were still somehow holding on against the waters. Maaike had seen how restless the sea could be.
Maaike’s thoughts were suddenly interrupted as Rosa spoke. “You see, Venice was a city built on water, in a similar way to the place you are coming from. But the past generations did not want to understand how much care was needed to make such a fragile environment not only survive but thrive. Venice was never the city alone, nor the people. It was also the birds, the fish, the trees, the water and every other small part that composed the lagoon. Venice was never only human, but we forgot that. And when we forget how closely tied to nature we are, we also lose track of the importance of care, if we don’t care for nature, we also don’t take care of the people who live in it and with it. Centuries ago, when people started realizing how human actions were affecting the world, Venice could have represented an example of creating an environment that accepted both the human and nature, and in which people were used to accept nature’s whims without fighting, without having the arrogance of wanting to change it. But this city also became an example of the shortsightedness of people. They did not care about the future, and so they lost their present. And now this is all that is left”
Rosa pointed towards what was in front of them.
“That’s the belltower of San Marco right?” said Maaike pointed to a green roof protruding from the water. “I have seen its pictures at the library.”
“Yes, most of the buildings you are seeing coming out of the waters are belltowers, Venice used to have a lot of them” said Rosa with a laugh. “But this is not why we came here”. And the boat crossed easily across the sparse towers emerging slightly. They reached a construction that looked newer. When they arrived, Rosa gestured Maaike to get off the boat.
“Carlo, you wait here with the boy”, she said in an assertive tone. Then she gestured to Maaike to follow her.
They entered the building; it was white and definitely newer than the old buildings they just sailed through. They entered an elevator and starting going down. Rosa didn’t say anything so Maaike just followed her silently.
When the doors of the elevator opened, they went out.
“We must be underwater now”, thought Maaike.
They walked across a narrow corridor and entered a room. To Maaike’s surprise books were stored there, and they looked old. Older than any book she had ever seen in her life. If she thought that the pictures they had at the library were old, these must have been many centuries older.
Rosa slowly walked to a shelf and carefully selected two books. She wrapped them with a cloth and gave them to Maaike.
Then she started to walk back where they came from. When they reached the boat, they got on without a word. Rosa murmured something to Carlo, but he didn’t translate; Maaike did not understand what was happening.
Rosa seemed happy and relaxed on their sail back to the shore. She seemed to be absorbed in contemplation, looking at the sparse buildings that could be seen in the water.
When they reached the coast, Rosa suddenly spoke. “Ti auguro un buon viaggio di ritorno! Ti prego, tieni al sicuro questi libri per noi, qui probabilmente andrebbero persi, ma sono parte della nostra memoria e vanno conservati. E poi, anche i due autori sono stati grandi viaggiatori, in tempi diversi ovviamente, ma come te hanno esplorato posti lontani e misteriosi. Buona fortuna!”, and then she disappeared back into the tent. Maaike started to follow her but Carlo stopped her. “We should get ready, tomorrow we travel back to the north” he said. “But I didn’t get what I wanted” exclaimed Maaike, almost angry.
“You got something more precious, you got the memories of Venice, its stories and also the stories of those who left it to travel far away, to visit new countries, but who always longed for it. Marco Polo and Nicolò Manucci wrote the books you are carrying. They are part of the memory of this city. Save them and with them, save the stories that the council of the elderly told you. They told you of a city that was complex, beautiful but difficult, full of contradictions, but also of hope and curiosity, a city that even when lost sight of what was important kept fighting. There were always people who tried to be the conscience of this city, reminding the people in charge how delicate it was and how quickly it could be destroyed. No one listened to them, they were not the majority, but they were there and they tried with all their strength to save not only the people, but the lagoon and all its beauty. Now you can bring back not only the story of how Venice disappeared but also their stories, and stories much older than those. Memory is the only way we have to keep thinking about the future. Saving the past means building the present and imagining a future that will be different. I also have something to give you, come!”
They walked silently to a low building of red bricks. Carlo pushed the door and entered. The room was small with a low ceiling. Carlo walked to the table and took a copy of a book whose pages were yellowed and whose back was discolored by the scorching sun. “Take also this. It is my copy of The Book of Histories. It is a poem written by the people who witnessed the rising seas and were forced to leave Venice. In here the tell their fight to make people realize that the city and the lagoon were in danger, and they tell of how they saw the water coming and not receding anymore. Take it, these are also the stories you came for.”
Maaike looked confused. She could not accept so many important books, why were they giving them to her? They were the memories of Venice. But listening to Carlo she started to understand, the memories needed to be saved and preserved, and shared in order to make a difference. Those books represented the different souls of the city, of the lagoon, and she was entrusted to keep them safe.
“Thank you”, she said to Carlo, “I will keep them safe, and with them, the memories of Venice, of its people and the lagoon. They will never fade from memory again.”
Silvia Lavanco Livreri
Italian version below
Palermo, July 14th, 2200 12 pm
A glance at that map hanging on the wall: it depicts a city that, although it is her own, looks like another. There is no nostalgia in her gaze; after all, for a girl born in 2186 Palermo always appears as she sees it outside her bedroom window: the corner of Via Roma and Corso Vittorio Emanuele, only one street separates her from the port.
She leaves the house with a quick step, still angry with her parents, who knows for what futile reason –but, you know, despite the mugginess and the turbid sea looming menacingly, adolescence is stilladolescence and, indeed, perhaps today it is an even more difficult adolescence: there are not many peers to share it with.
She walks. According to the map, there was supposed to be a long road before the seafront; she thinks about it as if she were thinking about a legendary place: she has seen pictures, but they seemed to her neither more nor less than drawings of a utopian place, so far away that she could not even dream of it…but then again, it is July and it is too hot even to sleep, let alone dream. Air conditioners had been banned, As if that’s enough, if that changes things, she thinks in a dismissive tone. She is fourteen years old, young, but not stupid; she is fully aware that, at this point in history, any action taken by the city government is just a way of wiping her conscience clean, a cure for a disaster that has long since occurred. They should have acted earlier, before the raging floods of the season began to alternate with extreme heat, with no middle ground left. Before the rain became just a memory. Before the sea gained positions on the coast while the inhabitants lost them.
The beautiful sea of Palermo, a friend of the people of the city. She had heard of it and stood there instead of that murky, stinking aquatic enemy. People from Palermo had not saved him, the sea. He had not saved them, the people. Perhaps that is why she is so angry today, she reflects on it as she rounds the corner of what used to be the “Cala”[1]: a few boys and girls around, in the 2200s, and she also has to look for what is needed for today’s “festino”[2]. Feast, feast, but what more will they have to celebrate? She collides with a small stall and gets angrier.
«Watch out!»
«Excuse me»
«Where are you going, so angry?»
«I was looking for snails for today», and, as if she is trying to distance herself, she mechanically uses the Italian language, which immediately clashes with the old woman’s dialect.
«The “babbaluci”[3]! They are here, this is an old tradition…all year long everyone says these things should not be sold anymore, that no one remembers them. Then the patron saint’s day comes and they look for the snails…people from Palermo, always like that!»
And indeed, all around them was a buzz, at every corner were sweaty, busy humans: moving garbage, pushing water off the street. Tucked away inside the old Royal Foundry, in what remains of the homonymous square, some people put the finishing touches on the star of the day: the “carro”[4].
«This year they put so much effort, it was not easy to build it, with this heat…but you can’t give it up, you know».
«What do I know? I know you couldn’t have the feast and instead I see they do it every year, but what’s the point?». This time she answers in dialect too, she got nervous: all this attachment to the festival, why? It’s just a procession, it’s just a popular thing, there’s so much else to think about, but she doesn’t say that.
«Darling, it’s to remind you who you are, because if you remember this, we will still have hope…»
4 pm
The sun filters through some openings on the roof of the old Foundry and beasts down hard on the noses bent over to work: the night session was not enough and, covering themselves as best they can, the volunteer people are now finishing the wagon before the parade. A young man of about thirty, although big gloves on his hands, handles lightly the tools, which the afternoon heat had made incandescent – weak refrigeration systems, evidently, are not too useful –. Looking at him from a distance, the tools looked like nothing more than an extension of his hand, such was the familiarity: a near-perfect apparent fusion of the human body and matter. Neither suffered, and neither was inert. The hand knows which screw to tighten, but the screwdriver knew which movement to make. An alliance is what the boy is thinking as he watches with his eyes what takes place at the end of his limbs as if they were not his own. It is the same synergy he sees around him. The busy people were almost dancing around the wagon in synchrony – who knows how consciously – of movements: their steps and gestures weaving a web.
Now he shifts his gaze to the nearly completed work: it is towering. The structure is made entirely of wood, is colorful, and is at least five meters high. It resembles a boat resting on four wheels; the lower part is so large that it can hold at least ten people facing the parapet and all the material needed for the parade. A pulpit from which someone was supposed to give his annual speech was carved on the forward part of the boat. At one time, many years before, the mayor of the city would stand there for a brief greeting, and then much space was given to actresses, actors, and people telling stories, reciting poetry, and cheering on the crowd. Today it is different, no one wants to expose themselves so much, and no one knows what to say to encourage people. People in those popular areas don’t have much hope for the future, the little they have has to be taken care of, it’s not an easy task when you don’t
have confidence even for yourself. Behind the pulpit, from the center of the wagon stood a large tower, a kind of mast, at the top of which would rest the statue of the patron saint: Saint Rosalie. [5] It is on this structure that the saint would parade along the streets of the city, all the way to the sea. Let me be clear, this was not a grand tour – and at this thought the boy, who has meanwhile stopped working, ironically smiles –. The lower part of the city, which once overlooked the sea, had shrunk considerably, and in the few streets that had not yet been completely submerged there was always a bad smell and wetness on the road, which is why they had decided to remove them from the parade route.
The discussion on how to end the parade had been long: from one side some said to stop before the sea, from the other side some insisted on keeping the tradition and hoisting the structure on a boat at midnight and taking it out to sea. Eventually, it was decided on a middle ground: raise it on a boat but without going too far, otherwise, it would be tiring and dirty. In any case, the will had been to try to respect tradition as much as possible (except for the fireworks, which by then had been banned for years): a miracle had to be asked for this time, and, as we know, a great miracle requires great dedication.
«The wagon is beautiful this year», he says.
«It’s always beautiful» a nearby woman echoes him.
«This year it’s more beautiful because we thought we couldn’t make it, because of this heat…and no money…and the administration not supporting us anymore» comments her friend.
«They tried, but they know, if the people here want to do something…» by now there is a small huddle of people admiring the wagon and chatting.
«Enough of this rhetoric, the wagon has to be finished…rather where is the one who has to speak tonight?», who speaks is always the most practical person and brings the others back to order.
«He is strolling along the harbor…» says the boy feeling almost guilty for communicating the whereabouts of his friend who wanted to be alone for a while.
Who knows what he will say tonight, he thinks, but, beside him, his friend seems to intercept his concern and asks him in a whisper: «Will he make it?». The boy responds by looking far into the emptiness.
8 pm
One person decides to stop behind the cathedral, to keep in mind to look at things from another point of view. The huge church seen from behind is just as beautiful as seen from the front, if not more so because it has the flavor of hidden things, of things that try not to let you see and that you see anyway. Better yet, you purposely turn the corner to look at them. The problem is that in the corner where urban planning hides them, other things get piled up as well. So, the person sits down, looking from
the outside at the part that corresponds to the apse of the Church and takes a seat between a dry bush and a heap of waste. The person sits down and thinks we should all do that: not stop at first sight, not look at a beautiful front and think that’s all there, but go around it, ask ourselves: where does it end? Does it end up in a nice place? We will be amazed to discover that sometimes it does, but very often, unfortunately, it doesn’t. And then sometimes we should sit among the dry leaves and the garbage and perceive ourselves as small and big at the same time, try to feel on our shoulders the problems of each being living on this planet and embrace the awareness that there can be no one-size-fits-all solution to save the earth, but that everyone has to do his or her part, and that would be more than enough already.
What is my part? the person asks herself, and again the stomach tightens, Get on that wagon? And say what? Is it going to be all right? Everything seems already gone wrong.
«You don’t have to do it if you don’t feel like it» the friendly voice comes from behind.
«I promised»
«I know»
They look into each other’s eyes and hint at a weak smile.
«Have you been here in the square long?»
«Not long enough. It’s hot».
«I know».
«How is it going over there? Are they having fun?»
«Yes, nothing stops them»
«Are they waiting for me?»
«Less than they wait for the rain»
«Do you know how many centuries have passed since the Santuzza worked a miracle and defeated the plague?»
«I don’t remember…»
«Almost six, I looked it up to prepare the speech…five hundred and seventy-six years. And now they ask her for rain, they challenge the city, they challenge the heat, they challenge the uncertainty, and they ask her for a few drops. No matter if they are religious or not, they do it. And I am a grateful person for what I see, for their dedication, for the city they create, for the resilient community they have been able to hold together».
«There’s always someone who gets pissed off…», the face smiles with weariness.
«And my gratitude also goes to them, to the ones who pout but get busy, to the little boys and girls who blame the adults, suffer loneliness but always lend an ear to those who want to talk. To the old
men and women who ruminate, but then know how to relieve you. One cannot be perfect, to each his own, as seen during the preparations».
«You insisted that they should have the fest again this year, I thought you did not agree, that you wanted to invest time to do something else, to repair the small harbor, for example, instead of decorating the wagon and streets, why?»
«Because there is a drought, but also because they can’t take it anymore and because people are looking for a miracle and they need to look for it».
«But are you a believer?»
«Not in a religious way».
«What do you believe in?»
«I believe in them, I believe that they will find a way to cope with the lack of water if it doesn’t come. They prepared a big party under the scorching sun, they must have realized at least that».
Clapping can be heard, the procession must be close by now.
«Come on, it’s my turn».
The person regards the sheet of confusing notes taken and puts it back in his pocket: it is no longer needed.
11:59 pm
The wagon has concluded its short tour, surrounded by heads dancing along the seafront’s streets. “Evviva Palermo, Evviva Santa Rosalia”[6] shouted like a mantra, a chant, or a prayer: even the most skeptical person sometimes prays and even the most believer sometimes repeats only mechanically.
The little girl takes her place on the ground, tired of walking. She sits on the “balate”[7] and does not seem to mind the heat that the stone gives off at night, after a day of beating sun. No adult could sit on it, but, since generations, that’s how thing go: young people sit on the balate, they don’t care how much hot they are. After all, they don’t care even to imagine them cooler than they are now. She sees a boy near the boat giving directions on how to hoist the wagon onto it, and she is amazed at the care he takes in that process.
She will not look at the wagon walking on the sea, she will watch the human beings who have worked to coordinate the day, wondering if it is not all in their gestures that is the meaning of so much hope.
The boy is sweating more now than in the afternoon heat under the sun; when the wagon is finally hoisted onto the boat, he notices that he has thrown his shirt on the ground. He bends down to pick it up: it is dirty, but he will wash it later. He wears it now if only because he feels the gaze of a little girl across the street on him, Who knows what she is thinking, he turns his back on her but still feels her gaze.
He will not look at the wagon walking on the sea, he will look at the sky because he believes it.
His friend in a moment will come close to him and take him by the hand, keeping her eyes firmly closed, because she is afraid of not believing enough.
The person who spoke from the wagon to the crowd around is now walking home, has turned back to the sea, catches a breath, giving in to weariness. The person will not look at the wagon walking on the sea but will soon stop the steps and will be stuck with a foot in the middle air, like one who does not know whether to go or stay, with his eyes fixed on Porta Nuova.
Between turned-away looks and pointed glances, between raised eyebrows and wet eyes, everyone looks or not at what they want to look at as if it were the last time…will it be?
Then a unanimous gasp, a single phrase in the murmur:
«It’s done».
Notes
[1]Today the “Cala” is the little touristic harbor on the border of the city center.
[2]In Italian “Festino” (“feast” in English, as we’ll call it in this story) is how people from Palermo refer to the celebrationsin honor of Santa Rosalia (Rosalia Sinibaldi, Palermo 1130-1170), patron Saint of the city since 1625 when, as history tells us, she saved the city of Palermo from the plague.
[3]In the Palermitan dialect “babbaluci” stands for a particular little type of snail, it is tradition to eat it during the summerin general and, most of all, during the feast for the main Saint.
[4]The Santa Rosalia float is built differently every year, carried in procession on the night of July 14-15; the rest of theyear it remains on exhibit in the city center.
[5]The wagon that the writer had in mind while writing this text is the one built for the July 14, 2022, parade.
[6]This is in Italian the common phrase repeated by people during the feast, I preferred to keep it in the original languagein the text. You can translate it as “Yay/Hurray Saint Rosalia”.
[7]“Balata”, from the Arabic word “balath” (“stone”) is the term for the large square bricks typical of the paving ofPalermo’s streets. It is made of black stone and, even today, it gets hot during the summer nights.
References
Giarrizzo S., Dizionario Etimologico Siciliano, Herbita Editrice, Palermo. History of the Feast of Santa Rosalia: https://www.comune.palermo.it/storia-festino-santa-rosalia- palermo.php.
Pasqualino F., Rocca R., Dizionario Siciliano – italiano, compilato su quello del Pasqualino, Giuntini, 1859, consulted on https://archive.org/details/dizionariosicil00pasqgoog/page/n69/mode/2up.
ITALIAN VERSION
Palermo 2200
Silvia Lavanco Livreri
Un rapido sguardo alla cartina sul muro, raffigurante una città che, pur essendo la sua, sembrava un’altra. Nessuna nostalgia nel suo sguardo; d’altronde, per una ragazza nata nel 2186 Palermo è sempre stata come la vede fuori dalla finestra di camera sua: via Roma angolo Corso Vittorio Emanuele, solo una strada tra lei e il porto.
Esce di casa a passo svelto, è ancora arrabbiata con i suoi genitori, chissà per quale futile motivo – ma, si sa, nonostante l’afa e il mare torbido che incombe minaccioso, l’adolescenza è pur sempre l’adolescenza e, anzi, forse al giorno d’oggi è un’adolescenza ancora più dura: non ci sono molti coetanei con cui condividerla.
Cammina. Secondo la cartina doveva esserci una lunga via prima del lungomare, lo pensa come se pensasse ad un posto leggendario: ha visto delle foto, ma le sono sembrate né più né meno che disegni di un posto utopico, talmente lontano da non riuscire neanche a sognarlo…ma d’altra parte è luglio e fa troppo caldo persino per dormire, figuriamoci per sognare. Da quando avevano vietato i condizionatori poi…Come se questo potesse bastare, potesse cambiare le cose, il suo pensiero ha un tono sprezzante. Ha quattordici anni, è giovane, mica stupida: è perfettamente consapevole che, a questo punto della storia, ogni azione intrapresa dal governo cittadino è soltanto un modo per pulirsi le coscienze, una panacea per un disastro ormai avvenuto da tempo. Avrebbero dovuto agire prima, prima che le alluvioni fuori stagione iniziassero ad alternarsi al caldo estremo, senza mezze misure. Prima che, infine, la pioggia diventasse soltanto un ricordo. Prima che il mare guadagnasse posizioni sulla costa e gli abitanti le perdessero.
Il bel mare di Palermo, amico dei palermitani. Ne aveva sentito parlare, stava lì, al posto di quel nemico acquoso torbido e puzzolente. Non lo avevano salvato, il mare, i palermitani. Non li aveva salvati, i palermitani, il mare. Forse per questo è così arrabbiata oggi, ci riflette mentre gira l’angolo verso quella che una volta era la Cala: pochi ragazzini e poche ragazzine in giro, nel 2200, e le tocca anche cercare il necessario per la festa di oggi. Festino1, festino, ma che avranno ancora da festeggiare?. Urta una piccola bancarella e si incupisce più di prima.
«Accura!»2
«Mi scusi.»
«Unni va, accussì mutriata?»3
«Cercavo le lumache per oggi…» e, come per darsi un tono e prendere le distanze, utilizza meccanicamente l’italiano, che subito si scontra con il dialetto dell’anziana signora. «I babbaluci4! Ca su, chista è tradizione antica…tuttu l’annu ricinu ca ri sti cose un si n’avissiru a vinniri chiù, ca un c’interessa chiù a nuddu. Poi arriva u fistinu e vannu circannu babbaluci…palermitani, sempre accussì5!».
E in effetti intorno a loro era tutto un fermento: ad ogni angolo, esseri umani sudati e affaccendati spostano l’immondizia, spingono via l’acqua dalla strada. Nascosti all’interno dell’Ex Real Fonderia, in quel che resta dell’omonima piazza, alcune persone danno gli ultimi ritocchi al protagonista della giornata: “u carro6”.
«St’annu s’apprecaru assai, un fu facile a fallu, cu stu cavuru, ma un si po’ arrinunciare, u sai7».
«Ma io chi sacciu? Sacciu ca un si putia fari u fistinu e invece viu ca u fannu tutti l’anni, a chi serbe8?». Stavolta risponde in dialetto anche lei, si è innervosita: tutto questo attaccamento alla festa, perché? È solo una processione, è solo una cosa popolare, c’è tanto altro a cui pensare, ma questo non lo dice.
«Picciridda, serbe pa arricurdariti cu si, picchì si t’arricordi chistu, avemu ancora spiranza…».9
Ore 16:00
Il sole penetra da alcuni buchi sul tetto dell’antica Fonderia e picchia sulle nuche chine intente a lavorare: il turno notturno non era bastato e, coprendosi come meglio possono, adesso le persone volontarie danno gli ultimi ritocchi al carro. Un ragazzo sulla trentina maneggia con leggerezza, nonostante i grossi guanti, gli attrezzi che il caldo pomeridiano aveva reso incandescenti – a poco evidentemente servono i deboli sistemi di refrigerazione. A guardarlo da lontano, gli strumenti non sembrano altro che un prolungamento della sua mano tanta è la dimestichezza: una perfetta apparente fusione tra corpo umano e materia. Nessuno dei due subisce, nessuno dei due è inerte. La mano sa quale vite stringere, eppure il cacciavite sa quale movimento compiere. Un’alleanza, questo sta pensando il ragazzo guardando con gli occhi quello che avviene all’estremità dei suoi arti, come non fossero suoi. È la stessa sinergia che vede intorno a sé. Le persone affaccendate quasi danzavano intorno al carro in una sincronia – chissà poi quanto consapevole – dei movimenti: i loro passi, i loro gesti intessono una tela.
Adesso sposta lo sguardo verso l’opera quasi ultimata: è imponente. La struttura è tutta in legno, variopinta e alta almeno cinque metri. Ricorda una barca poggiata su quattro ruote; la parte inferiore è così grande da contenere almeno dieci persone affacciate al parapetto e tutto il materiale che serve per la parata. Sulla parte anteriore è stato ricavato un pulpito da cui qualcuno avrebbe dovuto tenere il suo discorso annuale. Un tempo, tanti anni prima, vi si affacciava il sindaco della città per un breve saluto e poi molto spazio era dato ad attrici, attori e persone che raccontavano storie, recitavano poesie, incitavano la folla. Oggi è diverso: nessuno vuole esporsi così tanto, nessuno sa cosa dire per incoraggiare la gente. Le persone in quelle zone popolari non nutrono molta speranza per il futuro, la poca che hanno va curata, ma non è un’impresa facile, quando non se ne ha neanche per sé stessi. Dietro il pulpito, dal centro del carro, si erge una grande torre, una sorta di albero maestro, alla cui sommità sarebbe stata poggiata la statua della patrona: Santa Rosalia. È su questa struttura che la santa avrebbe sfilato lungo le vie della città, fino al mare. Sia chiaro, non si trattava di un grande giro – e a questo pensiero, il ragazzo, che intanto ha smesso di lavorare, sorride ironicamente –. La parte bassa della città, che un tempo si affacciava sul mare, si era notevolmente ristretta e nelle poche strade che ancora non erano state del tutto sommerse il tanfo e l’umidità rendevano poco piacevole il passaggio, motivo per cui avevano deciso di eliminarle dal giro della parata.
La discussione su come concludere la processione era stata lunga: chi diceva di fermarsi prima del mare, chi insisteva sul mantenere la tradizione e issare la struttura su una barca a mezzanotte e portarla a largo. Alla fine, si era deciso per una via di mezzo: issarla su una barca ma senza spingersi troppo lontano, altrimenti sarebbe stato più che altro faticoso e sporco. Ad ogni modo, la volontà era stata quella di cercare di rispettare il più possibile la secolare usanza – eccezion fatta per i fuochi d’artificio, che ormai erano stati banditi da anni –: si doveva chiedere una grazia e, si sa, per un grande grazia serve una grande dedizione.
«È bello quest’anno, il carro» dice.
«È bello sempre» gli fa eco una donna vicina.
«Quest’anno è più bello perché pensavamo di non farcela, con questo caldo…e senza soldi…e l’amministrazione che non ci appoggia più», commenta l’amica.
«Ci hanno provato, ma ormai lo sanno, se il palermitano vuole fare qualcosa…», ormai si è formato un piccolo capannello di gente che ammira il carro e dice la propria.
«Basta con questa retorica, il carro si deve finire…piuttosto dov’è chi deve parlare stasera?», chi parla adesso è sempre la persona più pragmatica e richiama rapidamente all’ordine.
«Passìa10 verso il porto…», dice il ragazzo sentendosi quasi in colpa per aver denunciato la persona che voleva soltanto stare da sola per un po’.
Chissà cosa dirà stasera, questo è solo un pensiero, ma l’amica a fianco sembra intercettare la sua preoccupazione, «Ce la farà?» gli chiede in un bisbiglio. Il ragazzo risponde guardando nel vuoto.
Ore 20:00
Ha deciso di fermarsi dietro la cattedrale11, per ricordarsi di guardare le cose da un altro punto di vista. L’enorme chiesa vista da dietro è bella tanto quanto vista da davanti, se non di più, perché ha il fascino delle cose nascoste, di quelle che cercano di non farti vedere e che tu invece vedi lo stesso. Anzi, giri appositamente l’angolo per guardarle. Il problema è che nel cantuccio in cui l’urbanistica le nasconde, vengono ammucchiate anche altre cose. Così siede, guardando dall’esterno la parte che corrisponde all’abside della Chiesa, tra un cespuglio secco e un cumulo di rifiuti. Si siede e pensa che dovremmo fare tutti così: non fermarci alla prima vista, non guardare una bella facciata e pensare che sia tutto lì, ma girarci intorno, chiederci: dove finisce? Finisce in un bel posto? Ci stupiremo nello scoprire che a volte sì, ma molto spesso purtroppo no. E poi a volte dovremmo sederci tra le foglie secche e l’immondizia e sentirci piccoli e grandi nel medesimo tempo, provare a sentire su di noi i problemi di ciascun essere che vive su questo pianeta e abbracciare la consapevolezza che non possa esistere una soluzione univoca per salvare la terra, ma che ognuno debba fare la propria parte, e questo sarebbe già molto più che abbastanza.
Qual è la mia parte?, si chiede, mentre di nuovo lo stomaco ha una stretta, Salire su quel carro? E dire cosa? Andrà tutto bene? Sembra già andato tutto male.
«Non devi farlo se non te la senti», la voce amica viene dalle sue spalle.
«L’ho promesso»
«Lo so»
Si guardano negli occhi accennando un debole sorriso.
«Sei qui in piazza da molto?»
«Non abbastanza. Fa caldo»
«Lo so»
«Come va di là? Si divertono?»
«Sì, non li ferma niente»
«Mi aspettano?»
«Meno di quanto aspettino la pioggia»
«Sai quanti secoli sono passati da quando la Santuzza12 ha fatto il miracolo e ha sconfitto la peste?» «Non mi ricordo…»
«Quasi sei, l’ho cercato per preparare il discorso…cinquecentosettantasei anni. E ora le chiedono la pioggia, sfidano la città, sfidano il caldo, sfidano l’incertezza e le chiedono qualche goccia. Non importa se siano religiosi o no, loro lo fanno. E io sono una persona grata per quello che vedo, per la loro dedizione, per la città che creano, per la comunità risoluta che hanno saputo tenere unita» «Anche se c’è sempre qualcuno che si arrabbia…», sorride di stanchezza.
«E la mia gratitudine va anche a loro, alle persone che mettono il muso e però si danno da fare, ai ragazzini e alle ragazzine che danno la colpa ai grandi, soffrono la solitudine e però porgono sempre l’orecchio a chi ha voglia di parlare. Agli anziani e alle anziane che si rummuliano13, ma poi sanno come darti conforto. Non si può essere perfetti, a ciascuno il suo, si è visto durante i preparativi». «Hai insistito perché facessero il festino anche quest’anno, pensavo non fossi dello stesso parere, che volessi investire tempo per fare altro, per riparare il porticciolo, per esempio, invece che per addobbare carro e viuzze, perché?»
«Perché c’è la siccità, perché non se ne può più, perché la gente sta cercando un miracolo e ha bisogno di cercarlo»
«Ma tu sei credente?»
«Non in senso religioso»
«E in che senso?»
«Io credo in loro, credo al fatto che troveranno un modo per far fronte alla mancanza di acqua, se non dovesse arrivare. Hanno preparato una festa in grande sotto il sole cocente, si saranno resi conto almeno di questo».
Si sentono schiamazzi, la processione deve essere vicina ormai.
«Andiamo, tocca a me».
Riguarda il foglio di appunti confusi che aveva preso, lo ripone in tasca: non è più necessario.
Ore 23:59
Il carro ha concluso il suo breve giro, attorniato da teste danzanti tra le vie del lungomare. “Evviva Palermo, evviva Santa Rosalia”, urlato come un mantra, una cantilena o una preghiera; che anche il più scettico a volte prega e anche il più credente a volte ripete meccanicamente.
La ragazzina ha preso posto a terra, è stanca di camminare. Si siede sulle balate14 e sembra che non le importi il calore che la pietra emana alla sera, dopo una giornata di sole battente. Nessun adulto vi si siede su, ma, da generazioni, è così che vanno le cose: i ragazzi e le ragazze si siedono sulle balate, non importa quanto siano calde, d’altronde non c’è alcun interesse nell’immaginarle più fresche di così.
Vede un ragazzo vicino alla barca dare indicazioni su come issare il carro e resta stupita dalla cura che dedica a quell’operazione.
Lei non guarderà il carro passeggiare sul mare, guarderà gli esseri umani che si sono adoperati per coordinare la giornata, chiedendosi se non sia tutto nei loro gesti il senso di tanto sperare.
Il ragazzo sta sudando più adesso che nel pomeriggio sotto il sole; quando finalmente il carro è stato issato sulla barca si è accorto di avere gettato in terra la sua maglietta. Si china a raccoglierla: è sporca, ma la laverà più tardi. Adesso la indossa, anche soltanto perché sente su di sé lo sguardo di una ragazzina dall’altra parte della strada, Chissà che pensa, le volge le spalle ma la avverte ancora. Lui non guarderà il carro passeggiare sul mare, guarderà il cielo, perché ci crede davvero.
L’amica tra un attimo gli si farà vicina e lo prenderà per mano, tenendo gli occhi saldamente chiusi, perché ha paura di non crederci abbastanza.
Chi ha parlato dal carro alla folla intorno s’incammina verso casa, volta le spalle al mare, tira un sospiro, si arrende alla stanchezza. Arresterà molto presto il suo passo, ma rimarrà fermo, con un piede sospeso a mezz’aria, come chi è indeciso tra andare e restare, gli occhi puntati verso Porta Nuova.
Infine, tra sguardi distolti e sguardi puntati, tra sopracciglia alzate e occhi bagnati, tutti guardano ciò che vogliono guardare come se fosse l’ultima volta…lo sarà?
Poi un sussulto unanime, una sola frase nel mormorio
«Fatta fu».
- “Festino” è il modo in cui i palermitani si riferiscono ai festeggiamenti in onore di Santa Rosalia (Rosalia Sinibaldi, Palermo 1130-1170) patrona della città dal 1625 quando, la storia ci dice, salvò la città di Palermo dalla peste.
- It. «Attenzione»
- It. «Dove vai, così imbronciata?».
- It. “Lumache” tipiche del palermitano. È tradizione mangiarle durante l’estate in generale, ma, soprattutto, la sera del festino in onore della Santa Patrona.
- It. «Qua sono, questa è un’antica tradizione…tutto l’anno dicono che queste cose non si dovrebbero più vendere, che non interessa più a nessuno. Poi arriva il giorno del festino e cercano lumache…palermitani, sempre così!».
- Il carro di Santa Rosalia viene costruito ogni anno in modo diverso e portato in processione nella notte tra il 14 e il 15 luglio; il resto dell’anno rimane esposto in centro città.
- It. «Quest’anno si sono impregnati molto, non è stato semplice costruirlo, con questo caldo poi, ma non ci si può rinunciare, lo sai».
- It. «Quest’anno si sono impregnati molto, non è stato semplice costruirlo, con questo caldo poi, ma non ci si può rinunciare, lo sai».
- It. «Bambina, serve per ricordarti chi sei, perché se ti ricordi questo, abbiamo ancora speranza…».
- It. «Passeggia».
- Oggi la piazza dalla quale si può ammirare dall’esterno l’abside della Cattedrale di Palermo si chiama Piazza Sett’Angeli.
- “Santuzza” è il modo con cui comunemente i palermitani si riferiscono a Santa Rosalia.
- It. “Si lamentano”.
- “Balata”, dall’arabo “balath”, pietra, è il nome delle lastre di pietra nera con cui sono costruite le vie del centro storico.
Bibliografia e sitografia
Giarrizzo S., Dizionario Etimologico Siciliano, Herbita Editrice, Palermo.
Pasqualino F., Rocco R., Dizionario siciliano-italiano compilato su quello del Pasqualino, Giuntini, 1859, consultato all’indirizzo https://archive.org/details/dizionariosicil00pasqgoog/page/n5/mode/2up.
Storia del Festino di Santa Rosalia: https://www.comune.palermo.it/storia-festino-santa-rosalia- palermo.php.
José Mena
Image 1: José Mena, Founder of MiHAoUZ, in the first prototype, image with permission to use by MiHAoUZ
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the
beneficiaries?
Nestled in the heart of Quito, Ecuador, the MiHAoUZ Project isn’t just a concept on paper – it’s a testament to human ingenuity and the pursuit of a better tomorrow. With a vision rooted in creating thriving and self-sustaining communities across Ecuador, this personal initiative goes beyond blueprints and diagrams. It’s about turning dreams into reality through the power of prefabricated constructions that marry efficiency, affordability, and a light ecological footprint.
The project’s journey was fueled by curiosity and a commitment to transformation. Drawing inspiration from the bustling cities of Boston and New York, research was meticulously undertaken to distill concepts that could transcend borders and cultures. The result? A visionary blueprint for transportable, ecological, and replicable homes that could redefine the very essence of housing.
In 2016, the project stepped into the spotlight at the Entrepreneurship Fair of the esteemed San Francisco University (USFQ). Amid a sea of ideas, the MiHAoUZ prototype emerged as the undisputed victor in the Social and Environmental Responsibility category. This recognition was more than just a trophy; it was a testament to the project’s potential to reshape the narrative of responsible architecture.
But MiHAoUZ was not a lone crusader. It stood on the shoulders of local industries that believed in its cause. Cutting-edge materials flowed in from companies like NOVOPAN, KUBIEC, and Edesa, weaving innovation into every fiber of the project’s being. Financial support from INSOTEC breathed life into blueprints, ensuring that the vision was backed by more than just good intentions.
The heartbeat of MiHAoUZ resonated within the walls of the USFQ, where eager students, dedicated professors, and intrigued visitors converged to witness something remarkable. A community came together to see the prototype materialize before their eyes, transcending paper sketches and becoming a tangible testament to what collaboration can achieve. As the pieces fell into place, the structure rose from the ground in a mere day, a testament to efficiency and purpose.
Image 2: Speed Build: Prefabricated Home Assembly in 1 Day – MiHAoUZ Project, images with permission to use by MiHAoUZ.
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?
The heart and soul of the MiHAoUZ Project, however, lay in its outreach to the marginalized. It was a whisper of promise to rural communities that lacked the luxuries many take for granted – access to energy, sanitation, and dignity. These communities, often overlooked by progress, were the true beneficiaries of this endeavor. Solar panels and biodigesters replaced distant dreams with immediate solutions, channeling sustainable energy and hope into homes that stood as more than just structures.
The MiHAoUZ project proposes a shift away from traditional construction, which can have a significant impact on climate change due to several factors:
- Greenhouse gas emissions: Conventional construction often involves the intensive use of materials that generate large greenhouse gas emissions during their production. For example, the manufacturing of cement, widely used in construction, releases significant amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) due to the calcination process of calcium carbonate.
- Energy consumption: Traditional construction can also require significant energy consumption during the construction phase and throughout the building’s lifespan. The use of heavy machinery, construction equipment, and inefficient heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems can increase energy demand and, therefore, greenhouse gas emissions.
- Material waste: Traditional construction often generates a significant amount of material waste during the construction phase, contributing to deforestation, excessive extraction of natural resources, and solid waste generation.
- Loss of biodiversity: Conventional construction can involve the destruction of natural habitats and loss of biodiversity due to urbanization and urban expansion.
These prefab marvels weren’t merely about brick and mortar. They were bridges connecting people to the future they deserved, promising a better quality of life while treading lightly on the Earth. It was a quiet revolution, a way of saying that everyone deserves access to not just the basics, but to a life filled with respect for the environment.
MiHAoUZ wasn’t just about houses; it was about justice – environmental justice. It championed the spirit of innovation and the symphony of collaboration as it etched a path towards a brighter future. By redefining housing as not just a roof, but a promise, it unfurled the banner of change and cast a spotlight on a more equitable Ecuador. It was a beacon, a reminder that the future could be built with intention, compassion, and a deep understanding of what it truly means to uplift communities while treading gently on the Earth.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
In the heart of Ecuador’s rural landscapes, the MiHAoUZ project comes alive with a fervent mission to weave together the fabric of sustainable communities. At its core, this endeavor is more than just a blueprint – it’s a heartfelt journey towards harmonizing humanity with the environment.
The main objectives of the MiHAoUZ project are: (1) creating sustainable communities, (2) reducing environmental impact, (3) promoting replicable solutions.
Imagine walking through the verdant landscapes of Ecuador’s low-income rural areas, where hopes and aspirations are often overshadowed by the lack of affordable and eco-friendly housing. This is where MiHAoUZ steps in, with a resolute determination to craft something extraordinary out of the ordinary. It envisions communities that are not just clusters of houses, but thriving ecosystems where families can flourish.
One of MiHAoUZ’s pillars is its commitment to creating homes that are more than shelter – they’re catalysts for transformation. These homes will stand as living testaments to resilience and innovation. They will harness the power of the sun with solar panels that wink in the daylight, generating clean energy for the community. Waste will turn into wealth as biodigesters transform organic matter into valuable resources, creating a circle of sustainability that mirrors the rhythms of the Earth itself.
The project doesn’t just build structures; it crafts narratives of change, stories of people taking the reins of their own lives. With every nail hammered and every beam laid, the community becomes the author of its own destiny, shaping the physical and social landscapes for generations to come.
But MiHAoUZ doesn’t stop at erecting homes. It’s a movement, a revolutionary dance with the environment. It’s about using prefabricated materials that whisper secrets of efficiency, and innovative building techniques that embrace the future while honoring the past. As hammers meet nails and walls rise to meet the sky, the project pays homage to the Earth by reducing waste and energy consumption, casting a vote for sustainability and climate resilience.
At its heart, MiHAoUZ is a storyteller. It doesn’t just tell one tale; it pens a multitude. It doesn’t just build one home; it lays the foundation for countless more. The project’s beating heart is woven with threads of sustainability, social responsibility, innovation, and collaboration – values that infuse every step, every decision, and every dream.
With each brick laid, the project stands as a tribute to social responsibility. It’s a gesture of solidarity with those whose voices often go unheard – the marginalized, the underserved. MiHAoUZ isn’t just about building structures; it’s about weaving dreams and aspirations into the very fabric of these communities, providing a sanctuary where futures can bloom.
Innovation is the song that MiHAoUZ sings. It’s the tune of possibility, the melody of progress. As new materials and technologies are woven into the architectural tapestry, these homes become living embodiments of creativity and forward thinking. Aesthetic marvels that blend seamlessly with their surroundings, these homes are a testament to the power of human imagination to harmonize with the natural world.
Collaboration is the symphony that propels MiHAoUZ forward. It’s a harmony of minds and hearts, a collective endeavor that embraces the knowledge of local industries, the backing of financial institutions, and the wisdom of academic partners like USFQ. Together, they breathe life into MiHAoUZ, transforming it from a vision into reality.
In the story of MiHAoUZ, the past and the future merge, creating a narrative that transcends time. It’s a tale of sustainable homes rising from the Earth, of communities standing strong against the tides of change, and of a world that becomes a little more just and equitable with every brick laid. As MiHAoUZ turns the page on conventional housing, it pens a chapter of hope, resilience, and transformation – a chapter that will be read and remembered for generations to come.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
Over the course of its journey, the MiHAoUZ Project has woven a tapestry of experiences that breathe life into its aspirations. The initial prototype, a testament to innovation, was painstakingly transported and reassembled on Ilaló Hill not just once, but thrice, underlining the persistence and determination that lie at the heart of this endeavor. From this humble genesis, the project’s scope expanded to encompass diverse locales, each with its own story to tell.
A significant chapter unfurled in the historic city of Ambato, nestled 150 kilometers away from the bustling heart of Quito. Here, the project gained recognition beyond its innovative construction techniques, breathing life into the very essence of the city’s architecture. The mantle of transformation then extended to Tumbaco, a quiet suburb where the construction of two houses mirrored the dreams of countless families seeking sustainable shelter. In this microcosm, the project’s foundations stood as a beacon of hope, embodying the belief that a brighter future could be built one brick at a time.
A symphony of impact echoed through the creation of a school, an amalgamation of nine interconnected buildings in the backdrop of progress. The community’s children embarked on a new chapter, where the structures that housed knowledge were themselves a testament to the harmonious coexistence between human habitats and the environment.
And as the project’s reach stretched even further, the sands of Olón, a tranquil coastal retreat, bore witness to its transformative touch. Here, a house emerged as more than just bricks and mortar; it was a testament to the adaptability of the project to diverse terrains and climates, standing as a sentinel against the tide of conventional construction practices.
Figure 1: Chronicle of Innovation: The Evolution of the MiHAoUZ Project, images with permission to use by MiHAoUZ
Through these unfolding stories, the very tenets of the MiHAoUZ Project were tested, and they stood strong, like the pillars of a bridge connecting innovation and reality. The chapters of this tale, etched in time, resonate with meaning:
- Swift Assembly: The narrative of construction was not one of mere creation, but of rapid transformation. The process proved swift, a reminder that sustainable solutions need not be slow to manifest. Indeed, the project’s very nature whispered to the world that housing solutions could rise like phoenixes from the ashes of traditional methods.
- Journey of Translocation: Prefabricated and poised for mobility, the project danced across landscapes, showing that the promise of sustainable living was not limited by geographical constraints. A story of innovation found its voice in the road less traveled, demonstrating that transformation could traverse borders and boundaries.
- Echoes of Repetition: Each new setting did not merely recount the same tale; it was a canvas on which a familiar story could be painted anew. The project’s replicability, its ability to mold itself to new environments, whispered that sustainability was not a solitary pursuit but a harmonious chorus sung by diverse landscapes.
- Adaptation’s Embrace: The houses, the school, the shelter by the sea — they were not rigid structures but chameleons, adapting to the environment’s every nuance. Here, design bowed before the elements, and comfort stood hand-in-hand with energy efficiency, in a dance that painted a picture of harmony between human habitation and the natural world.
Who are the actors involved? What are their backgrounds?
These experiences, etched on the canvas of time, illuminate the project’s effectiveness in ways mere words cannot capture. The whispers of swift assembly, the tales of translocation, the echoes of repetition, and the embrace of adaptation together form a narrative that attests to the MiHAoUZ Project’s impact. It stands as a living testament to the fusion of sustainability and community, reducing the footprint of the past while laying the foundation for a greener future.
Amidst these pages, the characters who breathe life into this narrative emerge, each with a unique role and story:
- Stewards of the Woods: Industries blessed with forest resources became partners, custodians of materials that would shape the future. Their presence wasn’t just about materials; it was a commitment to sustainable sourcing, a pledge to let innovation be guided by the whispers of the woods.
- Sages of Academia: Professionals and researchers from academia lent more than just their expertise; they brought the wisdom of generations. Armed with qualitative and quantitative knowledge, they wove a tapestry of innovation, each thread a testament to the human mind’s boundless potential.
- Keepers of the Land: Local governments stood as pillars, their support not just regulatory but foundational. They didn’t just provide infrastructure; they nurtured the seeds of change, ensuring the project blossomed within the embrace of local aspirations.
- Soul of Communities: Communities, the heartbeat of the project, didn’t merely receive; they actively participated. They weren’t passive recipients but active creators, their insights the ink that penned the story. In their hands, the project was more than just bricks; it was a chance to shape their own destiny.
By bringing together industries with forest assets, professionals from academia, local governments, and communities, the MiHAoUZ project creates a collaborative and multi-stakeholder approach. Each actor contributes their unique background and expertise, ensuring the project’s success in delivering sustainable and environmentally friendly housing solutions to low-income rural communities.
Thus, the MiHAoUZ Project isn’t a mere abstract concept; it’s a living tapestry woven by a cast as diverse as the colors of nature. It’s a tale that captures the human spirit’s capacity to bridge dreams and reality, to create harmony between innovation and the world we call home.
Figure 2: Harmonizing Rural-Urban Ecology: A Holistic System Approach, figure with permission to use by MiHAoUZ
Which limits does it encounter?
MiHAoUZ is a project driven by a noble mission to uplift rural communities through sustainable housing solutions. However, like any entrepreneurship, it faces a range of real-world challenges that require more than just a conceptual approach. Let’s delve into the project’s challenges and potential hurdles with more depth, recognizing the human factors at play:
- Legal Framework: Navigating the Maze of Ownership: Behind the legal terminology lies the human struggle for a place to call home. Many individuals in these communities lack the formal titles that grant them ownership of the land they occupy. For these families, the absence of these documents isn’t just a bureaucratic hurdle – it’s a stark reminder of their vulnerability and lack of security. Picture families whose generations have lived on this land without recognition, now facing the daunting task of proving their right to their homes. Addressing this challenge requires not only legal reforms but also empathy for the lived experiences of these families.
- Financing: Dreams Held Back by Financial Realities: The financial barrier isn’t just about numbers and eligibility criteria; it’s about the aspirations of individuals who want to provide better lives for their loved ones. Imagine the frustration of a parent who dreams of giving their children a safer and more comfortable space but can’t access the necessary resources. It’s about dignity and the right to improve one’s circumstances. This challenge can be better understood by realizing that aspirations aren’t limited to a few, but are shared by every human heart. The project’s success hinges on finding inclusive financing mechanisms that respect these dreams.
- Corruption and Bureaucracy: Navigating Complex Realities: Corruption and bureaucracy might sound like abstract concepts, but they have very real consequences for the project and the people it aims to help. Consider the project team and community members who have to endure endless delays and unexpected expenses due to red tape or unethical practices. The frustration they feel is palpable, and their determination to make a change despite these challenges is equally real. The fight against corruption isn’t just about project efficiency; it’s about defending the integrity of the project’s purpose against systemic obstacles.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
In this journey to make a difference, there are people behind every challenge:
- Engaging Skepticism: Faces Behind the Doubt: When we talk about skepticism or resistance, we’re really talking about the individuals who fear change or are uncertain about something new. These individuals might have seen failed initiatives before or may be wary of change disrupting their way of life. To overcome this, the project needs to engage in conversations that respect their concerns. It means listening and understanding their fears, and then gently guiding them towards the project’s vision. It’s a delicate dance between preserving tradition and embracing innovation.
- Facing Infrastructure Hurdles: Realities of Remote Communities: Logistical challenges sound technical, but they impact people’s lives in direct ways. Imagine the excitement of a community expecting their new homes, only to face delays because the components can’t reach them due to poor roads or inadequate transportation. It’s a disappointment that goes beyond material concerns; it’s about the hope that was deferred. Overcoming this requires more than just good planning; it requires recognizing the value of promises kept.
- Community Integration: Building More than Structures: Integrating the new housing units into existing communities isn’t just about architecture; it’s about bridging the gap between different ways of life. Picture the moments of tension when new and old residents interact, possibly due to cultural differences or misunderstandings. Building a structure is one thing; building a sense of belonging and unity is another. The project’s success depends on fostering these connections and understanding the intricacies of human interactions.
- The Road to Scalability: Balancing Dreams and Resources: Scaling up a project is often talked about in terms of strategy, but it’s also a matter of juggling hopes and limitations. Think of the project team that dreams of reaching more communities but has to grapple with resource constraints and logistical complexities. The endeavor isn’t just about growth; it’s about making tough decisions that honor the initial mission while being practical about execution. It’s a journey of realizing what’s possible while staying true to the project’s essence.
- In Conclusion: A Journey of Humanity and Hope: Behind every challenge and limitation of the MiHAoUZ project are individuals – families, project teams, communities – whose lives and aspirations are deeply intertwined with its success. Addressing these challenges means not just solving technical issues, but recognizing the human stories that lie beneath. It’s about acknowledging the struggles, hopes, and dreams that make this project more than just a prototype – it’s a testament to the resilience of communities and the power of collective effort.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
The MiHAoUZ project is more than just a blueprint; it’s a living example of adaptable and sustainable housing that resonates with the real world. Here’s a deeper look at how its replicability is firmly grounded in practicality and human engagement:
Crafting Homes with a Human Touch: The heart of the MiHAoUZ project beats with the concept of adaptable design. Think of it as a puzzle that clicks together to form a cozy, modern home. The beauty is that this puzzle can be assembled in various corners of the world, addressing unique needs and cultures. Each modular piece is like a brushstroke in a masterpiece painting, with local materials and techniques adding vibrant shades to the canvas. The project’s genius lies in being able to embrace the landscape, climate, and the people who’ll inhabit these homes.
Sustainability that Sings: The MiHAoUZ project is not a sterile prototype, but a testament to sustainable living. It’s a whisper to the environment, a promise to minimize the carbon footprint. Wood and renewable resources are the orchestra, playing harmoniously with solar panels and biodigesters. As the sun kisses the solar panels, and waste transforms into energy, it’s more than a home; it’s a symphony of ecological harmony. This harmony can be the anthem for other communities, echoing through homes built with respect for the planet.
Communities Building Communities: Imagine a village coming together to build its future. The MiHAoUZ project is more than construction; it’s a collective endeavor. It’s a celebration of culture and identity, with local communities adding the brushstrokes to the canvas. The very process of building these homes cultivates a spirit of collaboration. From young hands passing tools to elders sharing wisdom, the MiHAoUZ project isn’t just about erecting walls; it’s about nurturing bonds and shared dreams.
Redefining Shelter: When winds howl and earth trembles, MiHAoUZ houses stand firm – not as mere structures, but as shields of resilience. These homes are woven from threads of preparedness. With their roots in sustainable building practices, they empower communities to face nature’s fury with courage. It’s more than shelter; it’s security. And this security ripples through the community, encouraging the preparedness that safeguards lives and dreams.
From Local to Global: MiHAoUZ doesn’t just build houses; it constructs a better world, brick by brick. Its impact extends beyond four walls – it’s about the systems that govern our lives. As policy makers witness the triumphs of the project, they’re nudged towards a fresh perspective. Regulations and incentives blossom, nurturing eco-friendly practices. The MiHAoUZ initiative serves as a storyteller, spinning narratives of change that inspire broader shifts in the way we build and live.
Empowering Tomorrow: MiHAoUZ empowers communities by giving them more than a home; it gives them agency. It’s a catalyst for change – not just in architecture, but in how we perceive the power of community. As the MiHAoUZ project spreads its wings, the lessons learned become a compass for others to navigate their own journeys. It’s a ripple that extends far beyond construction, carrying the spirit of sustainability, resilience, and empowerment to new horizons.
In Conclusion: The MiHAoUZ project isn’t just about replicating structures; it’s about replicating ideas, dreams, and hope. It’s about embracing the pulse of a community, the heartbeat of a planet, and weaving them together into a tapestry of sustainable living. From modular components to resilient communities, from local adaptations to global shifts – the MiHAoUZ initiative is an anthem for a more sustainable, inclusive, and resilient world.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes?
Yes, the MiHAoUZ initiative has the potential to contribute to broader changes in various areas, fostering long-term sustainability, community preparedness, and influencing institutional arrangements. Here are some ways in which the project can facilitate broader changes:
Legal and institutional frameworks: The success and impact of the MiHAoUZ project can highlight the need for updating or creating supportive legal and institutional frameworks. It can demonstrate the effectiveness of sustainable construction practices and encourage policymakers to develop regulations and incentives that promote eco-friendly and resilient building methods.
Community preparedness: By implementing sustainable and resilient housing solutions, the MiHAoUZ project can enhance community preparedness for natural disasters, such as earthquakes or extreme weather events. The project’s focus on safe and adaptable housing can encourage communities to prioritize disaster preparedness, fostering a culture of resilience and proactive measures to mitigate risks.
Long-term sustainability: The MiHAoUZ project’s emphasis on sustainable materials, energy efficiency, and low-carbon design aligns with the goals of long-term sustainability. By showcasing the benefits and feasibility of sustainable construction practices, the initiative can contribute to a shift towards more environmentally conscious building methods in the construction industry.
Community empowerment: Through its participatory approach, the MiHAoUZ project empowers communities by involving them in the decision-making process and providing them with sustainable housing solutions. This empowerment can extend beyond housing, encouraging communities to actively engage in other aspects of sustainability, such as resource management, renewable energy adoption, and social cohesion.
Knowledge dissemination and replication: The MiHAoUZ project can serve as a valuable case study and knowledge hub for sustainable construction practices. By sharing their experiences, best practices, and lessons learned, the project can inspire and inform other initiatives, leading to a wider adoption of sustainable building methods and contributing to broader changes in the construction sector.
Overall, the MiHAoUZ initiative has the potential to catalyze broader changes in law, institutional arrangements, long-term sustainability practices, community preparedness, and community empowerment. By showcasing the benefits of sustainable and resilient housing, the project can contribute to a more sustainable and resilient future in both local and global contexts.
References
Earth Overshoot Day home – #MoveTheDate. (n.d.). Retrieved August 21, 2023, from https://www.overshootday.org/
Español — IPCC. (n.d.). Retrieved August 21, 2023, from https://www.ipcc.ch/languages-2/spanish/
Este proyecto crea vivienda inteligente y transportable | Revista Líderes. (n.d.). Retrieved August 21, 2023, from https://www.revistalideres.ec/lideres/proyecto-vivienda-inteligente-transportable-desarollo.html
Post Occupancy Evaluations | WBDG – Whole Building Design Guide. (n.d.). Retrieved August 21, 2023, from https://www.wbdg.org/resources/post-occupancy-evaluations
Mumtaz Ahmad Numani
(Post-doctoral fellow, Moturi Satyanarayana Centre, Krea University)
Email: mumtaznumani@gmail.com
“Although, this atlas entry titled, “Srinagar in 2200: A Paradise or Paradise Lost?” explores the possible futures for Srinagar city in 2200 while exploring its past and the present ecological histories, I would like to introduce first to the readers Kashmir’s history, with a particular focus on Srinagar’s landscape gardening development culture. This, I hope, will engage readers to understand Srinagar—previously known as the city of gardens. Moreover, after reading this essay, the readers should develop a better understanding of the current landscape dynamics, and will learn about Srinagar’s inspirational ecological past in such a way that they can provide imaginative answers to the two following questions: if ideas and practices from the past were adapted, how would Srinagar look like in 2200? And, if unplanned urbanization continues apace, how differently might Srinagar look in 2200?”
1. Introducing landscape gardening culture:
Although there are several historical accounts that one might rely on to explore Srinagar’s ecological past, however, this essay mostly draws its analysis from Tarikh-i-Hassan[1] which engages its readers to think of the Kashmir’s ecological past, particularly the Srinagar’s landscape gardening culture and its various histories. With that literary substance in account, it [Tarikh-i-Hassan] provides us a lesson on, how historical knowledge can help us understand the ecological past of a city; and also help us imagine more precisely the kinds of futures that the city might have—given the present landscape view and/or unplanned urbanization.
Tarikh-i-Hassan reports that the Rajas (Kings) of Kashmir had developed gardens from the early period (Hassan Khuihami, 1954; Shamsuddin Ahmad, 2003). Therefore, the concept of garden culture in Kashmir goes back to early times before the advent of Islam in the 14th century. A variety of gardens mostly in the form of orchards created in the valley were actually influenced by the concepts of Vatikas (or wooded pleasure gardens) of early India (Mughal Gardens in Kashmir, 2010). These orchards, endowed with a variety of plants (flowers, herbs and fruit plants), were to act as refreshing visiting places for people as are the today’s gardens. For example, among the earliest of such gardens (orchards) in early Kashmir, was the Bagh-i-Toot (Mulberry Garden), first laid out by a Hindu saint Maya Swami and later developed by succeeding Muslim rulers. Maya Swami was a hardworking saintly person living in solitude on the mountain side of Takht-i Sulaiman, who laid-out a wonderful garden on the edges of canal ‘Chounti Kol’, named Takya Maya Swami. The people of the city were visiting this place for refreshment purposes. It is said that, Hazrat Mir Muhammad Hamdani purchased the aforementioned landscape area later on. The landscape area passing through the edges of river Jhelum was first maintained and then connected from Amira Bridge to Takht-i Sulaiman. Afterwards, Hazrat Mir Muhammad Hamdani grafted mulberry trees in large numbers in it, which was endowed as a pasture land for the city animals. Some trees continued to exist until the period of Durrani emperors[2] (Hassan Khuihami, 1954; Shamsuddin Ahmad, 2003). However, the gardens developed and maintained by the Hindu Rajas of Kashmir in early times extinguished over the passage of time. Given the current morphological structure of the Srinagar’s landscape, today, one cannot even locate the original places where these gardens were built in Kashmir. But one might want to know then, how the idea of landscape gardening culture flourished in Kashmir’s Srinagar with an artistic perfection?
It is an established fact that the art of landscape gardening was very much familiar to the Persian people from early times. Here, it bears to mention that, with the establishment of Muslim rule in Kashmir, some knowledgeable leaders from Persia kept coming to Kashmir to be in the court of the rulers. With the passage of time, these innovative immigrants created a great impression among the common people of Kashmir, as well as on the court of the rulers. Among other dozens of things that gradually flourished in Kashmir with the coming of Persian people, the art of landscape gardening stood out as the best.
With these creative Persian immigrants on their courts, the sultans of Kashmir had become very fond of laying beautiful gardens. For example, Sultan Zain-ul-Abideen, lovingly called Bod-Shah[3] (The Great King) among the locals, was a pioneer in creating the most notable gardens in the Valley. He is credited with developing a large beautiful garden on a four-mile square piece of land at Zainagir.[4] To the one side of it, he built towering buildings and on the other side, he planted rows of trees and flower beds; and between these buildings and plants, fountains, water canals and water-falls had been successfully set up. The environs of the garden had become so great that the king and his close aides were frequently making visits to charm themselves. Sultan Zain-ul-Abideen had also built some more beautiful gardens, one of which was built at Na’la-bal[5] (Image 1.1), of Naushera (Images 1.2 and 1.3). To the water arrangements of this garden, a royal canal was dug out from Sind-lar which flowed through the middle of this garden. Hassan informs that the garden was in stable position up to the Sikh rule.[6] (Hassan Khuihami, 1954; Shamsuddin Ahmad, 2003).
The other notable gardens during this period were built by Hussain Shah Chak and Yousuf Shah Chak. Hussain Shah Chak developed a large garden in village Nauhata, which was adjacent to the Shrine of Hazrat Khawaja Moinuddin Naqshbandi (Image 1.4). A water canal by the name of “Lachma-Kol”[7] was brought into the garden; and also, some waterfalls and fountains were built into it. Similarly, Yousuf Shah Chak on the edges of river Jhelum developed a vast garden of different flowers and plants from Fateh Kadal (bridge) to the ghat of Dal hasan yar. This garden consisted of thirteen compartments/stages; and its traces were found till the rule of Afghans in Kashmir (Hassan Khuihami, 1954; Shamsuddin Ahmad, 2003).
Image (1.1): View of the Na’la-bal (watercourse) of Naushera, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (1.2): View of Naushera Srinagar from the side of road. Photograph by the author.
Image (1.3): View of Naushera graveyard. According to the local residents, this is the place where Sultan Zain-ul-abideen had built the large garden. Photograph by the author.
Image (1.4): View of Nauhata chock (adjacent to Jamia Masjid) near Shrine of Hazrat Khawaja Moinuddin Naqshbandi, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Thus, the foregoing description (of the gardens built in pre-Mughal period), derived from the historical accounts, makes it clear that the art of landscape gardening with artistic perfection started with the coming of the Persian immigrants to Kashmir. Those gardens were almost similar in pattern to the Persian gardens. But, what perhaps the Mughals did later, as a report on the Mughal gardens of Kashmir remarkably observes, “was to work on a refinement of the set pattern and thus taking the art of landscape gardening to a new height” (Mughal Gardens in Kashmir, 2010). Thus, one might ask then:Did the Mughals take the art of landscape gardening in Kashmir to a new height for self-gratification only? And, what important lessons those past regional landscape gardening projects communicate to the human cultures across time and space?
Although, nature in any form has always been attractive and gardens of any type contribute, “not only to the look of our landscape, but also to the wisdom of our thinking about the [landscape ecology] and environment” (Mark Francis & Andreas Reimann, 1999). Thus, gardens, particularly in our age, act as a safeguard to the environmental crisis emerging locally and globally. Therefore, scholars wrestling with the core environmental issues consider past and present-day landscape gardening projects as a significant subject of study.
From an environmental perspective, the ruler’s (and/or emperor’s) ecological landscape engagements have been given less attention as far as intellectual wisdom is concerned. Current environmental issues have given us a reason for exploring the ecological landscape engagements in the past for our general understanding. Here, it is noteworthy that the Kashmir’s ecological landscape engagements as a cultural practice have been perceived mostly as an act of leisure and pleasure. This perception emerging from previous scholarly interpretations of the landscape gardens completely negates the richness of human intellectual wisdom shown in the past. This perception also underplays the human character involved in past sustainable development practices. The rulers in the past did not look upon the province of Kashmir just as a pleasure ground; rather their persistent ecological engagement with its landscapes provide a somewhat deeper concern with what now constitute core environmental issues.
2. Srinagar-the city of gardens, lakes and rivers:
Nowadays, “one can hardly think of a natural system that has not been considerably altered, for better or worse, by human culture” (Foltz et al; 2003). And, if one has to look at the regional level, those landscape changes had occurred in the valley of Kashmir, mostly in the urban city of Srinagar. Srinagar (See Map below), the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir, an ancient city with a rich history and culture, situated in the centre of the Kashmir Valley on the banks of the Jhelum River, cannot be imagined without the lakes (For example, Dal lake. Image 2.1), rivers (Jhelum. Image 2.2), and particularly the marvellous landscape gardens (Shalimar and Nishat gardens. Images 2.3 and 2.4). These natural assets and the hundreds of other gardens were planned and commissioned by various rulers, but mostly by the Mughal emperors[8] and their governors in Kashmir. For example, according to Hassan Khuihami[9], not less than six hundred (600) gardens were developed in the Kashmir valley particularly during the Mughal period.Hassan records a short biography of not less than a hundred gardens.However, it is very unfortunate to notice that only a few landscape gardens have survived in the city of Srinagar, which begs the following questions: How did this huge transformation in the landscape of the Srinagar city happen? And/or, how were these landscape gardens extinguished?
As mentioned earlier, in the total number of gardens in Kashmir valley, the maximum number of gardens were developed in Srinagar, mostly around the Dal Lake. Therefore, much like Lahore of Punjab, Srinagar of Kashmir, too deserved an appellation of being called ‘the city of gardens.’ Hassan Khuihami, gives a strange reason for the extinction of most of the landscape gardens in Kashmir. He records: “The animosity between two opposite communities/ groups (or, individuals) often ended up in destroying the valuable properties of each other. In Kashmir, the gardens having an abundance of fruit trees, flower plants and a few beautiful inner buildings were considered the valuable properties. Unfortunately, while taking the revenge against each other, these gardens often became the main target of destruction. For example, a large beautiful garden with several arrangements built at Zainagir by Sultan Zain-ul-Abideen was set on fire during the night by the Pandow Chaks of Trehgam. With this incident, the garden of Zainagir was completely destroyed and never became a garden again” (Hassan Khuihami, 1954). A couple of more incidents of the same nature have been recorded by Hassan.
What Hassan records above might be one of the major reasons for the extinction of the landscape gardens in Kashmir. However, I would like to suggest another reason for the extinction of the landscape gardens in the Srinagar city, particularly around the Dal lake. Srinagar from the very beginning constituted an epicentre of business/trade for the local communities of Kashmir valley. The landless communities who had been temporarily living in the adjacent areas might have been the first of the communities[10] who had settled down on the peripheries of the Dal lake. Moreover, with the decline of the Sultanate, Mughal and other dynastic rulers in Kashmir, the local but comparatively rich communities—who had money and access to businesses opportunities in the city—had also started settling in Srinagar. Therefore, over time, Srinagar had started becoming more populated and urban, which had gradually become the reason for landscape encroachments, and landscape transformation into commercial and permanent residential colonies. For instance, the very nomenclature of Naseem Bagh (Images 2.5 and 2.6),[11] Nageen Bagh (Image 2.7), Aisha Bagh (Image 2.8), Kothi Bagh (Image 2.9), Ram Bagh (Image 2.10), Illahi Bagh (Image 2.11) and Badami Bagh,[12] here I only mention a few, clearly suggests that these were past landscape gardens which had been transformed into the well-established commercial and residential colonies, with large roads and markets inside in the capital city of Srinagar. Such a radical transformation over the years would be cited as an example of ‘development’. But, simultaneously such a ‘development’ has also become a process of ‘erasure’ in which the past landscape gardens have been completely extinguished. Thus, other sets of questions call our attention: What impact does such landscape transformation have on the city ecology and climate? And, what appellation the Srinagar city will deserve in 2200, a paradise or paradise lost?
Over the years, conversion of the garden landscapes along with the agricultural and wetlands around the Dal lake into residential and commercial settlements might have benefited the select communities of Kashmir; but, on a large scale, it appears that this transformation has produced a negative impact on the internal morphology, ecology, and climate of the Srinagar city. Although, the chroniclers, from ancient to early modern times, presented the valley of Kashmir as “Paradise on Earth” and/or “Switzerland of Asia”, particularly around the Dal lake which was often happily referred to by the European chroniclers as “Venice of the East”, however, it is important to note that the present morphological structure and ecological functioning of the waterscapes and landscapes of the city speak volumes against the depicted reality.
Besides, the landscapes around Dal lake (and within the reaches of Dal lake even) have been consistently coming under new unplanned residential and commercial settlements. These new settlements are the direct cause for the decreased size and volume of the city’s green and water landscapes. For example, out of the hundreds of the flourishing green spaces, only a few garden landscapes exist today across the whole of the city. Formerly and around 1200 AD, the world-famous Dal lake-(which is the lifeline of the city), “covered an area of 7500 ha. But now, the lake area was almost reduced to one-third of its size in the 1980s, and was further reduced into one-sixth of its original size in the recent past. In fact, it has lost almost 12 meters’ depth” (R. Mahapatra, 2017).
The rapid illegal encroachments on the city have given birth to unplanned urbanization, which spurred the publication of a dozen articles raising the public concern on the looming ecological crisis across the city in the foreseeable future. These scientific reports suggest that the sustainable existence of the Srinagar city (which as mentioned earlier is mostly dependent on the world-famous Dal lake) is at high risk[13]. This is clear from the fact that the continued illegal encroachments and unplanned urbanization have altered the city’s climate patterns. One such report, prepared by the Centre for Science and Environment observes: “The loss of water bodies, and green landscapes (italics added) of Srinagar has, in fact, a bearing on the microclimate of the city, as meteorological data recorded during the past century suggests a rising trend in the mean maximum temperatures during the summers[14]. On July 15, 1973, the highest temperature ever recorded in Srinagar was 35.5 ºC. On July 7, 2006, it rose to 39.5 ºC. It is suggested that the rise in mean annual temperature in the area is mainly due to loss of water bodies, and green landscapes, since a considerable amount of evapotranspiration with a cooling effect might have been taking place in the past due to these valuable ecological assets during summers. What is more, the construction boom often leads to an increase in summer temperatures due to the creation of urban heat islands” (Soma Basu, 2014).
The report quoted above suggests that the loss of green landscapes and waterscapes occurred over the years have a direct bearing on the ecological functioning of the Srinagar city, which signals that the practice of illegal city encroachments and unplanned urbanization has not stopped and, henceforth, the city which was known as the city of gardens, lakes and rivers, and deserved the appellation of “Paradise on Earth”, “Switzerland of Asia” and/or “Venice of the East”might fall in the category of a dystopian city and/or a paradise lostin 2200?
Reflection: This essay structured in two parts is a non-fictional creative story mostly derived from reliable historical knowledges. Does the historical (and/or scientific) data “quoted” in the essay authenticates us to see the Srinagar city happening without the world-famous Dal lake & the landscape gardens in the next hundreds of years? Can our wisdom afford to see that? And, what would that be called in environmental humanities, ‘development’ and/ or ‘erasure of ecological past’?
Map[15]: Indicates the topography of Srinagar, which is the summer capital city of the state of Jammu and Kashmir, India (UT after post-August 2019). The map was prepared in 1924. Source: Adopted from Department of Ecology, Environment and Remote Sensing, Bemina Srinagar-10.
Image (2.1): View of the Dal Lake, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.2): View of the river Jhelum from the side of Raj Bagh, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.3): Views of the Shalimar garden, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.4): Views of the Nishat garden, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.5): View of the Naseem Bagh (inside campus, University of Kashmir). Photograph by the author.
Image (2.6): View of the Naseem Bagh from the side of Dal lake (right side). Photograph by the author.
Image (2.7): Views of the Nageen Lake (bottom), and Nageen Bagh (top), Srinagar. Photographs by the author.
Image (2.8): View of the Aisha Bagh adjacent to Nageen Lake, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.9): View of the Kothi Bagh, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.10): Views of the Ram Bagh, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
Image (2.11): View of the Ellahi Bagh, Srinagar. Photograph by the author.
References:
- Basu, S. (08 September, 2014). Unplanned urbanisation, encroachment blamed for Srinagar flood. Down to Earth Magazine.
- Foltz, Richard C. et al; (Eds.), (2003). Islam and Ecology, Harvard University Press.
- Khuihami, Peer Ghulam Hassan. Tarikh-i-Hassan, (Ed.), Sahibzada Hassan Shah, (Srinagar, 1954) Vol. 1st, The Research and Publication Department, Srinagar, pp. 281-283, 306; Ahmad, Shamsuddin. Urdu transl. Shams-ut-Tawarikh, (Srinagar, 2003), Vol. 1st. pp. 293-294, 313.
- Mahapatra, Richard et al; (Eds.), (2017). Environment Reader, Centre for science and environment, New Delhi, p.28.
- See, Mughal Gardens in Kashmir (2010). Report submitted by Permanent Delegation of India to UNESCO, (Ref. 5580).
- Pollan, M. Beyond Wilderness and Lawn, cited in Francis, M & Reimann, A. (1999). The California Landscape Garden: Ecology, Culture and Design, University of California Press, p. XIII.
[1] Tarikh-i-Hassan of Peer Ghulam Hassan Khuihami originally written in the Persian language (in two volumes) is one of the acclaimed historical accounts that better informs us the historical ecology of the Kashmir, which includes the Srinagar’s ecological past.
[2] The Durrani rulers (Afghans) remained in power in Kashmir from 1752 to 1819 A.D.
[3] In Kashmiri language ‘Bod’ means ‘Great’ and ‘Shah’ during the medieval period was referred to ‘King’.
[4] Zainagir at present is in Sopore of Baramulla district of Jammu and Kashmir.
[5] Na’la means watercourse in the Urdu language.
[6] Here, it bears to mention that Mughals remained in power in Kashmir from 1586 to 1752 A.D. Thereafter started the Afghan rule which remained in power from 1752 to 1819 A.D. And Afghans were then overpowered by the Sikhs who remained in power in Kashmir from 1819 to 1846 A.D.
[7] Water canal in the Kashmiri language is called Kol.
[8] Kashmir was annexed to the Mughal rule by emperor Akbar in 1586 A.D., and Mughals remained in power in Kashmir from 1586 to 1752 A.D.
[9] Peer Ghulam Hassan Khuihami was the reputable historiographer of Kashmir. He has authored Tarikh-i-Hassan in two volumes in the Persian language. Tarikh-i-Hassan is considered one of the principal historical scholars on the political and geographical history of Kashmir.
[10] See, Tarikh-i-Hassan Vol. 2, 13th Awrang/ Chapter on the period of Afghan rule in Kashmir (especially the period of Amir Khan Jawansher), mentions, how Hanjis/ Han’z/ Fisher communities (in Urdu, Kashmiri and English languages) of Nandpur had destroyed the gardens of Dal Lake.
[11] Bagh in Kashmiri (and Urdu) languages means garden. And, Naseem Bagh means, the garden of breeze.
[12] Badami Bagh adjacent to Dal Gate Srinagar is a Cantonment town now.
[13] See, Romshoo, S.A; and I. Rashid. (2012). Assessing the Impacts of Changing Land Cover and Climate on Hokersar Wetland in Indian Himalayas. Arabian Journal of Geoscience. Wani, R. A. (2012). Impact of Areal and Demographic Changes on Urban Growth of Srinagar City. Journal of Chemical, Biological and Physical Sciences.
[14] Green landscapes refer to garden landscapes.
[15] Here it is noteworthy that Dal Lake is divided into two parts. In the Map ‘Bod Dal’ in Kashmiri language means ‘larger part of the Dal lake’ and ‘Lokut Dal’ means ‘smaller part of the Dal lake’.
Domingos J. Langa
I am a cemetery in Pemba, Mozambique’s northernmost city. I was established during the colonial era. I had been the only city cemetery for more than a half-century. I consider myself a resident of the city center. Pemba is the provincial capital of Cabo Delgado. Without me, the city would not exist. If I am not present, the city will perish. At the same time, I consider myself on the outskirts. In the municipality’s strategic plans, I am virtually non-existent. When I am present, I am associated with less noble services. The locals are aware of my presence. Furthermore, they appear to understand how important I am to them. Nonetheless, everything suggests that my presence in their daily lives is fleeting; they only come to see me a few times a year. Furthermore, they are constantly gossiping about me. Nonetheless, they talk about me despite not knowing much about me.
I will begin by giving a brief overview of how I am currently organized. Beliefs, religion, urban planning, inequalities, and conflicts appear to be the elements that explain how I am organized. Within me, there are two sections: an office and a section for graves and burials. However, the burial site is further subdivided into burial sites based on religion (Christian and Muslim) and untouchables, which include the graves of soldiers from distant lands who died, I believe, in one of the great wars. Finally, there is a section for daring and mass graves. Some would say that poor souls died and were buried without being prepared! There are also trees, particularly acacias and flowers, as well as paths for people to take.
If I had to say more about myself, I would most likely emphasize more aspects. Furthermore, I am confident that I will do so. Even better, I want to do it. Where do I even begin? Being a location, I reserve the right to disregard any rigor requirements that may exist. My thoughts are racing with events from the past, present, and future. I am just going to let her roam free.
The Years of Tranquility!
“You are not permitted to make any noise in the cemetery.” So say some visitors who came to see me. At times, it makes me want to laugh, but only the trees, insects, and I can hear and understand! I will keep my mouth shut. I must always keep my cool. I believe that the silence required of those who visit me on occasion has provided me with a few years of peace. In fact, it has been a little more than a half-century of peace. People were terrified of me. Some said I was well liked because I housed long-term residents. I am not sure!
My neighbors aided in the spread of fear. Nonetheless, they were unafraid of me. They might have even done so. They were, however, one of the few people who could pay me a visit, sometimes as a matter of duty, sometimes as an imposition. They visited me on a regular basis to demonstrate their bravery and courage. They came from a primarily male institution and had to prove their masculinity and bravery. They had to see me as a brave and courageous test. Damn soldiers!
There is, indeed, a beach behind me. The name is Chibwabwary. It has a fantastic breeze. When it rains, the soil becomes extremely slippery, making access to the area nearly impossible. There were only a few trees between the beach and me. Anyone wanting to go to the beach had to walk through one of my walls. They also had to pass in silence. They could run, jump, dive, and scream once they arrived at the beach. However, scream quietly so as not to annoy me. Some claimed that only fishermen had the ability to speak loudly.
It is also worth mentioning two other neighbors who, despite their remoteness, have helped my survival: the port and the airport. Colonial officers, then the national government told me, and finally the municipality, “You cannot build houses near the port or the airport.” Again, I believe people did not build houses because they were afraid of me, but I am not certain that this was always the case.
Challenging times
Someone decided to build a cabin near the beach one day. The fishermen claimed that the area was dangerous at night. Nonetheless, the brave persisted. Then those people arrived. Fishermen asked them to keep an eye on their gear. The bathers claimed it was a possessed family who lived near a dangerous beach and a cemetery. The family would be relocated to a safer location,
according to the municipality. However, a larger number of people and families attended. More houses were constructed. Furthermore, more houses are still being built. Services, particularly electricity, arrived at the same time. The municipality renamed the new settlement “Unidade de Chibwabwary.” It was an official acknowledgement of an unofficial unit. I began to feel threatened.
I considered protesting, but it would be futile. Who would pay attention to me? Fear of me, which had been my shield for a long time, has been shattered. Although my walls remained intact, I began to receive more visitors than usual. They are also no longer tourists, but rather my neighbors. They have electricity but no running water. They come to me for help getting access to water. The guard supplemented his income by selling water. He did, however, lose his brave and courageous status. My neighbors have shown me that I had nothing to be afraid of in me, that I was simply a location. What exactly am I? My agony had only just begun.
Bidding farewell!
My visitors used to say, “Pemba is a small town with few inhabitants.” On the other hand, Unidade de Chibwabwary demonstrated otherwise. It appears to have reflected an increase in the population. If that was the case, there was no cause for concern because the unit was designed to be a peripheral. Furthermore, some politicians and elites believed that peripheral issues were not urgent. Nevertheless, as a neighbor, are my concerns also considered peripheral? I pondered.
The gravediggers, who were once thought to be far braver than the guard, the military, and my new neighbors, performed miracles: they always made room for a new burial. A sidewalk, a road for dividing graves, a road for hearses, under trees, or even exhuming abandoned graves could be used. However, space is not infinite. I am not infinite. The wonder has ended. Who, on the other hand, would say, “The cemetery is overflowing!” Was I stuffed?
The leader who authorizes the construction of a new cemetery is widely assumed the first permanent inhabitant of that new cemetery. There are not many willing volunteers to take on the role of the lamb. After much debate, conflict, and promise, the Cemitério de Muxara was built and inaugurated. I started to have a rival. More importantly, I was no longer in business.
The future of the place: what future?
Even though I am officially closed, I cannot be abandoned. My new neighbors keep me occupied. In addition, I was only closed for new burials. As a result, people continue to come to see me and take care of their loved ones. I, on the other hand, am complete. Anyone who takes care of the trees and the walls while ignoring the insects and birds takes care of me. Maybe I will be here in a few years. Maybe not.
In any case, I am scarred by rapid change, poor urban planning, rapid population growth, unplanned city expansion, unprecedented natural disasters, and accelerated erosion. Most importantly, I am proof of how the residents handled these issues and challenges. I am a bystander. My mind is packed with events. Perhaps I am nothing more than a memory. If I had to choose my fate, I would rather be a memory than a monument. Wind, rain, and sun are all visible, audible, and palpable to me. Plants, animals, and people can also be seen, heard, and felt. I keep track of and update events and phenomena. I interact with other people. I may have been inactive, but I am now more active than ever.
Bayartsetseg Terbish
Department of Sociology and Social Work
National University of Mongolia
Email: bayartsetseg@num.edu.mn
Climate change issues are at stake in Mongolia as nearly as 80 percent of its territory is under threat of desertification due to excessive use of pastureland and decreasing level of precipitation (Dorj et al, 2013). When it comes to urban areas, air and soil pollution is vividly considered the major issues among other human induced climate concerns including waste management and reduced green areas in the city (Legal Info, 2011). Rapidly growing urbanization and rural-urban migration have been considered one of the major contributing factors to such pollution as tremendous number of former pastoralist Mongolians face limited choice but to migrate to the capital city for accessing better formal resources such as education for their children and employment for themselves (Terbish et al, 2020). Extreme climate conditions of drought and cold winter with snow blizzards also pushed pastoralist herders migrating to settle (in)formally in peri-urban settlements referred to as ger areas, where many are caught up in the intersection of poverty and social inequality (International Organization for Migration, 2019).
Expansion of ger area is often targeted as problem area as these settlements are often considered the major causes of persistent social and ecological problems, as well as the main sources of air smog as ger residents burn coal throughout winter (Naranzul & Sarnai, 2018; UNICEF, 2019). Despite the fact that the Government of Mongolia and donor organizations are taking varying measures to combat air and soil pollution in Ulaanbaatar, considerable changes have not been observed to date. Nurturing positive changes through an integrated governance to reduce climatic issues is not the only controversy faced in Mongolia but it is related to an absence of an integrated approach to climate governance which has not yet developed globally as the nature of climate issues vary considerably city by city (Bulkeley & Broto, 2013). In particular, initiatives that are authentically grown from grassroots organizations and individuals are sporadic at best, particularly in Mongolia, and much is left to be done in the fight against climate change and raising awareness among communities.
Photo 1: Air pollution is apparent not only in winter. Photo by the author, fall 2021
Ger areas in Mongolia represents a balance between pastoralist historical past with the rapid urbanization and areas are legally recognized by the Government of Mongolia in terms of land entitlement and settlement development (Hamiduddin, 2021). As such, these settlements areas are not identical to ‘slums’ as some may assume. Nearly half of the total population of Mongolia (3.4 mill) reside in ger areas today where households burn coal briquettes on the stove regularly to keep warmth during the bitterly cold winter in Ulaanbaatar (Terbish et al, 2020). Population of Mongolia is relatively young with about 63 percent of total population being aged under 35 and, undoubtedly, considerable number of them live in ger areas (Policy Watch, 2019). Pollution in ger areas, especially air pollution, have an impact on educational achievement of children and youth as it detrimentally impacts the health and safety of the youngsters in Ulaanbaatar (UNICEF, 2019).
One of the policy approaches by the Government of Mongolia towards ger areas continue to be re-development by gentrifying ger areas with high rise apartments in central parts and to redesign middle and peripheral zones with detached houses (Parliament of Mongolia, 2014). Ger residents, however, find this policy approach controversial as many face affordability issues in this redevelopment process whereas some others prefer living on their land with improved management of heating, water, electricity and sanitation arrangements. A modernist approach towards urban renewal such as this may further segregate the city, creating a divide between those who are capable and less capable (Godfrey, 2019). In addition, re-making of the urban areas without understanding what locals truly want also has a danger of creating more situations of “urban space held by the administration” (Sedrez, 2014, 113).
Notwithstanding the fact of some negative climate effects associated with rural-urban migration and expansion of ger areas in Ulaanbaatar, the focus of this story is either to criticize the migrants nor the unprecedented urbanization process currently at stake. But, rather, it is to highlight one of the local initiatives driven by Public Lab Mongolia (PLM)[1]– a local non-governmental organization (NGO) that is working towards raising awareness on air quality by equipping Mongolian youth with the technology, training and resources to find the answers to questions they have about air quality. Guided by the Hannigan Air Quality and Technology Research Lab in the Mechanical Engineering Department of the University of Colorado and Department of Environment and Forest Engineering at the National University of Mongolia, this NGO has been conducting an AQIQ program that employs an STEM-based curriculum since 2020 by training 8-12 graders at three piloted high schools in Ulaanbaatar and six additional schools in Central and Western provinces, as air pollution is also apparent beyond the capital city. Equipped with the user-friendly air quality measuring devices called Y-Pods, nearly 180 adolescents were mentored to assess not only indoor and outdoor air quality, but they were also open to explore other pollutants and human practices (hair dye, nail polish, air freshener, shoe polish, washing detergent) that have some harmful effect in human and environmental health. Some projects developed by adolescents measured emissions from cars, with a recommendation for adults shifting to electric or hybrid car uses whereas other project examined pollutants from washing detergents, raising awareness on checking pollutants and emissions contained in a powdered detergents we use daily.
Photo 2: Poster developed by youth from Arkhangai province. Source: Public Lab Mongolia, 2022
Youth demonstrated greater level of aspiration in learning basic research skills and became aware of elementary knowledge in climate change and adaptation strategies through this program. It is expected that participants of this program dispatch their awareness and knowledge further to their peers and family members to start with the change at the micro scale to a greater activity towards community education for a climate justice. Starting small is significant as PLM believes, to acknowledge and to localize the climate change acts through bottom-up approach, so that we avoid the risk of cliché on climate topic among general public as many still do not believe the possibility for climate apocalypse (Swyngedouw, 2013).
Through these three years of implementation, educational bureau of the respective districts and provinces were supportive of this initiative and assisted the PLM in piloting schools for a smooth implementation of the program. Through this program, PLM hopes to prepare future air quality advocates and educators in their respective communities by instilling critical thinking and science-based reasoning skills in today’s youth.
Reference
Bulkeley, H., Broto, V.C. (2013). Government by experiment? Global cities and the governing of climate change. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 38, 361-375. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-5661.2012.00535.
Dorj, O., Enkhbold, M., Lkhamyanjin, Kh., Mijiddorj, A., Nosmoo, A., Puntsagnamjil, M., Sainjargal, U. (2013). Mongolia: Country features, the main causes of desertification and remediation efforts. In G.A Heshmati & V.R Squires (Eds.), Combating desertification in Asia, Africa and Middle East. (pp.217-229). Springer Dordrecht.
Godfrey, B. J. (2012). Urban renewal, favelas, and Guanabara bay: Environmental justice and sustainability in Rio De Janeiro. In. Vojnovic.I (Ed.). Urban Sustainability: A Global perspective. (pp.359-368). USA: Michigan University Press.
Hamiduddin, I., Fitzpatrick, D., Plueckhahn, R., Sangi, U., Batjargal, E., & Sumiyasuren, E. (2021).Social sustainability and Ulaanbaatar’s ‘ger districts’: Access and mobility issues and opportunities. Sustainability, 13, 11470. https://doi.org/10.3390/su132011470
International Organization for Migration (July, 2019). IOM, Mongolia Build Displacement Tracking Capacity to Prepare for Natural Disasters. https://www.iom.int/news/iom-mongolia-build-displacement-tracking-capacity-prepare-natural-disasters
Legal Info (2011). National program against climate change. https://legalinfo.mn/mn/detail?lawId=203357&showType=1
Naranzul, B., Sarnai, G. (2018). A Brief on air pollution. Ulaanbaatar: Admon Printing.
Parliament of Mongolia (2014) Development Strategy for Ulaanbaatar City – 2020 and development approaches for 2030. https://policy.asiapacificenergy.org/node/2723
Policy Watch. (2019). Right to education for youth in ger areas of Ulaanbaatar: Efficiency of the state service delivery. https://www.policywatch.mn/equalsociety4childrenyouth.html
Sedrez, L. (2014). Constructing and de-constructing communities: Tales of urban injustice and resistance in Brazil and South Africa. In The Edges of environmental history: Honoring Jane Carruthers. (pp. 113-116). Rachel Carson Center.
Swyngedouw, E. (2013). Apocalypse now! Fear and doomsday pleasures. Capitalism Nature Socialism, 24(1), 9-18, DOI: 10.1080/10455752.2012.7592
Terbish, B., Lietaert, I & Roets, J. (2020). Shifting senses of solidarity and belonging in the internal migration pathways of citizens in ger areas in Ulaanbaatar: A social work perspective. International Social Work. 1–14. doi.org/10.1177%2F0020872820927768
UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Fund, 2019). The impact of climate change on education in Mongolia. Ulaanbaatar: UNICEF Mongolia Country Office.
Thais Palermo Buti
1Landsat satellite photo (circa 2000) of Santa Catarina Island (Florianopolis). Wikimedia
For Xuakti, that was the best time of the year. Although she had been teaching in Ilha Brasil for nearly a decade, the expressions she saw on the faces of his students at the end of their first immersive geography class always moved him. She identified with them, and wondered how she would react if she could have lived that educational experience when she was only four years old. At that time, Xuakti was still living near the forest, or what remained of it, with his community, 4,000 kilometers away, in Xingu.
She would never have said that thirty years later she would be in Florianópolis island, teaching geography to children whose origins were so different from his own. She would miss his land, but she couldn’t refuse a proposal like that. The white people had called his family and some other indigenous relatives, quilombola and ribeirinhos, scattered around Brazil, and involved some biobot colonies to bring back to life a place far away in southern Brazil, which she only knew through the devices, but she knew it was a place inhabited by white people.
They had told her precisely “bring back to life “, a very serious thing, a mission of salvation. She had discussed about it with his relatives, they made some research. No one of them trusted white people; in the end, they have a very different idea of the meaning of life. However, the situation in the Xingu had become unsustainable, due to the last dam that were built, the cost of seed patents and the maintenance of the water wells. In Florianópolis, on the other hand, the investments in the “revitalization” were huge and came from foreign countries; not to mention the technology they had at their disposal, which at his home, in Xingu, would never arrive. So, they ended up accepting the proposal, as a challenge for the survival of the community, but also for the foundation of a new society.
Xuakti was a good teacher in Xingu, and so she was also in Florianópolis. She was appreciated, respected, was able to communicate with everyone, and had quickly learned to master the use of devices, as if she were born with them. The devices have solved so many problems, she thought, when a little girl reappeared on screen, and slowly they all returned to the virtual classroom. After the first moment of astonishment, the questions about the class used to be more or less the same: Xuakti, is the center of the earth really that hot? Xuakti, why is there so much noise inside the dunes? Xuakti, why couldn’t I catch the cloud?
The children knew the answers, but the hyperreal immersive experience imprinted the questions in a different way in their minds which, together with the corporeal dimension, first confused them, and then made them more deeply aware of the answers. And only after this first session they could move forward to the next ones, when the children, led by Xuakti, experienced the world as if they were plants, rocks, butterflies, birds and whales. Including the immersive empathy classes in the first-year didactic grid had been a requirement of Xuakti and his people, otherwise they would have left the Island. Because they couldn’t accept to look at the world only from the point of view of humans, as do the whites. The administration accepted, developed the necessary technology, and the classes became such a success that they were included as part of Ilha Brasil’s HighLux tour package.
Then, once the children had become familiar with immersive experience, in their second year of Geography, the teacher taught the most important lesson of that cycle, the one on extreme environmental disasters. Children were immersed in hurricanes, landslides, earthquakes, they were introduced into the most radioactive sites and into the smokestacks of the most contaminating industries of past times. Parental permission was needed for that lesson.
It was still daylight when Xuakti greeted the last child and closed the screen. Sunny Friday crept in like a memory after the last past weeks of rain, and flooded her with the urge to go out. She would go for a walk in the Park, as she called the Ilha Brasil Bio-Regenerative Reserve, where she lived together with ten thousand people from all over Brazil. But she met Ademar at the exit of the hut, and was almost forced to change his mind. After exchanging a few sentences, perceptible only by the devices, the two men got into the car, which seemed to be waiting for them.
The car flew over the Park, and as soon as it reached the exit it entered the carriageway. They didn’t have authorization to fly over the city. The risk of accidents due to the gusts of wind that increasingly hit the island – located in the Tornado Corridor of Latin America – was too high. So, outside the Park they could only use electric vehicles, whether they were two, three or four wheels. Ademar was already preparing for the meeting and were choosing from the many available skins the most suitable for the meeting.
Xuakti pretended not to notice his friend’s gaze. She preferred to enjoy the view from above, which lasted no more than a few minutes – just enough to cover the approximately one thousand hectares of the Park. During this time, she admired the many mountains in the south of Florianopolis, almost all reforested, the Peri lagoon, one of the few untouched by the wild urbanization of the past centuries, the beaches of Saquinho and Naufragados, with its buildings swallowed up by the sand that were going wild again, the bottom of Mount Matadeiro, where 90 years before a landslide buried the beach of Lagoinha do Leste, one of the most beautiful of the island.
But the place she loved most, perhaps because the farthest from his Amazonian imagination, was the beaches of Armação and Matadeiro, where hunters used to trap and kill whales two centuries earlier, before their definitive extinction in the 22nd century. She had experienced both beaches in immersive training when she was just arrived in Florianópolis. Both had escaped urbanization thanks to the historical value that the authorities of the time had assigned them, and they had been largely spared by the Monte landslide, even if there was very little beach left. But the nearby beach of Morro das Pedras had a different fate, and had slowly succumbed to the oceanic force: first the sand, then the houses facing the sea, then the shops behind the houses, and no dams, no retaining walls, could prevent the sea to rise, while people would continue to buy land, builders to build buildings, government to grant permits.
The last glimpse went to the small, still visible tip of Campeche Island, a paradise of neolithic art which, a few years after being privatized and transformed into a golf course, was embraced by the elusive veil of the waters. These were all ancient stories, which Xuakti had learned to internalize in countless debates and formative immersions, and which brought her closer to the land that she, together with his indigenous relatives, quilombola, ribeirinhos, and biobot colonies, was now helping to rebuild.
This is exactly what Xuakti was thinking when the wheels of the car touched the ground and Ademar looked at her showing off the carefully chosen skin: a striped cat superimposed on the amphibian that was so fashionable in the north of the island, where they were going for a meeting with the mayor of Florianópolis and with the representatives of the Technological Poles, who have always had their headquarters in those area. Even though Ademar was white, she liked him. Ademar was a descendant of the original peoples of the island, the manezinhos, whose ancestors had arrived in Florianópolis in the eighteenth century, from the Azores. The European archipelago was still famous for the fires that devastated some of its islands between 2057 and 2084, forcing the population, that no longer had access to water and livelihoods, into a mass exodus. Those were times when water conversion technologies were not yet available for Azores inhabitants – and would not be available to the majority of the people in the world for many years to come, including his people in Xingu.
Ademar never stopped boasting about his origins as the great-grandson of one of the last artisanal fishermen of Campeche, the ancient district in the south of the island that became part of the Park. He had ambiguous feelings about the establishment of the Reserve, which he often considered to be a prison and a bubble out of reality. For Xuakti, whose people had had to live in the Reserves since time immemorial on the threat of their total decimation, the friend was too romantic. Even his argument that the Reserve were created by a philanthropist businessman sounded to Xuakti like nonsense, because in his people’s memories the public and the private have always been mixed.
But the differences between the two friends stopped there. Mostly, they spent their time in the Park, working, playing Hunthinker – a game donated by the Technological Poles to the Park’s inhabitants – taking care of the community, walking. Xuakti liked listening to Ademar’s stories, like now, when they had to cross the almost 50 km of the island of Florianópolis to reach the headquarters of local power. While handling the device to prepare the meeting’s highlights, Ademar complained again about the lack of electric collective transport on the island, which would avoid the hours of traffic in the car, especially now that the road system in the main highway was diverted for the construction of the sixth bridge connecting Florianópolis with the mainland.
The construction works were lasting more than fifteen years, because the Government no longer had funds, and companies no longer had interest in investing on the island, after the golden age of tourism and real estate expansion had finished, about seventy years earlier. Who would come to this concrete forest, with a sewerage dump every 500 meters, almost no beaches, and the tornadoes that arrive every other day as well, everyone wondered.
It was then that Jacob Jacob, grandson of the homonymous tycoon who popularized space travel, took advantage of the collapse of the real estate market especially in the south of the island – which had resisted predatory urbanization until the end of the twentieth century – and proposed to the government an unrepeatable deal: he would have bought the 200-year concession of what was left of the public lands of the south of the island, would have made an agreement with the private ones who remained there, and would have built a gigantic Environmental Bio-Regeneration Reserve. No investment would have generated such an important enhancement, Jacob assured, because Ilha Brasil – the name chosen for the Park – build lives, regenerates systems.
The slogan turned out to be true. The project consisted in the construction of a regeneration village, called Ilha Brasil, a territory of environmental preservation and recolonization, which aimed to reconstruct the natural conditions of the island and its biodiversity. To succeed, Jacob’s team collected analyzes and opinions from scientists, humanists, experts in regeneration and even scholars of the old movement of sustainability. He counted on the opinions of bots developed with the most advanced algorithms. The common conclusion converged on the need to – in the words of bot-47235 who drafted the final opinion – “apply the most advanced technologies and make use of functional cultural systems to establish a careful and caring relationship with the mythical nature of things to bring out finally the world as the soul plenum it has always been1”.
The position paper was welcomed by all the experts and Jacob’s team engaged in the selection process throughout Brazil, to collect the support of people and small communities who met the criteria established by the final opinion. Hundreds of thousands of people were evaluated, and ten thousand were selected. Their role was to apply their knowledge in management and bi-relationality with woods, forests, mangroves, rivers, but also in traditional medicines, shamanism, regenerative culinary, technological exploration, defense, biogenetics and biorobotics, and other skills that would serve to create and make the reserve flourish, from all points of view.
At the end of the selection, nine thousand indigenous people, ribeirinhos, quilombolas belonging to small communities in the north and northeast of Brazil were chosen, while the other thousand were whites from other regions of Brazil and from other parts of the world. The investor entrusted the management to a trusted group, and following the inauguration of the Park in 2180, he never returned. He passed away a few months later, leaving his project as a shared inheritance between his daughter and a bot in his inner circle.
Public power had little to do with the project. State intervention was limited to the granting of licenses and permits, expropriations, authorization for access to some genetic banks, and the incentive for internal migration and repopulation. Once completed, the Park was completely self-sufficient. It generated and distributed energy, which was also sold to those inhabitants of the city without their own generation microsystem. It had its own education system, with schools and universities, and an economy based on biorobotics and hyperreal immersion tourism, highly technological sectors in which Jacob had a competitive advantage thanks to his grandfather’s activities, and which attracted a niche of wealthy consumers. To help to convince the city administration to close the agreement for the development of the Park, Jacob undertook to build a free drinking water conversion and supply line, thanks to the new technology he was developing and which he wanted to test in Florianópolis.
After about an hour of travel, spent watching a metamentary, Ademar and Xuakti had arrived halfway along the way, in the historical center of Florianópolis, which preserved in part the colonial architecture of the seventeenth century, in part its holograms. Only two of the three old bridges built between the 20s and 90s of the twentieth century and which opened the island to the mainland were still operating. The third one, and oldest, Ponte Hercílio Luz, was used only as a landing point for hyperreal immersive tourism – an idea that the old Jacob had pushed to the local government.
Traffic was heavy, but they had time, and they both preferred to enjoy the tranquility of the car over the agility of other electric vehicles. The journey to Canasvieiras, the extreme north of the island, would take another hour. After passing the center, Xuakti liked to disconnect to look at the landscape, characterized by an endless expanse of skyscrapers, bio-robot buildings and energy factories. The Technological Poles were the flagship of investors since ancient times, when they were conceived as innovation districts towards the end of the 20th century. There the gusts of wind and floods did not arrive with the same destructive power with which they arrived in the south of the island. But the decontracting bots had not yet managed to expel from the waters of the bay all the pollution that had deposited there in centuries of urban and technological settlement. Xuakti was reminded of the hyperreal immersive games of water, which she had played especially at the beginning of her stay on the island. It was nice to play with the waves. Who knows, she thought, what it must have been like for real. “I’ll show you,” Ademar commented, smiling.
———-
1 Viveiros de Castro, 2010
References:
Arguedas Ortiz, D. (2019). A gigantesca ‘catedral’ subterrânea que protege Tóquio de inundações. BBC Future. https://www.bbc.com/portuguese/vert-fut-46940113
Bispo, Fábio. (2019). Quarta ponte em Florianópolis depende de iniciativa da bancada federal. ND Mais. https://ndmais.com.br/infraestrutura/quarta-ponte-em-florianopolis-depende-de-iniciativa-da- bancada-federal/
Corredor dos tornados da América do Sul. (2021). Wikipedia. https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corredor_dos_tornados_da_Am%C3%A9rica_do_Sul
Da Rocha, V. (2021). Casas ficam cobertas por dunas em Florianópolis. Folha de São Paulo. https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/cotidiano/2021/07/casas-ficam-cobertas-por-dunas-em- florianopolis.shtml
Gago da Câmara, J. (2019). Açores: As mudanças climáticas também atingem este paraíso no
Atlântico. Sapo. https://visao.sapo.pt/opiniao/a/paralelo-38/2019-01-01-acores-as-mudancas-
climaticas-tambem-atingem-este-paraiso-no-atlantico/
Praia do Morro das Pedras é engolida pelo mar. (2021). Sul de Floripa. https://suldefloripa.com.br/praia-do-morro-das-pedras-e-engolida-pelo-mar/
Prefeitura de Florianópolis & BID. (2017). Relatório Final. Estudo 2 Vulnerabilidade e Riscos Ambientais Florianópolis. Iniciativa Cidades Emergentes e sustentáveis.
Tucunduva P. Cortese, T., Sotto, D. & Hernández Arriagada, C.A. (2020). Territórios frágeis em intempérie – Eventos climáticos extremos em época de pandemia: o caso de Florianópolis. IEA USP. http://www.iea.usp.br/pesquisa/projetos-institucionais/usp-cidades-globais/artigos-digitais/eventos- climaticos-extremos
Valente, E. (2021). Meio Ambiente – Maré alta derruba muros e adentra propriedades no Morro das Pedras. O Avanço do mar destruiu muros. Alamy. https://www.alamy.com/florianpolis-sc-24-05- 2021-meio-ambiente-mar-alta-derruba-muros-e-adentra-propriedades-no-morro-das-pedras-o- avano-do-mar-destruiu-muros-e-image429099419.html
Viveiros de Castro, E. (2010). Prefácio: O recado da mata. In Kopenawa, Davi e Albert, Bruce. A queda do céu, Palavras de um xamã yanomami. Companhia das Letras. pp. 11-41.
Ilha Brasil
(Italian)
Per Xuakti quello era il miglior momento dell’anno. Anche se insegnava a Ilha Brasil da quasi un decennio, le espressioni che scorgeva sui visi dei suoi alunni alla fine della prima lezione di geografia immersiva lo facevano emozionare. Si immedesimava in loro, si chiedeva come avrebbe reagito se avesse potuto vivere quella esperienza formativa a soli quattro anni. A quell’età, Xuakti viveva ancora nei pressi della foresta, o di quello che vi restava, con la sua comunità, a 4 mila chilometri di distanza, nello Xingu.
Non avrebbe mai detto che trent’anni dopo si sarebbe trovato a Florianópolis, a insegnare geografia ai bambini dalle origini così diverse dalle sue. Le mancava la sua terra, ma non aveva potuto rinunciare a una proposta come quella. I bianchi avevano chiamato la sua famiglia e alcuni altri parenti indigeni, quilombola e ribeirinhos, sparsi per il Brasile, e coinvolto alcune colonie di biobot perchè rimettessero in vita in un posto molto lontano nel sud del Brasile, che lei conosceva solo sui dispositivi, ma sapeva che era un posto di bianchi.
Le avevano detto proprio “rimettere in vita”, una cosa molto seria, una missione di salvezza. Lei aveva discusso con i suoi parenti, si erano informati, nessuno si fidava dei bianchi, che hanno un’idea di vita ben diversa dalla loro. Ma in fin dei conti la situazione nello Xingu era diventata insostenibile, per via dell’ultima diga, del costo dei brevetti per i semi e della manutenzione dei pozzi acquiferi. A Florianópolis invece gli investimenti in questa “rimessa in vita” erano enormi, tutti arrivati da fuori; senza parlare della tecnologia che avevano a disposizione, che lassù, a casa sua, non sarebbe mai arrivata. Così hanno finito per accettare, come una sfida per la sopravvivenza della sua comunità, ma anche per la fondazione di una nuova società.
Xuakti era un bravo maestro nello Xingu e così è stato anche a Florianópolis. Era apprezzato, rispettato, riusciva a comunicare con tutti, e aveva imparato velocemente a dominare l’uso dei dispositivi, come se ci fosse nato. Tanti problemi hanno risolto i dispositivi, pensava, quando una bambina si è riaffacciata allo schermo, e piano piano sono tutti tornati all’aula virtuale. Dopo il primo momento di stupore, le domande sulla lezione appena conclusa erano sempre più o meno le stesse: Xuakti, il centro della terra è davvero così caldo? Xuakti, perché dentro alle dune c’è così tanto rumore? Xuakti, perché non riuscivo a prendere la nuvola?
Non che i bambini non conoscessero le risposte, ma l’esperienza immersiva iperreale imprimeva le domande in un modo diverso nelle loro menti che, in connubio con la dimensione corporea, prima li confondeva, per poi renderli più profondamente consapevoli delle risposte. E solo allora si poteva passare alle lezioni successive, quando i bambini, guidati da Xuakti, sperimentavano il mondo come fossero piante, rocce, farfalle, uccelli e balene. Quella di inserire nella griglia didattica del primo anno le lezioni di empatia immersiva era stata un’esigenza di Xuakti e del suo popolo per rimanere nella Riserva, perché non avrebbero accettato di guardare il mondo solo dal punto di vista degli umani, come fanno i bianchi. L’amministrazione ha accettato, ha sviluppato la tecnologia necessaria, e le lezioni sono diventate un successo tale da entrare a far parte del pacchetto turistico HighLux di Ilha Brasil.
Poi, quando i bambini avevano familiarizzato con l’immersione, al secondo anno di geografia, il maestro impartiva la lezione più importante di quel ciclo, sui disastri ambientali estremi. I bambini venivano immersi negli uragani, negli smottamenti di terra, nei terremoti, venivano introdotti nei siti più radioattivi e dentro le ciminiere delle industrie più contaminanti dei tempi passati. C’era bisogno di un’autorizzazione dei genitori per quella lezione.
Era ancora giorno quando Xuakti salutò l’ultima bambina e chiuse lo schermo. Il venerdì soleggiato si insinuò come un ricordo dopo le settimane di piogge appena passate e lo inondò di voglia di uscire. Avrebbe fatto un giro a piedi nel Parco, come chiamava la Riserva Bio-Rigenerativa Ilha Brasil dove viveva insieme a diecimila persone provenienti da tutto il Brasile, ma l’incontro con Ademar all’uscita della capanna lo obbligò a cambiare idea. Dopo essersi scambiati qualche frase percettibile soltanto dai dispositivi, i due uomini salirono sulla macchina, che sembrava aspettarli.
L’auto ha sorvolato il Parco e non appena giunta all’uscita si è immessa in carreggiata. Non avevano l’autorizzazione per volare in città. Il rischio di incidenti a causa delle raffiche di vento che sempre più potentemente colpivano l’isola – collocata nel Corridoio dei Tornado dell’America Latina – era troppo alto. Quindi fuori dal Parco si potevano usare soltanto le elettriche, che fossero a due, tre o quattro ruote. Ademar si stava già preparando per l’incontro e sceglieva tra le tante skin disponibili una che fosse adatta all’occasione. Xuakti faceva finta di non avvertire lo sguardo dell’amico perché preferiva gustarsi il panorama dall’alto, che durava non più di pochi minuti – quanto bastavano per percorrere i circa mille ettari del Parco – durante i quali ammirava i tanti monti del sud dell’isola, quasi tutti riforestati, la laguna di Peri, una delle poche indenne all’urbanizzazione selvaggia dei secoli scorsi, le spiagge di Saquinho e Naufragados, con le sue costruzioni inghiottite dalla sabbia che si inselvatichivano nuovamente, i piedi del Monte Matadeiro, dove 90 anni prima uno smottamento aveva sotterrato la spiaggia di Lagoinha do Leste, una delle più belle dell’isola.
Ma il posto che le piaceva di più, forse perché il più lontano dal suo immaginario Amazzonico, erano le spiagge di Armação e Matadeiro, dove fino a due secoli prima i cacciatori intrappolavano e uccidevano le balene, prima della loro estinzione definitiva nel secolo XXII. Aveva vissuto entrambe le spiagge nel training immersivo appena arrivato a Florianópolis. Erano sfuggite all’urbanizzazione grazie al valore storico che le autorità dell’epoca avevano assegnato loro, ed erano state in gran parte risparmiate dalla frana del Monte, anche se di spiaggia ne restava ben poca. Destino diverso era toccato alla vicina spiaggia di Morro das Pedras, che lentamente soccombeva alla forza oceanica: prima la sabbia, poi le case davanti al mare, poi i negozi dietro alle case, e nessuna diga, nessun muro di contenimento, hanno potuto impedire al mare di salire, mentre le persone continuavano a comprare i terreni, i costruttori a costruire edifici, il governo a concedere permessi.
L’ultimo sguardo è andato alla piccola punta ancora visibile dell’isola del Campeche, un paradiso dell’arte rupestre che, pochi anni dopo essere stata privatizzata e trasformata in campo da golf, è stata abbracciata dal velo inafferrabile delle acque. Erano tutte storie antiche, che Xuakti aveva imparato a interiorizzare negli innumerevoli dibattiti e immersioni formative, e che la avvicinavano a quella terra che ora, insieme ai suoi parenti indigeni, quilombola, ribeirinhos, e alle colonie di biobot, stava aiutando a ricostruire. Se solo avessero iniziato prima a fare quello che dicevano da sempre.
Proprio a questo pensava Xuakti quando le ruote dell’auto hanno toccato terra e Ademar l’ha guardata sfoggiando la skin attentamente scelta: una gatta striata sovrapposta dall’anfibiotico che andava tanto di moda al nord dell’isola, dove si recavano per un incontro con il sindaco di Florianópolis e con i rappresentanti dei Poli Tecnologici che da sempre avevano le proprie sedi da quelle parti. Anche se era bianco, Ademar le piaceva. Era discendente dei popoli originari dell’isola, i manezinhos, i cui antennati erano arrivati a Florianópolis nel secolo XVIII, provenienti dalle Azzorre. L’arcipelago europeo era rimasto famoso per gli incendi che hanno devastato alcune sue isole tra il 2057 e il 2084, obbligando a un esodo di massa la popolazione, che non aveva più accesso all’acqua e ai mezzi di sussistenza, in un’epoca in cui le tecnologie di conversione dell’acqua non erano ancora disponibili – e non sarebbero state disponibili per gran parte del mondo ancora per troppo tempo, compresa la sua gente nel Xingu.
Ademar non si stancava di vantare le sue origini di bisnipote di uno degli ultimi pescatori artigianali del Campeche, l’antico quartiere del sud dell’Isola entrato a far parte del Parco. Serbava un sentimento ambiguo sull’istituzione della Riserva, che spesso considerava una prigione e una bolla fuori dalla realtà. Per Xuakti, i cui popoli avevano dovuto vivere nelle Riserve fin da tempi immemori, pena la loro totale decimazione, l’amico era troppo romantico. Anche i distinguo che faceva sul fatto che la riserva fosse stata creata da un miliardario filantropo suonavano alla maestra di geografia come discorsi che non avevano alcun senso, perché nelle memorie della sua gente, il pubblico e il privato si sono sempre mischiati.
Ma le differenze tra gli amici si fermavano lì. Per lo più, spendevano il loro tempo al Parco, lavorando, giocando a Hunthinker – gioco donato dai Poli Tecnologici agli abitanti del Parco – curando la comunità, passeggiando. A Xuakti piaceva ascoltare le storie di Ademar, sentire la proprietà con cui parlava quando camminavano nel Parco o quando, come ora, dovevano attraversare i quasi 50 km dell’isola per raggiungere la sede del potere locale. Mentre maneggiava il dispositivo per preparare i punti salienti dell’incontro, Ademar si lamentava per l’ennesima volta della mancanza di un trasporto collettivo elettrico sull’isola, che eviterebbe le ore di traffico in macchina, soprattutto ora che la viabilità nell’Autostrada principale era stata deviata per i lavori di costruzione del sesto ponte di connessione con il continente.
Lavori che duravano più di quindici anni, perché il Governo non aveva più fondi, e i privati non avevano più interesse a investire sull’isola, dopo che circa settant’anni prima l’età dell’oro dell’espansione turistica e immobiliare era finita. Chi vorrà più venire in questa selva di cemento, con una discarica fognaria a ogni 500 metri, quasi senza spiagge, e i tornado che arrivano un giorno sì e l’altro pure, si chiedevano tutti.
Fu allora che Jacob Jacob, nipote dell’omonimo magnate che rese popolare i viaggi spaziali, approfittò del crollo del mercato immobiliare soprattutto al sud dell’isola – che aveva resistito fino alla fine del XX secolo all’urbanizzazione predatoria -, e propose al governo un affare irripetibile: avrebbe comprato la concessione di 200 anni di quello che restava delle terre pubbliche del sud dell’Isola, si sarebbe accordato con i privati che vi restavano, e avrebbe costruito una gigantesca Riserva di Bio-Rigenerazione Ambientale. Nessun investimento avrebbe generato una valorizzazione così importante, assicurò Jacob, perché Ilha Brasil – il nome scelto per il parco – costruiva vite, rigenerava sistemi.
Lo slogan si rivelò veritiero. Il progetto consisteva nella realizzazione di un villaggio della rigenerabilità, un territorio di preservazione ambientale e ricolonizzazione, che puntava a ricostruire le condizioni naturali dell’isola e la sua biodiversità. Per riuscire nell’intento, il team di Jacob ha raccolto analisi e pareri di scienziati, umanisti, esperti in rigenerabilità e anche studiosi delle vecchie correnti della sostenibilità. Ha contato sui pareri dei bot sviluppati con gli algoritmi più avanzati. La conclusione comune convergeva sulla necessità di – nelle parole del bot-47235 che ha redatto il parere finale- “applicare le tecnologie più avanzate e avvalersi di sistemi culturali funzionali a stabilire una relazione attenta e di cura con la natura mitica delle cose per far emergere finalmente il mondo come plenum animico che è sempre stato”.
Il parere è stato accolto da tutti gli esperti e il team di Jacob si è impegnato nel processo di selezione in tutto il Brasile, per raccogliere l’adesione di persone e piccole comunità che rispettassero i criteri stabiliti dal parere finale. Centinaia di migliaia di persone sono state valutate, e diecimila sono state selezionate. Il loro ruolo era quello di applicare la propria conoscenza nella gestione e bi-relazionalità con boschi, foreste, mangues, fiumi, ma anche in medicine tradizionali, sciamanesimo, culinaria rigenerativa, esplorazione tecnologica, difesa, biogenetica e biorobotica, e altre competenze che sarebbero servite a creare e far fiorire la riserva, da tutti i punti di vista.
Alla fine della selezione, sono stati scelti novemila tra persone indigene, ribeirinhos, quilombolas appartenenti a piccole comunità nel nord e nordest del Brasile, mentre l’altro migliaio erano bianchi provenienti da altre regioni del Brasile e da altre parti del mondo. L’investitore ha affidato il management a un suo gruppo di fidati, e a seguito dell’inaugurazione del Parco, nel 2180, non vi ha fatto più ritorno. È deceduto pochi mesi dopo, lasciando il suo progetto in eredità condivisa tra la figlia e un bot del suo cerchio stretto.
Poco ha avuto a che fare il potere pubblico con il Parco. L’intervento dello Stato si è limitato alla concessione di licenze e permessi, agli espropri, all’autorizzazione per l’accesso ad alcune banche genetiche, e all’incentivo alle migrazioni interne e ripopolamenti. Una volta completato, il parco era completamente autosufficiente. Generava e distribuiva energia, che vendeva anche a quegli abitanti della città sprovvisti di un proprio microsistema di generazione. Contava su un proprio sistema educativo, con scuole e università, e aveva un’economia basata sulla biorobotica e sul turismo di immersione, settori altamente tecnologici in cui Jacob aveva un vantaggio competitivo grazie alle attività di suo nonno, e che attraevano una nicchia di consumatori esigenti e facoltosi. Per aiutare a convincere l’amministrazione della città a chiudere l’accordo per la realizzazione del Parco, Jacob si è impegnato a costruire una linea di conversione e rifornimento di acqua potabile gratuita, grazie alla nuova tecnologia che stava sviluppando e che voleva testare a Florianópolis.
Dopo circa un’ora di viaggio, spesa guardando un metamentario appena divulgato, Ademar e Xuakti erano arrivati a metà del cammino, nell’antico centro storico di Florianópolis, che conservava in parte l’architettura coloniale del secolo XVII, in parte i suoi ologrammi. Dei tre vecchi ponti costruiti tra gli anni ’20 e gli anni ’90 del Ventesimo secolo e che hanno aperto l’isola al continente, ne restavano soltanto due operativi, dopo importanti lavori di rinforzamento delle basi, mentre il terzo e più antico, Ponte Hercílio Luz, veniva utilizzato solo come punto di atterraggio del turismo di immersione – un’idea che il vecchio Jacob aveva fatto sottoscrivere dal governo locale.
Il traffico era intenso ma avevano tempo, ed entrambi preferivano godere la tranquillità dell’auto all’agilità degli altri veicoli elettrici. Il viaggio fino a Canasvieiras, estremo nord dell’Isola, sarebbe durato ancora un’altra ora. Superato il centro, a Xuakti piaceva disconnettersi per guardare il paesaggio, caratterizzato da una distesa interminabile di grattacieli, costruzioni biorobotiche e impianti energetici. I Poli Tecnologici erano il fiore all’occhiello degli investitori fin dai tempi remoti, quando furono concepiti come distretti dell’innovazione verso la fine del Secolo XX. Lì le raffiche di vento e le inondazioni non arrivavano con la stessa potenza distruttiva con cui giungevano nel sud dell’isola, ma i bot decontraenti non erano ancora riusciti a espellere dalle acque della baia tutto l’inquinamento che vi si era depositato in secoli di insediamento urbano e tecnologico. A Xuakti vennero in mente i giochi immersivi iperreali di acqua, che aveva fatto soprattutto all’inizio della sua permanenza sull’isola. Era bello giocare con le onde. Chissà, pensò, come sarà stato farlo per davvero. “Te lo farò vedere”, commentò Ademar, sorridendo.
Thais Palermo Buti
Introduction
Ort9 is an urban garden and public park located in Casal Brunori, a residential neighborhood in the outskirts of Rome. Before being turned into a park, the space was used as a landfill. This text tells the process that the local actors (NGO and neighborhood committee) engaged to recover a neglected urban public space and to give it back to the community.
Parco Ort9: place, characteristics, and actors involved
The initiative is implemented in the residential neighborhood Casal Brunori, in the outskirts of Rome, Italy1. Its institutional promoters are the NGO Vivere In… and the Neighborhood Committee.
The NGO was born in 2006, starting from the initiative of a group of friends who decided to commit themselves to enhance the neighborhood. As reported in a 2018 news story on Repubblica website: “From the cleaning of the green areas to the parties organized to fill the absence of moments of socialization, over the years they have created initiatives to mend the social fabric. In the neighborhood there is a lack of meeting places and while the elderly suffer from the lack of services, families move with their car to other areas of the city, in search of spaces for free time.
Sergio Albani, founding member of the association, had been looking hopefully at one of the large green fields of Casal Brunori, reduced to a landfill, since 2006: among the tall grass there were refrigerators, televisions, even safes abandoned after the thefts. Albani dreamed that instead of decay there were gardens and the Ort9 park is dedicated to him, who disappeared before seeing the idea of him become reality” (De Ghantuz, 2018).
1 The district extends immediately outside the Grande Raccordo Anulare to the south and is between via Pontina and via Cristoforo Colombo. The total inhabitants are 4,361 and the commercial activities around 50.
The process for the creation of the urban gardens and the public park was slow and gradual. Formally, it began with the sending by Vivere In to the Municipality of Rome, in 2005, of a draft of an architectural project, proposing the creation of the gardens in the space then occupied by the landfill. But it was only in 2015 that the Municipality, accepting a proposal sent by the Council of Culture of the 9th district of Rome, agreed to participate in the Sidig-med European project, which made it possible to obtain the necessary funds for the start of the works in the area, 12,000 square meters. Vivere In… NGO was the operational promoter of the project, and this association was entrusted with the management of the Ort9-Sergio Albani Park in February 2017.
Currently, Ort9 is a public park with 107 individual urban garden plots, in addition to shared plots. The park has an automated irrigation system through driplines, shared mechanical and manual tools, as well as public restrooms, barbecues, and indoor or outdoor socializing areas. The park is always open and it is considered a European Best Practice in urban regeneration (Parco Ort9, n.d.).
1 Ort9 Sergio Albani urban garden. www.viverein.org
The role of the citizenship and the local authorities
The creation of the park would not have been possible without the support of the local authorities, specifically the 9th District, which gave Vivere In NGO the concession for the management of the space, also entrusting the Association with the cleaning of the green area surrounding – service for which the NGO gets no compensation.
Other actors involved are the Council of Culture of the 9th District of Rome, the Local Health Agency (ASL), which uses part of the shared lots for the treatment of people with mental illness or former drug addicts, and some public schools in the neighborhood, which use the plots for practical educational workshops. The Council of Culture of the Rome 9th District played a crucial role especially in the launch of the initiative (see point “timeline”).
But the main actors of the whole process are the inhabitants of the neighborhood, who over the years have pursued a common project. As declared by the President of Vivere In, Filippo Cioffi, in an interview to Urlo Web, “these gardens are not the ultimate goal, but the tool to recapture the territory and enhance it. They, even if individually managed, allow people to share a common idea and the use of the spaces allows the neighborhood to be redeveloped”. Cioffi also recalled the disappearance of prostitution phenomena, in addition to the evident arrangement of the area, previously hosting an open-air landfill that the citizens themselves have reclaimed. “To speed up a too slow bureaucracy – continued Cioffi – we ourselves took away the abandoned refrigerators and had the land analyzed, two indispensable factors to be able to start the gardens” (Savelli, 2017).
The timeline and the effects of the initiative
2006 – Vivere In NGO presents a draft proposal for the accommodation of the area to the Municipal
Administration.
2015 – the Council of Culture of the 9th District presents to the Municipality of Rome, in collaboration with Vivere In and with the involvement of the Casal Brunori District Committee, a project of the Constitution of the “ORT9” Committee of the District IX, to “actively promote a network of associations present in the area, coordinated by the Deputy Presidency of the District IX, as a technical-administrative reference point, functional to the realization of future projects of urban social gardens in urban and peri-urban areas of the Municipality of Rome” (STIFINI, 2015).
The goal was to actively collaborate in the “realization of the ORT9 Pilot Urban Garden of the 9th District, as a model of excellence for the city of Rome, developed as part of the international project 4
SIDIG-MED, financed by the European Commission, with the aim of developing a model of good governance of urban and peri-urban agrarian/agricultural areas in the Mediterranean, the promotion of social and intercultural dialogue in and between the 4 urban realities involved: city of Rome (Italy), Barcelona (Spain), Mahdia (Tunisia) and Al – Balgua (Jordan)” (STIFINI, 2015).
The 2015 proposal of the Council of Culture to the Municipality of Rome was, in effect, an invitation to participate in the EU tender which would have allowed, subsequently, to obtain the necessary funds for the start of the works.
2016 – the reclamation of the area begins
2017 – inauguration of the urban garden (individual and shared plots)
2021 – expansion of the garden and creation of other facilities (plots for wheelchair users and people with visual impairments; lighting; barbecue area; squares)
The beneficiaries of the initiative
The beneficiaries of the park is the population of Casal Brunori neighborhood in general, who can access a public park that is always open, and more specifically the 110 families assigned to individual urban gardens (originally 107 families and since 2021, 3 families of wheelchair users). School pupils and people subjected to health treatment who use shared gardens are also direct beneficiaries.
The main objectives and values of the initiative
The aspirations with the creation of the park can be summarized in the sentence expressed by the District Committee in its presentation, and which is based on the creation of value for the whole territory: “to bring an example of ‘being together’, a rediscovered feeling of sharing, a way to regain possession of the territory, an area previously abandoned and returned to people, a rediscovered scent of beauty” (Il parco, 2020).
In concrete terms, the goals, which have been achieved, are to recover about 12km2 of public space that has become an illegal landfill to return it to the community.
Limits of the initiative
According to Filippo Cioffi, President of Vivere In, the institutional limits have arisen from the distrust of the Municipal Administration to formally allocate areas to social urban gardens even if regulated by the Master Plan in its Articles 75 and 85.
The physical limits are linked to the absence of specific funds for recovery, cleaning and executive planning of the community garden system. In the absence of a precise policy, the practice is to occupy the areas and self-finance its use, which creates uneven and non-homogeneous situations, instead of where the ideal situation of programming a governance model, an essential element for the correct management of spaces and the community.
A critical point mentioned by Mr. Cioffi is that the demand for urban gardens is much higher than the supply. Annual waivers between 10/15% fail to meet the continuing demand for assignments, which have exceeded 100% and continue to grow.
How the initiative engages with climate
(does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?)
From all the testimonies I have heard, and also from the interactions I have had with the people responsible for the care of the Park and the projects carried out by Vivere In NGO, I did not seem to glimpse, in the narratives, a connection between the park or only between urban gardens and initiatives to mitigate or adapt to climate change. On the part of public institutions and promoters of the initiative, there is a call for environmental sustainability, urban regeneration and commons.
The main dimensions that emerge in the stories, as positive points and reasons for the success of the initiative (which has won several prizes as a good practice of urban regeneration), are those relating to the sociality that the Park provides, and to the recovery of contact with nature, as well as the aspects of decorum of the urban space, removed from neglect to be usable again by the citizens of the neighborhood. Further positive effects of urban gardens are related to health and education, due to the partnerships with the Local Health Agency and with some schools.
Therefore, the connection between climate change and the Park can only be made in the context of analysis and interpretation, but it does not seem to emerge from the third sector organizations and from the local authorities involved or from the direct beneficiaries. The reason for this deviation, in my opinion, is that climate change is still seen as a distant concept for most people, especially those who live in urban areas not particularly prone to extreme events. Thus the same local authorities and 6
grassroots organizations of the territory do not seem to conceptually include urban regeneration initiatives focused on the creation or recovery of green areas in the spectrum of measures to mitigate climate change.
Possible broader changes thanks to the initiative
As Filippo Cioffi explains, “the experience in the management of the Ort9-Sergio Albani Park and the governance model adopted by the Vivere In NGO was recognized as a European good practice in the panel ‘Resilient urban and peri-urban agriculture’ and is now shared, through the Ru:rban EU projects. The NGO participates of several platforms and projects and is a reference point in the community”.
The governance model could be replicated, but it could be constraint by the limits and characteristics of each local community. For sure many inhabitants of Casal Brunori have changed the way to interact with their territory and among each other. The quality of their lives has improved since they have the park and the urban gardens. So I suppose that even if the main promoter actor, Vivere In NGO, suspended its activities, it would leave a more engaged community. Even if the engagement is directly related to climate change, to retake contact with the own territory through participatory activities, even to reach what could appear like small goals (such as an urban garden), could contribute, in time, to create long-term awareness about climate change and its challenges.
Potential replicability in other settings
Urban gardens are an expanding reality in many large European cities and other continents. It is certainly a facility that can be replicated, as there are many residual spaces in the suburbs that could be converted into self-managed green areas for use by the community, which could host individual or shared garden plots.
However, there is a crucial aspect in the creation and management of urban gardens, which is linked to the ownership of the land. While in Rome most of the urban gardens are located on communal lands, the same does not necessarily occur in other cities, and in other countries.
To stay in European territory, in England, it is normal that groups of people or basic organizations interested in creating an urban garden, must negotiate with private individuals, with whom to stipulate an adequate contract (ie allotment, license, lease) in order to create the garden and be adequately
protected from a legal point of view (Leases, 2020).
Rome is perhaps a city particularly full of abandoned public places which, with the stubbornness of the grassroots communities, a lot of patience and a bit of luck in identifying and maintaining dialogue with the institutional interlocutor, can be recovered and reintroduced for the benefit of community.
The first challenge, in general, is to find the land (which includes the analysis of practical issues related to the slope, the sun, the presence of water, etc.). Then there are the legal aspects of its management. Not to mention the need to analyze all aspects related to the community’s relationship with space. If we are talking about a regulated space (ie not an occupation), it will probably be necessary to set up a legal entity to manage it. The cohesion of the community and its ability to know how to deal with obstacles, to know how to dialogue with local authorities and other stakeholders in the area, is certainly a fundamental question when thinking about the replicability of an urban garden (Da Luz, 2020).
We can find still other differences in urban garden management in a metropolis such as São Paulo, Brazil, a country that presents enormous problems related to land ownership and management, and where family farming and small farmers are relegated to the second category in terms of investment in agriculture and of value perception. One great challenge is to rethink new systems of agricultural production, distribution and consumption, starting from the experiences of urban and peri-urban agriculture that have been taking place for years in the outskirts of the city.
The experience of San Paolo is different from that of Rome, where the growers of urban gardens – normally organized in non-profit associations – are not allowed to sell the crops. Thus, in Rome it remains an activity linked to self-consumption and the urban garden is conceived more like social innovation and urban/environmental regeneration activities rather than a way to overturn production systems.
There are several vulnerable areas in São Paolo where, through urban gardens, a process of recovery of green areas has been triggered, in a process that sees the suburbs at the forefront both in the production of food and in environmental preservation. But in São Paulo there are huge problems with access to land, water and an optimal logistics system for distribution.
An interesting aspect in the experiences of urban agriculture in São Paulo, reported by Fernando de Mello Franco, director of URBEM, is that due to the high cost of land, production must find underused, residual urban spaces. Areas of abandoned oil pipelines and electrical systems, industrial warehouses, empty parking lots, floors of large buildings, re-signify the residues of production and consumption of the city (De Mello, 2020).
In San Paolo as in Rome, the new dynamics bring back the old debate on the dichotomies between nature and culture, which today takes on the contours of the differentiations between countryside and city, between urban and rural, which are increasingly blurred.
Note about consensus: I declare that the President of Vivere IN NGO, Mr. Filippo Cioffi, gave me permission to publish the interview he granted me.
References:
Casal Brunori, gli orti urbani diventano un parco: “I lavori sono già partiti”. (2021, February 16). Roma Today. https://www.romatoday.it/zone/eur/spinaceto/orti-urbani-casal-brunori-parco-ort9- trasformazione.html
Da Luz Ferreira, Jaqueline (Coord.) (2020, November). Mais perto do que se imagina: os desafios da produção de alimentos na metrópole de São Paulo. Instituto Escolhas. São Paulo.
De Ghantuz Cubbe, Marina. (2018, September 05). Viaggio nei quartieri, Casal Brunori: dove c’era una discarica adesso c’è l’orto collettivo. https://roma.repubblica.it/cronaca/2018/09/05/news/dove_c_era_una_discarica_adesso_c_e_l_orto_ collettivo-300883075/
De Mello Franco, Fernando. (2020, November 27). Seminario Desafios Politicas Publicas Agricultura Urbana e Periurbana. Folha de São Paulo, Instituto Escolhas, e URBEM. Evento virtual. https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/seminariosfolha/2020/11/producao-local-e-capaz-de-abastecer-sao- paulo-afirmam-debatedores.shtml
Grilli, F. (2016, July 19). Casal Brunori: in attesa degli orti crescono i rifiuti ingombranti. Roma Today. https://www.romatoday.it/zone/eur/spinaceto/casal-brunori-bonifica-area-verde-orti- urbani.html
Grilli, F. (2018, May 03). Casal Brunori, gli orti solidali conquistano tutti: vinto anche il Best Practice Award 2018. Roma Today. https://www.romatoday.it/zone/eur/orti-urbani-casal-brunori- best-practice-award.html
Il parco ad ORTI di Casal Brunori…un VALORE per tutto il territorio. (2020, February 19). Casal Brunori. https://www.casalbrunori.org/aree-verdi/il-parco-ad-orti-di-casal-brunori-un-valore-per- tutto-il-territorio/
Leases and Licences; Negotiating Land. Community Land. (2020, October). Advisory Service Cymru. GardeniserPro. Green House Social Farms&Gardens.
Orto Inclusivo. (2020, December 8). Vivere In. https://www.viverein.org/sezioni/progetti/orto- inclusivo/
Parco Ort9 – Sergio Albani Casal Brunori. (n.d). Gardeneiser. https://gardeniser.eu/en/urban- garden/parco-ort9-sergio-albani-casal-brunori
PRG – Piano Regolatore Generale – Artt.75. e 85. Nuova Infrastruttura Cartografica (NIC). https://www.comune.roma.it/TERRITORIO/nic-gwt/
Savelli, Serena. (2017, September 21). Gli orti urbani di Casal Brunori diventano realtà. Urlo Web. https://urloweb.com/municipi/municipio-ix/gli-orti-urbani-di-casal-brunori-diventano-realta/
Stifini, Andrea. (2015, September). Progetto Ort9. Consulta della Cultura del Municipio Roma IX EUR. Cultura IX. http://www.cultura9.it/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/ORT9.pdf .
Abdelhafid Jabri
Abstract: This is a speculative flash story happening in 2100 AD in Saidia[1], a coastal city in the Northeast of Morocco. It is about the effects of the sea level rise on the region and on the local people in case the planet’s temperature goes up to four degrees celcius.
As a result of the sea level rise along the Moroccan coastlines to almost nine meters high, several coastal cities began to submerge. The economy of the country was at an alarming stage because tourism was heavily affected by this phenomenon which spared neither the rich nor the poor. Most experts thought that it was too late to find workable quick fixes since even developed countries were unable to face the crawling of the sea. One of the affected cities by this phenomenon is Saidia. Houses, hotels, and all administrative and leisure sites were beginning to go under water. Electric power plants had to shut down as drainage efforts collapsed in the face of this environmental crisis. This pushed local people to retreat to less endangered places or to neighboring cities like Berkane, Ahfir and Oujda.
Omar was one of the boys living in Saidia. He was a middle-school student in Charif Idrissi School. His family used to run a kiosk in the Cornice. Their house was situated two or three kilometers off the beach. However, the sea water had not only invaded their kiosk but had also surrounded the vicinity of their house as well as the antique Casbah whose walls were noticeably affected.[2] The soil no longer absorbed the water because many hectares of water-loving trees had been removed in the early 2000s for construction purposes by multinational companies. When Omar’s father asked the authorities about compensation, they told him that only families with a house insurance against catastrophes would be compensated.
In the early afternoon of that cold, rainy winter, Omar’s family packed their luggage and joined the long queue of families to quit Saidia on buses parked in an elevated area. The bus took a shortcut toward the crossroad of Berkane and Oujda. As soon as it reached the top of a hill, Omar jumped out of his seat to get the last view of Saidia from the rear window. He saw a flat light blue line of the sea stretching symmetrically and gracefully to the horizon from the Algerian frontiers on his right to the Spanish islands adjacent to Ras El Ma on his left. Water had already moved forward to the majority of the city’s surface, and it was almost deserted except for police patrolling zodiacs.
“Come back to your seat, son!” ordered his father.
“I will, dad. I just want to have a last glance at my birthplace,” said Omar wanderingly. “When are we going to see it again?” he then asked.
“God only knows, son” replied his clueless father.
Since that day, Saidia was declared an afflicted city and its beach became no more than an abandoned landscape. Ironically, it returned to the times when birds and fish were the only native inhabitants. As for Omar and his family, the aftermath of that natural disaster greatly touched their wellbeing. Omar could hardly find a school to pursue his studies and his father could not find a job. The only revenue was the small financial aid provided by the government to people who were in the same situation. There were many promises to find lasting solutions to this problem, but none was kept.
After years of hardship, Omar succeeded in his studies and had a scholarship to study landscaping in Europe. After a successful journey, he became a landscaper, a specialty which he considered as his favorite hobby. The first thing he did upon graduation was to get a loan and start a small landscape company. However, because his childhood memories of Saidia never left him, he applied for a call for projects funded by Morocco to rebuild the natural landscape of that afflicted city. To his joy, the proposal was selected, and his dream was made true: at last, he could do something for his homeplace.
“Father, I have finally achieved my dream, our common dream… I can now be an active member in the promotion of this afflicted land,” he said beside his father’s tomb.
[1] Saidia is situated at the Mediterranean Sea, Northward from Berkane city and Westward from the Moroccan-Algerian border.
[2] Being part of the local heritage, the ‘Casbah’ is an old fortress built by the Moroccan Sultan Hassan 1st in 1883 AD.
Made Dewi Suastini
2200 is a start for all. Global warming is happening faster than all people can imagine. Sea level rise is happening faster and sinking small islands around the world and Denpasar is one of them and it has happened in the previous 100 years. Sea level rise is a formidable threat. Everything was predictable although not quite precisely because no one knew how fast the destruction would come. There was one big initiative that saved the coastal population of Bali at that time, namely the creation of a floating city and that was realized swiftly by the government and completely changed the condition of Denpasar City in 2200. Its appearance is quite modern with a shape consisting of a collection of triangular to hexagonal platforms, this city is tough designed for Resistant to natural disasters such as floods, tsunamis and hurricanes. A city on the water that becomes the permanent residence of hundreds of thousands of people. Climate Change Preparedness that has been designed far from the 20th century has brought this city is save from the apocalypse.
This floating infrastructure provides everything human needs from clean water obtained from the discovery of seawater desalination technology in real time, plant and animal food sources from biotechnology, modern waste treatment channels that are efficiently integrated, clothing needs, business development, to places where people can live. gathering place on a large scale. People slowly began to adapt to the new environment. Rising sea levels cause coastal cities such as Denpasar to face unique demographic, environmental, economic, social and spatial challenges. Through these complex changes, it is possible for humans, nature, and technology to coexist forever. Denpasar researchers who collaborated with international researchers in 2200 are also getting crazy in developing technology. A great project is being developed from the early 2200 that is to free humanity from all kinds of misery. This project will be the largest project created by human hands based on the word Utopia World. This is the beginning of a big step.
People live their lives normally because the creation of a lifelike environmental design makes it easy for people to adapt. The land in the floating city they stepped on was no different from the land on the original island. Life goes on as usual. Those with families will live together while some people decide to live alone and determine their freedom. Government and society are more organized. The political system is still running which brings dynamics among the people but is still controlled through the opposition parties. Everything seems to be going so well even though when we look deeper and deeper, human intentions to beat each other always create upheavals. No white is truly white, there will always be imperfections. There are always people who are against and they are in the opposition team which also plays a role in regulating the running of the government. Some groups still think that they cannot achieve happiness without winning something for themselves.
Everything starts with the intention of fulfilling human happiness. So far, human life basically has 5 levels of happiness or what is commonly called the pyramid of happiness which is taken from the perspective of A.H Maslow, namely physiological/life/body needs, security needs, love needs/the need to be a part, self-esteem needs and the last need for self-actualization. Utopia is a perfect life depicted by humans. A life without suffering, without lack, full of equality, there is only abundance and happiness similar to heaven which is called in religions. Since the beginning, time after time, humans have always pursued happiness. In theory, this happiness will be achieved if the conditions are met. Starting from physical needs, security, feeling loved and recognized, to self-existence. If one of these five basic needs has not been met, it will be difficult for humans to enjoy true happiness.
Some of these elements of happiness have been fulfilled long ago when humans were first able to protect themselves from the attacks of wild animals in the past to the time when everything could be easily obtained in one hand. Back in the 21st century, Denpasar is a busy city with a very plural population. The hustle and bustle of people working and the activities of the central government are held in working weeks. There is always a lot of electricity continuously on for 24 hours in Denpasar. Mixing of cultures often occurs in densely populated areas, while in suburban and periphery areas it occurs less frequently, people will tend to be more attached to their local culture. Further examining the socio-cultural conditions in Denpasar, initially the residents of Denpasar and various areas in Bali were immigrants from Taiwan through Maritime Southeast Asia around 2000 BC while Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and especially Hindu cultures. The culture began around the 1st century AD. Ten centuries later, nine Hindu sects began to spread, namely the Pasupata Sect, Bhairawa Sect, Shiva Shidanta Sect, Vaishnava Sect, Bodha Sect, Brahma Sect, Resi Sect, Sora Sect, and Ganapatya Sect.
The culture of the Denpasar population in 2200 was much different from the previous 200 years. Conditions that require them to always coexist with technology have made their belief in religion even more faded. Some people who still carry on their traditions, whether they are Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, Christian, or Confucian, they try to make alternative prayers where the media and location get updated versions of adjustments. In general, they have a building or prayer hall together as a sacred space and a solemn place for worship measuring 14 x 8 meters, equipped with several equipment and media used. In addition, they also install religious attributes in their homes, indicating their identity. There is a lot of lost culture and it all comes down to relevance. The more relevant the religious values, the stronger people will defend them from time to time. Despite thousands of years, the people of Denpasar have been very attached to the belief in God and the culture of worship.
On the other hand, the other biggest cause of change that shapes everything that happens in 2200 is a global agreement. The big scenario of the World Economic Forum to reset world civilization with the momentum of a pandemic through The Great Reset which was held in June 2012, almost 2 centuries ago. This organization is the same non-governmental organization that initiated the concept of The Fourth Industrial Revolution in 2011 and contains many of the most influential people and companies that run the world economy or more simply the world-class capitalists who run the wheels of civilization from this world. Agree or disagree, human civilization is always determined by the leaders of superpower countries and world capitalists who are already planning to research many sectors in the world ranging from economic, social, geopolitical, environmental, technology, business, industrial, and the last is individual reset. From this point, it starts to be rearranged how this new human world adapts more quickly to technology that is more friendly to nature because the next threat that has been expected to be more severe than a pandemic and global warming in the 21st century is a capitalist system that is more human-centric, not only profitable. power holders only.
2050 marks the beginning of a time of great change after people agreed to sit down together and agree on a pact whether it would end forever for good or otherwise. After that, the future of Denpasar City began to change starting with a more efficient food system through biotechnology which can anticipate crop failures due to increasingly unfriendly climatic conditions. A more open and transparent economic system through block chain technology which reduces the corrupt system because of its openness. With the opening of a new government system that is more transparent, it will provide new hope for equality and justice for every people in need. The new regulations in the digital world are followed by the residents of Denpasar where every human who enters this era requires a digital ID so that anyone who maneuvers in cyberspace is no longer anonymous so that it will greatly reduce the crime rate. The big deal brought Denpasar in a good direction because division, power struggles, and power have always been human nature since ancient times when their condition was improving. So that humans have been complacent for the last hundreds of years only care about satisfying their respective interests and egos. Pretending not to hear that this condition is getting worse.
Global warming as a disaster and the cause of the earth’s apocalypse has succeeded in becoming a turning point to unite mankind which is similar to the post-war scenario in the 20th century. From there, humans have hope and do not end up in a dystopia scenario because of the natural selection process that can reset our technology back to the stone age. Finally, the city of Denpasar and other cities that were able to survive continued to advance in the Utopia stage in the next few centuries until in 2200. This journey to become a Utopia world is the greatest choice because this can be achieved if humans agree on a common goal. There is no difference between social status, economy, culture, maybe even religion. Because without equality and a common goal, Utopian conditions will never occur forever in the lifetime of mankind.
Continuing the massive project that is being worked on and implemented in the city of Denpasar where all aspects will be controlled by AI. The government system is no longer run by human interests anymore but is entrusted with control of an AI computing system that is mutually agreed upon to regulate the course of a new civilization system programmed based on the principles of humanism that adheres to the principles that exist in this universe which has been proven to work harmoniously even for millions of years. The last thing to emphasize is that without humans, this earth will still be fine. That’s the difference between human-made and god-made systems, between mortal and immortal because the long history of humankind has proven to have never been successful in managing this world since humans held civilization on earth. It always ends in the destruction of each other even though humans have undergone various types of systems ranging from imperial, socialist, liberal, to democracy during the abstract human will with ego and desire as the center of its control, which is always filled with authoritarianism, power supremacy, and dynasties. political. Therefore, the government system implemented by AI will be much more relevant because it is unmotivated, impartial, and fair even to every living creature on this earth.
The 2200s should be a better time than ever. However, when all humanity agreed to unite, it would mark a new, terrifying era. At this time technology has provided everything for human needs. Thanks to nuclear fusion that provides unlimited energy to anyone who needs it for free. In this Utopia era, energy is produced very easily, cheaply, and unlimitedly. Just because of this free energy, everything in the world of Utopia becomes available for free too. Moreover, this place has all been controlled by AI and robotics that automatically produce and provide almost every basic need of mankind from food, health, proper housing, even entertainment. Because everything is very easy to obtain, humans are starting to have no thoughts of doing evil anymore and every human being has started to no longer work to get what he wants because everything is available very easily thanks to the help of AI technology with a very sophisticated quantum computer base that can run the system. in this Utopia world ranging from the economy, transportation, social needs, business, and industry very fairly.This is a time when every human being is considered equal in existence and only focuses on pursuing their own dreams and fantasies. The residents of Denpasar, who in the early 2200s still had several groups attached to religion, then began to disengage from various types of beliefs. They start chasing things as big as they want to achieve. AI has stored the entire database of mankind as well as every object in the world that can be connected to humans and all objects wirelessly, understands all the needs and even worries felt by mankind and immediately provides solutions for them instantly. It all makes humans no longer feel pain and suffering.
In this city too, treatment has been very advanced thanks to Nano technology so that cancer cells are no longer a threat. Even before humans are born, genetics with the potential for cancer can be modified like new again thanks to the help of the much more advanced Crisper technology. Likewise, with physical genetic modification starting from gender, face, hair color, and body posture so that humans can have physical conditions according to their own desires. There is no envy and envy towards other humans just because this gets a proper self-existence in the eyes of society. Because now everyone is equal. The super-advanced cell generation technology allows us to live in a youthful state that would make life and death just an option. No more dying from disease and childbirth. At this time, it is possible to give birth to a baby outside the mother’s womb. All the nutrients have been provided by technology from the embryo to the whole human being. Of course this has been genetically modified to perfection so that there are no more birth or physical defects.
In this Utopia world, Denpasar residents are only busy chasing dreams and imaginations that they have not yet experienced. But again, this sensation is very easy for them to get with the increasingly sophisticated neuroscience technology that makes it possible for every human being to feel whatever sensation he wants in his life. Enough just to consume a substance that will work in our subconscious. They will feel the sensation completely without the need to go through a long process. For example, the sensation of a peak of success, popularity, the sensation of falling in love, and connecting with the most coveted person, even feeling the sensation of being any creature in this world. Limits only as far as the imagination can think. Utopia is similar to the concept of a paradise where humans can no longer be governed by all physical limitations. Advances in quantum physics allow humans to be able to break down and manipulate the blueprints of an atom so that they become able to create various new materials in this universe, which makes humans no longer imprisoned in physical laws that enable them to create their own version of new laws. Until finally able to rewrite the new destiny of life from alpha to omega.
Until one point, the people of Denpasar City no longer even crave a hope in such flawless conditions. When they no longer even know what they want when they are easily fulfilled. Technology was originally created to make life easier and more efficient by speeding up or stopping a process. But after all the processes are taken over by him until there is nothing left for humans, then there is nothing more terrible than a human being who always gets whatever comes to his mind so easily. When they no longer even know what they want because it is easily fulfilled then everything no longer has a value. Because a value appears thanks to a process. The more difficult the process, the higher the value. The more limited a thing is, the more valuable it will be.
Even the people in the city had no idea what hope was in such flawless conditions. How can a person have hope when everything is under his control. Everything is measured, organized, no more spontaneity, no more surprises, and no more fear. When all hope and desire is no longer there, then all that remains are emptiness. Which is even more terrible than going through a long painful process but still has hope. Because that’s basically what makes humans feel alive. It is hopes and desires that are difficult for us to pursue that give us purpose in life, which ultimately makes them envious of human life in the past which was full of emotions and hopes even though they had reached the perfect stage.
An ironic turning point, the people in the city are no longer working hard just to get a bite of food but they don’t know how happy and delicious it is to get a bite of food that is obtained from the results of days of hard work. Maybe they no longer go through labor and delivery for 9 months but they don’t know how happy a mother feels when she first sees the depths of her baby’s eyes right after giving birth. They no longer felt the disease in their perfect body from birth but they did not know how happy a child was born blind to see for the first time. They have a perfect family that is never in need but they don’t know the happy feeling of a father who sees his wife and children laughing while eating together even though he has to take on 2 jobs at once in the day and night. They can live in youth as long as they want but they will never know how much every moment in life means so much in our short and ignorant life of tomorrow. The emotions that humans feel right now are the greatest real gifts. Humans in the past yearned for a Utopian life in the future and humans in the future were envious of human life in the past. So this search for happiness will find no end.
It is the ignorance of the townspeople about tomorrow that makes tomorrow more interesting to live. It’s their current discomfort that keeps them motivated. Suffering is still felt that makes happiness so much more meaningful. And the limited age makes them have more priorities so that every moment in every life becomes much more valuable. All the imperfections that exist in a person’s life now are what make life perfect. So there is no need to live another 200 years because after understanding that, everyone can achieve happiness. But because of human nature that never feels enough and feels capable of doing everything, so that they still feel alive and have a purpose. They create their own new life goals by making a new earth where happiness can still be fought with a hope and suffering with new humans who are still innocent as white as snow and without knowledge from the beginning again. Where happiness cannot be achieved in conditions of lack but also cannot be achieved even in conditions of perfect abundance. Happiness only exists in the condition of being sufficient and grateful. Therefore, these new humans can give a sincere love to their creator because that is the only thing they cannot do. But this time they take care and make sure that not all knowledge is good for consumption. Because someone who is in a state of knowing can never return to a state of not knowing. So there is no need to repeat their mistakes and end up in a reset condition again.
References:
Adnan, A. (2020). ‘Floating Cities from Concept to Creation’. Canada: University of British Columbia
Ardana, I. K. (2018). ‘Balinese Hinduism: Religion, Politics, and Multiculturalism’, International Seminar on Balinese Hinduism, Tradition, and Interreligious Studies
McLeod, S. (2018). ‘Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs’. Seen at January 23th, 2022, < https://canadacollege.edu/dreamers/docs/Maslows-Hierarchy-of-Needs.pdf>
Rahul Sharma
Part One: Journey to the Wastelands
Geolocation: Kanpur, India
Anita
She came after the suns exploded, and as the long winter began. The community elders were stupefied at her appearance: bloodshot-red eyes, spiked green hair, pale skin, brown and lead-coated nails. They knew Komal was different. The matriarchal priests would often chant mantras rooted in the lost-century eras but to no avail. The ayurvedic priests prepared several concoctions stored in glass bottles from the previous century. They brought her voice back. Yet, it sounded more coarse and husky than the other girls.
One fine morning when a glimmer of sunlight pierced through the snowing skies, Komal’s mother, Anita, took a ten-kilometre walk through the wastelands that formed part of river Ganges. On the fringes of the slippery-iced ground, mushroom pods were being neatly stacked up by a man named Bhagwan. He was breathing through a ventilator, donning dark goggles. Bhagwan was an innovator whose early experiments resulted in the regrowth of cauliflowers, carrots, wheat and potatoes. Lack of water meant that rice was still a distant dream. Anita had pinned all hopes for Koma’s cure onto him. In fact, he was a messiah for the villagers and even beyond.
In a quirky, off-handed manner, Bhagwan took Anita into a dingy and lowly lit room with candles. He was saving plant-extracted fuel for the harsher months of the year. Several handmade and previously sourced maps decorated the wall.
“This..”, he exclaimed jubilantly, “…is the future. That is where your daughter must go. In the middle over here. My sources have informed me that special herbs called cacti sea-berries grow here.”
“And will they help treat Komal?”Anita asked anxiously. Bhagwan nodded his head, although with pangs of uncertainty.
“I have researched this for the last decade. There is a slight possibility that my calculations might be wrong, but a traveller from the Global south said those in his region also inferred the same. When the suns came down and sickness began, the soil created a mutant plant from two old herbs that could wither away this strange illness many of us have. Even all of us have it, Anita. We all cough blood at midnight. According to old records, blood coughing was not common.”
A bit perplexed, Anit said, growing impatient, “I think it was always common. And I’ve had it with your tales. Last time I let Komal travel, she came back sicker than usual.”
Bhagwan pacified her and responded, “She was younger and more prone to the effects. Only alone, she can undertake this journey because she is immune to the effects. All of us will die miles before reaching the core. The core where the greatest sun exploded. She is the key to our future. To reverse the damages the elders did in fury. Maybe the rivers might even start flowing if we plant these herbs here, and the snow might go away.”
Teary eyed, Anita retorted, “Stop! Stop with all this blabbering. Many in our village don’t even trust your tales. The snow has been here since dada was born. None of us knew what went on before.”
Bhagwan repeated calmly, “It’s true, we don’t know but must find out sooner than later. Listen, you must let Komal go. She is a smart kid and will navigate her way around. She even survived those three months you were not home, picking wild berries. She can live on them. I remember when my tongue tasted even one of them, I almost found myself close to death. Had it not been for the potions..”
Anita cut him, “Okay, I understand. I know she is special. But as a mother, I am scared. After all, where will she go? And how? She can’t cross the great seas to reach the Wastelands, from the Midlands. Forget even making contact with the Northerners.”
Anita looked at the map while formulating her thoughts. Huge leaps of land submerged in the sea near the Poles and extended all the way near the equator. All of these were called the Great Islands, where the Northerners were rumoured to live in isolated tribes. Some even suggested that most of them were dead. No one in the Midlands had seen any of them before. Meanwhile, the Wastelands were uninhabited and mostly inaccessible creating a large divide between the two regions, currently populated by the last surviving humans. Bhagwan’s bizarre suggestion that only special prodigies like Komal, who had developed a sort of chemical resistance to overcome hazardous terrain of the Wastelands, seemed more like a myth than reality to Anita. But she knew Komal’s days were numbered if she didn’t get a cure in time before her 15th birthday.
Bhagwan shook Anita from her preoccupations, “Listen to me. I will give her a special hazmat suit. One of the travellers from the Tengerinfound it in a bunker.” Anita hesitated but nodded, caught in dire straits.
Tengerin were a series of mountainous terrains, located north of Midlands often ridden with harsher winters. Its survivors camped amidst a hidden labyrinth of caves praying to mutated wolves, while adhering to the old ways of shamanism. Little did even Bhagwan know that there were other unmapped and undiscovered pockets of the world, where wider secrets of humanity’s reincarnation secretly lay. But once he met a man from the Tengerins who travelled south and spoke of actual trees, the ones which existed in old recovered books. Bhagwan’s curiosity and kind mannerisms to outsiders led him to accumulate valuables, treasures and mystic objects from across the globe.
And so it came to be known that Komal’s journey towards the core of their newly established world began at Anita’s behest. It was destined to be a feat, given radically plummeting temperatures and falling skies. Some admired Anita’s selfless decision while others deemed her an unfit and reckless mother. It would only be much later when the herbs would be discovered and brought back by a traveller from the Great Islands, that she would be revered and worshipped. But Komal had a new destiny, and would come back to this part of the world only much later in her life.
Komal
A full snow cycle had passed. Clear, moonlight finally shone light at the edge of the midlands, drenched in white sheets of snow. Removing her hazmat suit, Komal checked her bag for reserves. She pulled out wildberries and stale bread, once packed by her mother one snow cycle ago.
The endless sub-zero temperatures did not deter her confidence. Along the way, the coastal villagers had been kind to her. She was almost at the end of her mission. A week-long boat ride would take her to the Wastelands. She could reach the core of the exploding suns, without feeling its ill effects. Many from her village had died from radiation sickness simply journeying towards the coast. From here on, it got harder and harder.
She opened her sledbag, and removed Bhagwan’s mechanically constructed boat which he had constructed with secretive spare parts assembled from an old nuclear station near their village. It resembled an old Shikara from the mythical land of Kashmir, according to tales and photographs passed on from her great-great grandmother.
Once Komal had finished assembling the boat and set sail, a strange melancholy led her determined heart ashtray. She could feel the water speak to her, in its strange, soulful manner. Through an invisible thread, it dragged the boat with its potent lifeforce, denying its waves to trickle its pieces asunder. Minutes turned into hours which turned into days. Melancholy turned into amazement. The end was near. Her breath was coarser. Her hands were jittery. Her legs did not stop shaking. She saw pieces of volcanic ash subdued within the water. A stranger creature, perhaps a mutant, jumped onto the boat. It half-resembled a wolf but also had fins at its back. A fish-wolf, Komal reckoned. It licked the legs of her hazmat suit. She petted him with delight. Never had she encountered an animal species other than her own.
The pair of them fell asleep only to be awoken by a buzzing sound. The core was near. The deserted area across the muck was a sight for sore eyes. Dilapidated buildings and ruins of a megacity could be seen in the distance. This was similar to the illustrations Komal had seen in her village school. The fish-wolf started barking, signalling to turn away with increasing tension. Komal let him into the water, gesturing that she would come back for him. It was her mission alone at the end.
Komal felt her head swirl as her boat rocked towards the shore of the abandoned city. The old Hindu priests from her village hypothesised that the city kept shifting its location as the core of the earth was constantly moving. Nevertheless, she managed to step foot into it, wearing long black boots carefully designed by Bhagwan. She removed a map from her bag, which would lead her to the herbs. The core was not far, as she could feel her body burning. Her time to complete her mission was limited.
She ran as fast as she could amidst buildings recaptured by nature where green moses grew. Surprisingly, an abundance of wildberries, wheatgrass and strange, new plants had sprung up around the once arid region in the course of the past few decades. Komal stopped running. She removed a plastic bag, and started collecting large samples of the myriad of herbs present all around her. Some resembled small pomegranate seeds while others looked like full grown vegetables. Suddenly, her eyes fell onto the cacti grown near an abandoned banking office.
She walked towards the once functioning banking office, where numerous accountants had toiled themselves away for hours, convincing inhabitants of mutual fund benefits amidst rising disasters. All this before the seasons changed and the suns exploded.
Suddenly, Komal heard a rumbling sound, and found a pair of human beings atop a strange scooter which was running by itself on wheels. Komal had read about this in her history lessons. She didn’t know these still existed. And how come were they here, which was close to impossible? Were they also resistant to radiation? And how on earth would people actually live here?
The scooter came to a jolting halt next to Komal. A girl, probably her age, tried to touch Komal. She lurched away from her, in fear. Walking a few paces, she hid behind a building observing them from afar. She didn’t want her life to end at the behest of other humans, so she thought it would be best to resist.
There was a garden across from her which led to a labyrinth of underground tunnels. She had learned about it in the map as one of the possible spots for cacti which would then produce the sea berries. In the hope of avoiding conflict and finding cacti elsewhere, she sped towards it. Unfortunately, she slipped in the mucky ground and ended up being dragged towards the debris. The sheer speed of the force was making her lose consciousness. She heard faint sounds of a whirling scooter. The scooter manoeuvred and picked her up just in time, averting her fall towards her demise. The last thing she remembered was a weird tingling sensation in her arm.
Epilogue
When tribes from ancient civilisation first encountered each other, there was fear. This fear almost cost Komal her life. Her saviours were the very source of her fear, just like the spot of destruction was the source of mankind’s cure.
The two strangers had erected a tent which would block all radioactive isotopes, and the heat. Inside, it was cold with the help of a generator functioning from geothermal heat.
“I am Tuuli and I come from the northernmost part of the Great Islands,” said Tuuli, speaking in the ancient language of Estonian, extending her arm to Komal.
It sounded gibberish to Komal. Only when Tuuli would draw onto an old book with the help of her father, would Komal start to comprehend her thoughts. Language was a fluid yet inconsistent notion. But soon she understood that the pair of them, father and daughter, had travelled South to collect the same herbs.
She was almost surprised to know that they already utilised the herbs in the region of the Wastelands. They even made radioactive blockers, medicines, food products and liquid soap from the herbs. There was also a way to farm them by replicating the samples elsewhere on earth.
So far, the pair of them, father Andrus and daughter Tuuli, had managed to build a scooter and a boat, but never decided to take the week-long voyage to the Midlands from the Wastelands. This was as far as they had managed to travel. However, it was Andrus’s dream to travel as far as he could, even to Tengrins, and down South into other unknown continents. They believed the world was more than Tengrins, Midlands, Wasteland and the Great Islands.
In the next few days, Tuuli’s father Andrus injected Komal with some radioactive blockers, made from crushing the roots of the cacti berries. Instantly, her hair transformed from spikes to curls, like her mother, while her red eyes turned into regular brown. She regained the haemoglobin in her blood, and her nails turned into a normal shape, simply over the next two days. She observed herself in a side-mirror which she had packed into her sledbag. She realised she had transformed into a new person. She looked like a warrior woman from older tribes, who had her own sense of identity. The scars and trauma from the burning suns evolved and instilled hybridity onto her skin. She was rejuvenated with hope.
High on confidence, Komal had to make a decision. Should she go back East towards her village into the Midlands to share the recipes with her people? Or to travel across the globe to discover new secrets? The second prospect sounded more interesting to her.
Meanwhile, Andrus pinned his hope on the East—to visit the Tengrin mountains, to build himself an armoury, adopt Shamanism and try cave delicacies. A split-decision was necessary. Over the next two weeks, Tuuli and Andrus constructed a new scooter from scratch, using elements scattered across ten sledbags. Once they had finished, they divided their luggage amidst themselves and parted ways.
Komal saw Tuuli shedding a few tears. Perhaps it would be a few years or so, when she would see her father again. Tuuli hugged Andrus tightly. Komal handed all the drawn maps to Andrus which would guide him towards Bhagwan, and her village. Meanwhile, Tuuli had marked maps, taken coordinates of all of their family and friends, as well as planned each leg of their journey back towards the Northern Tribes of the Great Islands.
Rejuvenated and born a new woman, Komal decided to go further North along with Tuuli. The secrets of humanity, and the act of plotting a new map were awaiting the few survivors.
End of Part One
Part Two: Fragmented and Divided Pieces
Geolocation: Tallinn, Estonia
Tuuli
Tuuli had never seen the fish-wolf or even heard about their existence. A snow cycle earlier, Komal had insisted they rescue it from near the shores before embarking on their journey. They named him Igor. He was terribly sick, and had to be given many radioactive blockers. But once they set out towards the Northern Islands, his health improved rapidly. He would effectively catch different species of fish for them. When he was around, food was in abundance. Reluctant at first, Tuuli was glad that Igor was now a part of their group.
The old men around them were sipping on Strellasbier made from the hops, rice and barley grown in the greenhouse of the region. Tuuli observed that Komal donated some cacti sea-berries in exchange for paella, an exquisite cuisine known from centuries ago made from rice.
“Are you drawing diagrams of the greenhouse?” Tuuli asked her.
Komal nodded while speaking in broken Estonian, a language she picked up from Tuuli, “Yes, one day I will bring this back to my people. In my village, our scientist Bhagwan made a mini-greenhouse but it was hardly as effective as this one. The Midlands will also progress like the Great Islands someday.”
Tuuli hugged and reassured her, “Ofcourse, they will.”
Komal retracted, “I feel guilty. For leaving my people.”
Tuuli sympathised and said, “No, it was necessary for you to leave, and learn secrets of the other continents. Only then can you go back and share it with them.” Komal nodded.
After leaving from the warmer shores of Spaña islands, they soon realised that their boat needed quick repairs. They were running out of resources. While they did receive generous food and shelter from Andrus’s friends, none of them had repair tools.
They had to quickly and swiftly make their way up North to Tuuli’s small island. Their travel across the region of the Great Islands, with its great diversity, abundance of culture and cuisine specialities had to wait. Some legends said it once used to be all land, in a continent called Europa. Tuuli laughed at that thought, since the ways of the sea were the only ones known to her. Land was harsh, desolate and required effort.
A few days later, they reached the shores of her village called Tallinna. “There are only five Estonians left in the world. My grandmother used to say that there were millions before the sea came to our land. I don’t know if I believe her. She was always exaggerating.”
Tallinna was one of the very few Estonian islands left in the world, the others being fragments of Saaremaa which were completely uninhabitable. Herein, the cold was dreary compared to Spaña. Komal had never seen the force of wind so quick that it could drag one to the shore if one was not careful. Igor kept getting back into the sea, although he seemed to enjoy it. The air was very fresh, being so far from the nucleus and the Wastelands. Although it was even harder to grow anything naturally. Technology was the tool for this island, fuelled by long expeditions taken by Tuuli and Andrus. The travelling duo has steered the fortune of the place.
“Most of us live indoors except for quarter of the snow-cycle where we breathe fresh” remarked Tuuli, as she gave a walking tour of the remnants of her home island.
A total of five people, including Tuuli and her father, inhabited the greenhouses and homes of Tallinna, which carefully maintained an optimum twenty and four celsius throughout the year. Marlene, a thirty year old woman, was their engineer and construction specialist whereas Eduk, her 7-year old son helped old grandma Eha, in farming. When Eduk was young, Marlene was widowed since her husband drowned in the sea. Grandma Eha lost her family decades ago. The five members formed a close-knit community and sought to develop Tallinna to its optimum potential. Tuuli took Komal by her hand, towards their village’s latest creation.
“A flying machine”, she remarked.
Komal gasped, awestruck at the magnitude of its sheer size that could fit up to 6 people.
“We’ve only been able to fly it across a few islands. But you know why father has gone to the Tengrins? Only to find more parts for this, so we can travel the world with it” remarked Tuuli, with a sense of pride.
Komal jumped with excitement, bewildered and amazed by the thought. Imagine if she came back to her village with a flying machine, wouldn’t Anita be proud? It had been almost a year and a half since she started the expedition. She had turned sixteen today, and had totally forgotten her own birthday. The duo celebrated with leftover baked goods from Spaña.
Marlene
While the children were optimistic and quibbling away about progress and humanity’s future, Marlene was bothered about other aspects. Tallinnas shared a good reputation amongst the other Estonian islands. It even formed a trade link with Spaña, that helped bring progress to both regions. But Dookins and Poolsens, the leftover fragments had intentions of declaring a war on them, in order to pillage their resources and technology. If they would lay hands on their flying machine, it would be used destructively in order to capture all of the Great Islands. The leaders of Dookins and Poolsens were fragile, old men with fragile egos. They had not learned from the past but were likely to repeat the destructive path their ancestors had chosen. To avert a possible crisis, Marlene had constructed barriers along the islands and was bolstering up defence plans in case of possible attacks. She had even constructed radioactive hand-bombs to kill and maim any invaders immediately. However, she wished she never had to use these gruesome measures.
The coming of Komal brought her a slight sense of hope, amidst the most forlorn and desolate ideas that often brimmed her mind. Maybe the little one could convince the Great Islands to not fight amongst themselves like the Midlands once did. It had only brought misery to the place and probably also to Komal’s ancestors.
Once Komal and Tuuli were separated, she approached her cautiously and carefully. Komal jovially spoke about her village, her mother, Anita and engineer, Bhagwan who was akin to God for her people. Smiling, she asked her about history lessons in her classes. Much to Marlene’s surprise, Komal didn’t even know about the war in Midlands. Their lessons only focused on the season changes and the sun explosions. Marlene thought pensively.
Over the next few weeks, Marlene gave her a comprehensive understanding of the history of Midlands, the Great Islands, Tengrins and the Wasteland. After the suns exploded and seasons changed, some survived. Yet, the establishment of colonies took time in all that had prevailed. Marlene taught Komal about the evil generals, the revered messiahs, the bloodthirsty hound soldiers and the desolate common folk amidst the vast stretches of mountains, land and islands. Greed was a repetitive pattern in all of these stories.
Marlene was secretly preparing Komal for a mission. She would become an ambassador of peace in the coming years. Her lessons in the most spoken languages of the Great Islands continued. She took a keen interest in this young girl from Midlands. After all, she did not want the knowledge of her community of five only to be decimated by a thousand from Dookins and Poolsens.
“What if there is greater life beyond the Great Islands? Have you sailed further to the West or the South?”, Komal asked Marlene. She shivered at the thought, clutching at her son, Eduk.
“Many-a-great sailors perished trying to go west and south. The waters are too choppy and dangerous. My husband drowned in his attempt to go west. The winds caught up with my daughter-in-law as she went south.”, she said, with a regretful look.
Komal said, “But what if we were to use the flying machine?”
Marlene had a feeling Komal was right, although she did not want her to leave anytime soon. Somehow, she convinced her to stay and meet the generals of Dookins and Poolsens. Once the situation would be pacified, travelling west or south could become sustainable.
Komal
A few snow cycles later by her 18th birthday, Komal was well versed in all the languages of the Great Islands. She was also well read in history, geography and political sciences. Marlene was her mentor and tutor, and ensured she grasped everything as quickly as possible.
Furthermore, grandma Eha had taught her valuable farming skills. She could not only grow her own food but also create medicinal products from locally sourced herbs. She once prepared cauliflower curry, one of her own recipes, using leftover spices and herbs from her midland village. On the weekends, she would take trips with the Flying Machine along with Tuuli. The two of them were often inseparable, forming a lifelong bond. These two years were one of the happiest in Komal’s life.
Out of the blue and much sooner than Marlene had anticipated, Dookins and Poolsens invaded the Estonian islands. Tallinnas was further away but news of the invasions reached fast amidst them. The greenhouse now housed around fifty refugees. Owing to effective communication systems amidst the islands, no one had died so far. Theor defence system was almost impenetrable, although if their boats would be capsized, their connection to the outside world would be hindered.
“It is time,” Marlene told Komal one morning, “You must go South! West has rougher seas, and would take longer to cross perhaps! South is out hope. Take Tuuli with you! We have enough among us and our greenhouse can sustain everyone of us for over a year. Get help for us to stop the war!”
Komal replied to her, “Are you sure there are people in the South?” Marlene nodded, “There are. I’m certain of it, and perhaps more technologically or advanced. They can help stop this war.” Komal thought pensively, “I feel technology leads to more war. I wish the world could use it the right way.” Marlene hugged Komal.
Tuuli and Marlene spent over an hour crying and laughing, talking, discussing logistics and casually discussing the future. Meanwhile, Komal prepared the engine of the flying machine for a long expedition. Andrus had come back last year with loads of new parts, enough for them to circle around the globe. However, much to Marlene and Tuuli’s dismay, he had gone back with the Tengrins to meditate and become a shaman. Komal missed his technical guidance at times but she was indeed in charge of the flying machine—a vehicle for their future.
Epilogue
Once both of them were ready, Komal geared up the engine as they lifted into the air. Those in the greenhouses waved goodbye to them, as its shutters immediately closed with the flying machine’s exit. The generals of Poolsens and Dookins retreated a few steps, anticipating an attack. Much to their relief, the planes went south.
“Hah—another suicide mission”, remarked the general commanding the Dookins army. However, the general of Poolsens remarked, “Their greenhouse cannot be penetrated. Maybe if we invested in science and not war, we could go further. I think they will reach to the South for help.” The general of Dookins sniggered away, taking a sip of a local flowery sap, which intoxicated him. “Let’s call a truce”, said the Poolsens general. The general of Dookins replied, “What nonsense! Never.” Little did they know this banter would cause their entire army to give up their arms and overthrow the drunk general, little by little.
The commandeering image of two young women in a flying machine, exiting a modern greenhouse generated fear and awe in an army of thousands. Finally, seeds of peace were strewn across the lands of the Great Islands.
Meanwhile, Komal and Tuuli would find new places across the globe starting from the Great Ibiz, the Dragon’s Nectar, the Giant Tree in the South until they would fly westwards to chance upon the largest mass of land: Cherookes, inhabited by very ancient tribes.These two geographers would change the course of history. Little did they know about that, yet.
*The End*
Summary and Reflection of the Exercises
Since the final entries of my research were focused on creative writing, my research exercises were aimed at imagining Estonian society, hundred years from now. They focused on creative brainstorming sessions, character sketches, photographs of villages around Tallinn and interactions with locals. Estonia is a very modern and progressive society, relying heavily on e-communications while promoting organic produce and preserving nature. It is also a sparsely populated country. I wanted to instil these aspects into my final entries while imagining the scenario when the sea levels would drastically rise and people would be forced to function as small, cohesive units on fragmented islands. I also understood that my final creative entries can also form the premise of a larger work if my characters were sketched out effectively.
Meanwhile, I contacted my grandparents and used archives to research more about the geographic region around Kanpur, which is polluting the Ganges and rife with tanneries. Imagining the dreadful scenario in case of climate change and nuclear disasters, a snowy winter although uncommon for the region, would not be a distant dream. The region is abundant with Hindu temples, priests and society functions at a collective level. Adding that culture background to my final submissions was also integral to preserve the current originality of the cities.
Overall, the exercises helped me in character development, storytelling and also in revisiting cultural contexts of the two chosen cities for my final entries.
Bruno Azevedo Prado
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the beneficiaries?
The Borborema Territory is located in the Brazilian semiarid region, particularly in the Agreste region of the state of Paraíba. The Brazilian semiarid is one of the largest semiarid regions on the planet. It covers a geographical area of 970,000 Km2, concentrated in states of Northeast Brazil, and is home to a population of 22.5 million inhabitants (12% of the national population) with 44% living in rural areas, making it the least urbanized region of the country (Petersen, 2015). Polo da Borborema (Borborema Pole) was established in 1996 in partnership with NGO AS-PTA. It is presented as a family farming organization that gathers 14 rural workers’ unions, about 150 community associations, a regional association of ecological farmers, and informal groups of women and young people. Organizations affiliated to Polo da Borborema accounts to approximately 6,000 families from 15 municipalities in the hinterland of Paraíba. Since it was established, it has developed actions aimed at the economic, social, and political strengthening of family farming in the region. To this end, it implements a program of technical training and dissemination of agroecological innovations based on the principles of living with the semi-arid and agroecology, and works to influence public policies, particularly those aimed at promoting food and nutrition security and income generation for families.
The map below depicts the 15 municipalities covered in the area where Polo da Borborema implements its actions.
Source: AS-PTA
How does this initiative engage with climate?
By proposing an alternative development for agriculture in the territory, Polo da Borborema has refused a model of neo-extractivism that permeates the complex geographies of Latin America. Working as political actor engaged in environmental justice issues, Polo has, for about twenty years, engaged with another network of civil society organizations – the Brazilian Semi-arid Articulation (ASA). Together in this macro regional project, they developed the idea that farmers, social organizations, and government agencies should change the paradigm that historically mobilized rural development in the region. Instead of “combatting the drought”, a political and institutional practice based on large infrastructure projects and the maintenance of regional oligarchies’ interests, this network of civil society proposed, based on local and traditional peasant knowledge, the idea of “living with the semi-arid” [convivência com o semiárido]. The proposal of “living with the semiarid”, taken as a paradigm of development distinct from the modernization of agriculture based on “fighting the drought” in northeastern Brazil, implies the revitalization and mobilization of locally available resources that guarantee resilience to agroecosystems. It led to the formulation of public programs for the construction of one million cisterns through new institutional arrangements involving the State and civil society. This idea re-situates agroecological transition processes based on living with the semiarid as situated technical projects that offer alternatives to the logics of modernization and to the view, based on environmental and geographical determinism, of the semiarid region as “problematic”.
This proposal is well summarized by Medeiros (2022):
In recent decades, peasant networks have flourished, encouraged by the broad macro-regional movement called Convivência com o Semiárido. They are forming communities with the unique feature of not being territorially contiguous — intensive communities whose strength lies in the recovery and reinvention of agroecological practices, and in the constant exchange of experienced knowledge. Through rainwater harvesting, the recovery of water springs, the reforestation of the Caatinga, the implementation of agroforestry systems, fair forms of animal husbandry and forest extraction, the cessation of burnings and poisoning, the gathering, exchanging, protecting, and selecting native seeds, and many other molecular and pervasive actions, these collectives directly confront the hydro-agribusiness model that has been creating desertification for centuries, and whose non-fruits are there for all to see: in the history of the genocides called droughts, in the wandering lives of landless Indigenous peoples and peasants, in the increasingly accentuated heat, in the increasingly sporadic rains, in the increasingly sandy and stony ground, and in the consequent difficulty for pioneer plants to recover the soil and the microclimate.
The idea of coexisting with the semiarid is, thus, a situated technical project, based on local knowledge and scaled-up in intensive communities across the region. It tells possibilities to occupy climate change narratives with stories that go against external solutions imposed by mainstream development.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
As the Declaration of the International Forum of Agroecology (2015) states
Agroecology is a way of life and the language of Nature, that we learn as her children. It is not a mere set of technologies or production practices. It cannot be implemented the same way in all territories. Rather it is based on principles that, while they may be similar across the diversity of our territories, can and are practiced in many different ways, with each sector contributing their own colors of their local reality and culture, while always respecting Mother Earth and our common, shared values.
This refers to core values that Polo da Borborema holds in its understanding of how agroecology is to be implemented in its actions. It also takes into account the idea that agroecology is understood as a science, as a practice and as a social movement. The establishment of the Pole has been the result of a renewal of the rural workers’ unionism in the territory and it has the political perspective of acting collectively, in networks and on a regional scale, to overcome the isolation represented by sole action restricted to the municipal level.
This strategy of acting collectively as a network, on a regional scale, accounts for an accumulation of learning and experience for the union movement and to participate and influence a territorial approach.
What is the timeline?
Polo da Borborema was created in 1996 and formally established as an organization in 2004, as a result of the aforementioned renewal of rural workers’ unions in the territory. As Petersen (2015) argues, the movement for a new unionism has been the result of decades of unions’ strategy focused on the national level with a generic agenda. The change of focus was largely stimulated, in the early 1990s, by a partnership with AS-PTA, a non-governmental organization promoting patterns of sustainable rural development and the strengthening of family farming in Brazil based on agroecology.
Who are the actors involved?
Taking agroecological values seriously means being able to put farmers’ knowledge at the center and providing opportunities for their interchange. This has also implications for agronomical science, which can – and should – learn from their methods of cultivation and ingenious systems of water management under challenging ecological conditions (even if the dialogue of knowledges is not always symmetrical, not to mention the existing conflicts and power asymmetries). The protagonists of this movement, then, are the farmers-experimenters, as the peasants call themselves in this network also involving NGOs and civil society organizations. Exchange knowledge activities stimulated by Polo da Borborema enhance not only technical, organizational, and political capacities, but also the identity of farmer-experimenters.
The agroecological movement in the territory also has an important focus on women and youth. Women in general face strong obstacles to participating in the management of production systems and income access. Despite successes in developing several agroecological innovations, a patriarchal culture has remained dominant both within the family and in organizations. The inequality between men and women has been a barrier for the full implementation of agroecology across the region, although a women’s movement for autonomy has been growing stronger over the last 15 years. This movement carries out regional demonstrations annually, known as the Marches for the Women’s Lives and for Agroecology.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
As with many environmental initiatives, the experience of the Polo da Borborema responds to local cultural influences and demands that are unique in the territory. But the experience of the ‘living with semi-arid’ and its macro regional scale accounts for how it can reach different areas. Above all, any replication would have to take into account the diversity of the territories, and the principle of exchange of knowledge is an important factor which enhances the possibility of replication.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes? If yes, which?
Some results have been documented and account for transformations in the enhancement of water management, with impacts on national policies such as the One Million Cisterns Program and the One Land Two Waters Program, with the construction of decentralized infrastructure to capture, store and transport water. In terms of access to market, more than 210 farmer families are regularly marketing ecological food at eight municipal fairs, while 176 families have supplied schools and nurseries with ecological food via public policies such as the National School Feeding Program (PNAE) and the Food Acquisition Program (PAA). The Pole has also established a regional network comprising 60 community seed banks and directly reaching 1,500 families has been organized that provides advocacy for the government policy for seed distribution and the Food Acquisition Program. Political crises and the rise of a national right-wing government over the last years have led, though, to the dismantling of many public programs addressing agroecology. This has led to direct impacts for family farmers and civil society agroecological networks. But they remain strong in their commitment to accountability, a rights-based State and citizenship – for it is only under such circumstances that agroecology and democratization of food systems can achieve better results.
References:
Declaration Of The International Forum For Agroecology, Nyéléni, Mali: 27 February 2015. Development 58, 163–168 (2015). Https://Doi.Org/10.1057/S41301-016-0014-4
Haraway, Donna. Staying With The Trouble: Making Kin In The Chthulucene. Duke University Press, 2016.
Medeiros, R. Seridoão (Part I) Or There And Back Again, Or A Terran Testimony. In Https://Aperfectstorm.Net/Seridoao-Part-I/
Petersen, P. “Hidden Treasures: Reconnecting Culture And Nature In Rural Development Dynamics” In Constructing A New Framework For Rural Development. Published Online: 09 Mar 2015; 157-194. Http://Dx.Doi.Org/10.1108/S1057-192220150000022006
Rockström, J., Steffen, W., Noone, K. Et Al. “A Safe Operating Space For Humanity.” Nature 461, 472–475 (2009). Https://Doi.Org/10.1038/461472a
A Visit to the Museum of Conviviality
By Shayan Shokrgozar
A tall Persian man wearing a matte red tie turned to his audience of 20 bright-eyed bachelor’s students. His eyes shone as he surveyed the smiles in the crowd.
Welcome to the Museum of Conviviality. My name is Arash Kamangir and I have been a guide here for about five years. Today, I have the pleasure of showing you around this historic building. As you all may know, we were established 50 years ago on the 200th anniversary of Limits to Growth. A report that urged human societies to limit growth on population increase, agricultural production, non-renewable resource depletion, industrial output, and pollution generation. Its central message being that the earth cannot support the rates of economic and population growth much beyond the year 2100, if that long, even with advanced technology. Though Limits to Growth had strengths and weaknesses of its own, in retrospect it is difficult not to see it as a course-altering document, the effects of which one can see even today. Although Limits was a historic report, we must not forget that the 1970s was a decade that promised a different and rich future full of possibilities. There was the Stockholm Declaration of 1972 that sought to advance “intellectual, moral, social and spiritual growth.” The rise of ecological economics through the likes of Georgescu-Roegen, deep ecology through Arne Næss, and a growing critique of development and industrialization coming from Ivan Illich among others. So, the museum is a celebration of many of those ideas, and much of what you will see here are the principles and actions that can be seen as coming from the same pluriverse as the ones inspired by it.
A college student of perhaps 22 years stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Mehran and I was wondering if you can tell us how the museum acquired its name?”
Good question. The name Conviviality is inspired by and is an homage to Ivan Illich and his book, Tools for Conviviality. In that book, Illich argued for a reorientation of the use of tools and the role of institutions. He called for a new type of research that is oriented toward alternatives to the dominant forms of production, which were at the time dominated by industrial forms. His hope was for these to then lead to new forms of organizing life and society, away from industrialization and towards conviviality. Thanks for the question, just let me know if something doesn’t make sense.
Adjusting his suspender – with its paisley pattern – Arash points to the first exhibition: a wall decorated with images of David Ricardo, Jean Baptiste Say, Karl Marx, John Maynard Keynes, Friedrich August Hayek, Karl Polanyi, Nicholas Georgescu Roegen, Thomas Piketty, among many others. Filled with carefully curated graphs from some of the most prominent institutes of the late 20th-mid 21st century – the World Bank, UN Reports, trade treaties, and so forth.
Given the centrality of economics and scarcity, we will begin today’s tour with an exploration of ecological economics that holds the core premise that finite resources and ecology make the continued growth of the economy unsustainable. This ecological and scientific understanding of the world made the scholar Joan Martinez Alier write about attaining a concrete utopia through radical social change. In many ways, the ideas about a Pluriverse – or universe of universes – were very much inspired by how to make a concrete or feasible utopia. The Pluriverse brought all these different ideas of organizing societies together, right. Based on, for example, Queer Love, Ubuntu, Buen Vivir, Deep Ecology, Ecofeminism, and many other thoughts, the Pluriversal thinking, especially starting in the 2030s, brought many of these worlds in conversation together. Through their collective strength, these movements managed to confront what was at the time a conception of modernity as universal – through which humans were expected to live in a single, globalized world with science as the only reliable truth and harbinger of progress. It followed with the certainty of Victorian rectitude that advanced societies had an obligation to assist the “backward”. Which conveniently, continued to play well for the needs of the wealthiest nations and entities. Any questions so far?
Arshiya, a second-year Bachelor’s student wearing a rose-colored shawl, wandered away from the group to inspect the next exhibit. It was a miniature model of the city in which they stood – Tehran, Persia. But instead of fields of rye, carrot, lettuce, intermixing with forests and cabin communities like she was used to, the city was defined by wide roads, big cars that pedestrians had to wait for. “Could you explain how it benefited the wealthiest nations and entities?”
In short, a lot of the labor-intensive work and extraction of raw materials was carried out in countries and communities that were largely not benefiting from the exchange. They had their air and water polluted and often even contaminated in the name of development – which were well-documented by initiatives such as the Environmental Justice Atlas – and this often led to losing customary access to lands that people used for subsistence-based lives. Hope that clarifies my point a bit? So yeah, despite devastating climate disasters and a long struggle of living in the ruins of the dark days of modernity and industrialization, it took a lot for small pockets of peoples to create the thriving ecosystems based on a need-based economy that today seem normal. For example, the idea that nation-states can be abandoned in favor of bioregions and consensus-based societies – informed by local ecological dynamics – was a lengthy effort. In Tehran, today, we see people practicing permaculture and organizing themselves within grassroots communities, but in the top-down societies of the past it was very hard to imagine organizing society is this way, which some would argue sprouted from the transition town network movement of the centuries past.
In the midst of the tour, Arvin, a young and bright lecturer in history, glances around the hall with its low-energy intensive materials, passive cooling features, gardens, and analog displays. Thinking about how the site of the museum, once a steel plant, shows the role of sociotechnical ideologies on placemaking.
Okay, now we come to the contemplation section of the museum, displaying items that were once fetishized – cars, planes, mockups of infrastructural megaprojects, and airports – which had vast energy needs, leading to the extinction of millions of our earthlings. These items were heavily reliant on a life philosophy around Extractivism. Whether it was minerals, harnessing vital flows like the sun and the wind for reasons that had nothing to do with decent living, or serving the planetary conditions. Since we now organize our societies in ways that allow us to live our lives and attain what we need without mass logistics, and there is rarely a need for fast transportation, our cities are organized around pedestrians, but it was far from this in the vast megacities of days long gone. People lived and worked in circumstances that locked them into a car-dependent life. Because of the dominant discourses around growth and development, which were dictated by the North Atlantic countries, this model spread across the world like wildfire. And infrastructures are incredibly difficult and time-consuming to reverse because an entire chain of other elements in society then become dependent upon them. Questions?
Mehrdad, an exchange student from the bioregion of Harat raised their hand as they began to talk: In class, Arvin told us about an agenda called “green” growth or sustainable development, and many people including prominent researchers and institutes worked on bringing it about. How does that fit in these stories?
Good question. When the ecological and climate crisis was deteriorating, a watered-down version of the Limits debates made it to a document known as Our Common Futures. Sadly it became the defining document of what superseded it for decades to come, whether it was the Rio conference or Kyoto that solidified it into international conventions or many of the following UNFCCs. This warrants a long discussion, but even today eco-modernists argue if just given a little more time humans would have accomplished absolute decoupling. They are not shy about their efforts to revive industrialization. They blame degrowth and its spread for preventing a technological utopia that would have succeeded in decoupling growth from development. I would suggest going back to the exhibit on limits and scarcity, there you will find some rich materials for how the imperative of saving capitalism led to decades of discussion on ineffectual policies like carbon trading, negative emission technologies, and false energy transitions discourses. These false promises were based on reassuring citizenry that while the present and future might look dystopian, the political and economic elite can adjust policy to adequately respond to them without there being any need to alter neoliberal capitalism.
Okay, now I know you all have various projects of interest for your course essay. So, with this background, I will let you go explore the rest of the museum, but I will be around if you have any questions or comments. I would highly recommend visiting our most recent addition, the singularity exhibition. It explores how some humans were trying to make themselves immortal through biotechnoscience and visions of transhumanism.
Some of the works mentioned
Asafu-Adjaye, John, Linus Blomqvist, Stewart Brand, Barry Brook, Ruth DeFries, Erle Ellis, Christopher Foreman, et al. 2015. “An Ecomodernist Manifesto.” https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.1.1974.0646.
Illich, Ivan. 1997. “Development as Planned Poverty.” In The Post-Development Reader, edited by Majid Rahnema and Victoria Bawtree, 94–104. London: Zed Books.
Illich, Ivan. 2009 [1973]. Tools for Conviviality. London: Marion Boyars.
Kothari, Ashish, Ariel Salleh, Arturo Escobar, Federico Demaria, and Alberto Acosta, eds. 2019. Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary. New Delhi: Tulika Books and Authorsupfront.
Meadows, Donella, Dannis Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and William Behrens. 1973. The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome’s Project on the Predicament of Mankind. New York: Universe Books.
Naess, Arne. 1973. The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement. A Summary. Inquiry, no. 16: 95–100.
UN. 1987. “Our Common Future.” A/42/427. World Commission on Environment and Development. https://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/42/427&Lang=E.
Franz Rothschild.
The Lima hills (Lomas de Lima), in the Peruvian capital, is one of the most extended ecosystems of the city. It consists of 19 hill sites in 19 of the 52 districts of the city, occupying between 7% and up to 24% of the territory every winter, when El Niño event occurs (MLM, 2014). When that happens, all sites are connected by wide stripes of vegetation that turn a grey and brown city into a green space that contain a vast natural and cultural heritage: This ecosystem shelters a rich biodiversity of plants and animals, supplies the city with several ecosystem services such as soil retention that stops it from land sliding on the sides that is so risky for the closest inhabitants, tourism supports the local economic development, and strengths the weak limeñan identity linked to the appearance of the Amancaes flower greatly mentioned in several cultural traditions. Other services provided are related to pollination, supply of atmospheric water, air cleaning food supply (LEL, 2014; MLM, 2014; PNUD, 2018). The geographical distribution of the hills can be seen on Figure 1 below.
Fig. 1. Lima hills. At the bottom, Cicazos hills in San Bartolo (source: periferia.pe).
The hills are open spaces and represent an opportunity to rethink their relationships with a desertic city that has a differentiated district access to green areas based on economic aspects (Mamani & Nieuwland, 2017; MLM, 2014), and with the potential to overcome some environmental challenges related to biodiversity, water access, and climate change. Despite their importance, the informal urban growth, that can go up even to a 90% as consequence for the lack of public policy in urban development and of efficient programs for social housing, has already degraded the soil and affected the ecosystems services. This lack for proper urban planning has increased the vulnerability for many people that cannot access to own a property, providing an opportunity to illegal land Traficant that have links to public authorities. The hills have been systematically decreasing in a context in which urban pressures on them are growing, not only because of urban occupation, but also for their use as landfill and for exploitation through construction aggregates mining (Mamani & Nieuwland, 2017).
Since 2011, after pressure exercised by local communities surrounding the hills usually led by environmentalists (Venegoni, n.d.), Public sector has initiated an action plan to face the different challenges on the hills through the Lima Hills program (Programa Lomas de Lima) with 4 action lines: The first one was the creation of the Área de Conservación Regional Sistema de Lomas de Lima (Lima Hills System Regional Conservation Area) that gave official recognition to the most of the sites as fragile ecosystems supported by the legal frame of two municipal ordinances (environmental policy N°1628-2012-MML and environmental agenda N° 1640-2012-MML) boosting different municipal policy in conservation issues to protect and preserve vulnerable ecological units through their controlled access and maintenance, characterization/ profile studies for further territorial organization. The other three actions lines are the development of eco-touristic circuits for sustainable economic growth of local inhabitants, ecosystem restauration with native species, and the construction of hill-parcs as open spaces for integrating the human activities within the natural environment (MLM, 2014; LEL, 2014).
As mentioned, several local organizations and enterprises have risen up to protect them all. By instance, the “Frente de Defensa Ecológica del Valle de Lurín – Fredecol” (Lurín Valley Ecological Defense Front) has included the Cicasos Hills as part of the group of vulnerable ecosystems they try to protect. The Cicasos hills are located in the southern district of San Bartolo, about forty-five minutes outside the metropolitan area of Lima. I interviewed Fredecol´s current president Jaime Chipana, an all-time environmentalist neighbor of the Lurin district, who gave us an overall view on the association´s organization, objectives, successes and challenges
Fredecol was formed towards the end of 2008 to fight against the pollution of the Lurin river by Lima’s drinking water and sewerage service (Sedapal) and several production plants located along the river, affecting the water table of the locality. It started with only 6 neighbors who invited Jaime to support them with his experience, and now it assembles around 300 people working on it ah-honorem and as required depending on the urgency of the several project they are involved in. Many specialists, including several renowned professionals in biology, environmental sciences, geography, history and law have made themselves available to cooperate when needed with the locals in order to protect the “small-south” (sur chico) of Lima. Some politicians are also included, required to be able to connect the organization with the political power and have higher chances to promote their cause and obtain results.
In the beginning, Jaime was invited due to its participation as civil representative in the Lurín district municipality for the local projects participative budget control, in charge of the project’s inspection and communication to the local inhabitants. As a result of their first actions, Fredecol obtained a municipal ordinance forbidding industrial activity in the “trapecio de Lurín” area, with the intention to benefit the protection of vulnerable areas in the vicinity. Protection was directed to the ecosystems and the living conditions of the inhabitants affected by the production plants established there. A few years after the first meetings and the convoking neighbors, Jaime became the participative budget representative at the wider “departamento” level, including all the Lima “distritos”.
In 2014, the Lima Cement Company presented a project to expand its operation to the El Manzano hills. Cementos Lima was already operating in Pachacamac, another district that shared boundaries with the northern part of Lurin, where they completely degraded the soil of the Pucará hills after non-metalurgic mining activities to exploit a high-quality clay. Their next objective was El Manzano. In 2015, and due to Fredecol´s small size and weight when facing the interest of one of the biggest clay companies in Southamerica, many other local organizations defending hills are convoked to form the Red de Lomas de Lima (Lima hills network), and later on the Red de Lomas del Perú (Peru hills network) formed in 2018. The Lima hills network presented a file proving that the technical solutions proposed by Cementos Lima were not viable. Finally, in 2020, the authorities denied the opening of the “Cristina” quarry in El Manzano hills. This was settling a precedent on grootgrass initiatives facing a company with great power and political reach.
In 2018, Jaime met the San Bartolo major, with the idea of recognizing the Cicasos hills as part of the network of vulnerable ecosystems of Lima. As explained before, the hills permit the current conditions of the water cycle in a desertic city. They provide remedy to short term issues derived from climate change, as a form of adaptation through the water cycle regulation, the presence of vegetation coping with carbon dioxide emissions, and the transfer of water to wetlands located close to them. That year, the hills were officially recognized as a vulnerable ecosystem by legal norm RDE 153-2018-MINAGRI-SERFOR-DE. Moreover, their soil allow the percolation of humidity into the water table, avoiding the disappearance of wells required for human consumption. The hills also shelter several insects required for pollination. More information can be found on the Storymap presented at the end of this document.
According to Jaime, the objectives of the recognition of the Lima hills as a vulnerable ecosystem are two. Firstly, to create a municipality-citizen element to protect vulnerable ecosystems. Secondly, to include the hills on the Lima Hills System Regional Conservation Area. The replicability of the model followed by other hills conservation organization would provide stronger background and probably more resources to protect Cicasos from its main dangers: Cementos Lima on their quest for more high-quality clay present in the hills soil, and real state companies interested in developing projects in a growing city. However, the development of a strategic plan presents several complications, including that there are several views on what this plan should look like with different views that could even be opposite one to another.
Many limitations of the protection of Cicasos hills, as for most of these projects, are related to the established corruption on private and public sectors, confirming the thesis that the State is the main booster of informality and loss of biodiversity (Venegoni, n.d.). Many economic interests besides the protection of ecosystems play different roles and exercise different levels of stress, most of them benefiting from the ignorance and disinterest of big part of local population in regards of ecological preservation and ecological services. This reflects on several municipal ordinances not being followed by citizens and companies, legal protections supporting polluting industrial activities, a police force not acting according to existing protocols for land enclosure, for example. The lack of resources also plays a big role on the lack of action to achieve the goals. There is no budget item at San Bartolo municipality to create the file for Cicasos and enter the formal hills protection system, reason why the municipality has started to plan eco-tourism activities to raise necessary funds.
| Preliminary research |
| 1) City: Lima |
| 2) Initiative: Ecosystem protection |
| Selection case |
| 3) Case: Cicasos hills (San Bartolo) |
| 5) Organization: Fredecol |
| Collection of information |
| 6) Internet: Scientific literature |
| 7) Projects reports |
| 8) Facebook |
| 9) E-mail contact |
| 10) Phone pre-interview |
| 11) Zoom interview with Fredecol President |
| Production of the entry |
| Submission of the entry |
1. Invitation to Cicasos eco-trekking.
2. A group of people standing on the dirt.
3. Fredecol team leading the eko-trekking at Cicasos hill.
Bibliography
Lomeros en Lima (LEL). 2014. Proyecto Lomas: Pacto politico Lomas de Lima. [Online]. Available at: http://proyectolomas.weebly.com/uploads/1/0/6/3/10637077/pacto_poltico_por_las_lomas_de_lima_i.pdf
Mamani, J.M., Nieuwland, B. 2017. Las lomas de Lima: Enfocando ecosistemas desérticos como espacios abiertos en Lima metropolitana. Espacio y Desarrollo, [Online], 29, pp. 109-133. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317143928
Municipalidad de Lima Metropolitana (MLM). 2014. Lomas de lima: Futuros parques de la ciudad. Servicio de parques de Lima, [Online]. Available at: https://periferia.pe/assets/uploads/2020/06/Lomas-de-Lima_compressed.pdf
Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo (PNUD). 2018. Proyecto EbA Lomas: Retos y oportunidades en la conservación de las lomas de Lima Metropolitana. PNUD, [Online]. Available at: https://www.undp.org/content/dam/peru/docs/Publicaciones%20medio%20ambiente/Brochure_24PP_FINAL.pdf
Venegoni, Luisa. N.d. Justice for invaders? Urbanization-Conservation Conflict in Lima, Peru´s Lomas Ecosystems, [Online]. Available at: http://stonecenter.tulane.edu/uploads/Venegoni_Upload-1498770155.pdf
Storymap
Contact
Enkhmend Altansukh
Golden rays shone through the curtains, with speckles of dust floating along gently. Light breeze filtered through the crack in the window, bringing in smells of freshly cut grass. The chirping of birds could be heard. And in this serene scene sat a man, his physical appearance indicating he was no older than 20. In front of him was a letter, explaining what had happened, what his purpose was. As the letter explains, he was one of the few survivors from the cryo-sleep experiments the government had initiated. While the science behind it was sounds, too many complications within the body had rendered 94 of the 100 participants dead. The world he woke up in, it was different from all he had seen before. Unbelievable events occurred almost daily in this age of science, but this was a miracle. Picking up the letter, he gave it a read once more:
“Dear Mr. Dashdelger,
As you have been notified by our agents, you are one of the six surviving members of our cryo-chamber experiment. Currently, it is the year 2237 and from your perspective, you’ve been travelled 200 years into the future. Your memories are a bit foggy due to the lack of brain activity in cryo-stasis, but rest assured, as you do about your day like you usually would, your memories will return. After sunset, our agents will come collect you and we will listen in on your observations. I look forward to listening in on the thoughts of one of our predecessors.
-Dr. Miller”
It was a surreal experience. But, with his memories all jumbled up from his 200 year-long ice bath, he had no way of truly taking it all in. So, he did as the letter instructed, and walked out to enjoy his city. As he walked along the streets of Ulaanbaatar, Dashdelger could see many things different from what he’d known. He’d walked this route many times in his own era but it was unrecognizable now. The tall walls that had been soundproofing between his villa and the railroad was gone, and so was the railroad. In its place stood buildings made of seemingly pure silver, taller than most in his time. The streets that used to buzz with car alarms, traffic, and people shuffling about their day was now nearly empty of cars, roads that used to be dangerous transformed to platforms for pedestrians. Nearly everyone was walking, the sun ‘s bright shine illuminating a bright way that seemed impossible outside of old people’s villas in the US at his time. Baffled and overwhelmed, Dashdelger just went along with his routine, taking every small thing he could in. The skies were no longer gray with smog, not a single car in sight, everyone had smiles on their faces and the streets were colored green with the number of trees and vegetation. Nearly every 5 meters stood a tree, providing shade for the denizens of a peaceful city.
Almost all day was he like this. Overwhelmed. He managed to run into one of his fellow survivors and learned what exactly had happened. His companion has explained that Ulaanbaatar has changed to become one of the hallmarks of harmony between human and nature. They both knew that wasn’t the case in their time and resolved to find out exactly how it happened, and what a fruitful journey it was. While they hit a few setbacks at first with the libraries they knew being museums now, but they managed to find out that it all started with a “Save our park” movement in 2021. They were there when it had just started, but it was nothing but a few posts on Facebook back then. Apparently, after they’d gone into the induced sleep, people who were in possession of lots of money funded the “Save our parks” project by buying the entire land and turning it back into its former glory. The process had been to buy all of the land, cultivate it from the near wasteland it had become and make it available for the general public but not allowing people to litter and desecrate. Many common citizens saw how effective it was, and so did the rest of the financially endowed. With a lot more people taking interest in saving our city from becoming a gray and black wasteland, it was only a matter of time before all unused or misused specks of land were transformed into beautiful parks. But change takes time, and Ulaanbaatar had far worse problems than lands with dead grass. The air pollution was a one of the biggest in the world and such a problem was trying to be fixed even before they’d been in cryo-sleep. However, help from the west had been exactly what they’d needed. A timely project and invention had ushered our world into a new era of sustainable energy, leading the charge to purge out all pollution and remedying what humanity had done to nature. With the proper leadership, mankind was once again becoming one with nature. They were still the apex predators, not as destructive god-children, but as benevolent beneficiaries.
Too soon had the evening come, and sure enough, the agents Dr. Miller told them of arrived and showed them to their meeting spot where they were hoping to get some answers regarding the drastic changes Ulaanbaatar had gone through. And as soon as they saw the faces of the other four, they knew they weren’t the only ones. Dr. Miller arrived not too long after and questions began to fly. Answers with as much detail had been given in kind. From their 200 year-long absence from the world, it seemed all of them had realized being in a hurry never truly means anything. So, they all took their sweet time, taking a break from the massive dumps of information when the first rays of red indicated the sun was rising. Dashdelger struggled to function with the massive headache as his thoughts tried to wrap around what Dr. Millers had disclosed. He said that after the “Save our parks” project had made official; the government had been looking to do further ventures into saving the environment but they didn’t need to take the initiative. Citizens, particularly those born in early 2000’s and lower were participating and contributing very actively. From what he guessed; it was due to their generation being able to see the first signs of their predecessor’s actions’ consequences but being early enough to stop it. And it wasn’t just them, with various genius inventions, social/economical/environmental shifts meant that humanity was a whole were heading towards a new era.
Dashdelger was baffled. It was the next day and his brain had finally sorted enough for him to fully understand the implications of all he’d heard. The world was a better place now, and Ulaanbaatar was just a small glimpse into what kind of future he’d arrived in. The current globe-wide project all countries worked towards was removing the pollution from the sea. Just that statement alone boggled the mind. The things the future (past?) generations had accomplished made him feel awfully inadequate and shameful about his own. It would be justified, seeing his children’s generations went down as the saviors while his own generation were the ones who ruined the environment in the history books. It was humbling. Then he looked up and all his worries became insignifact. He realized his own feelings held no value in the grand scheme of things. Maybe that what they failed to realize and their children succeeded in. They’d known to put something else before their own feelings, ambitions, and wants. The sky was blue, not gray, and Dashdelger knew that even if what the current generation was doing failed or backfired, the next would stop in and fix it. Nature has a way of persevering like that. But for now, he had much smaller things to do. Like enjoying his new city, still Ulaanbaatar, but in the year 2237.
References:
- Facebook page on Save the park https://www.facebook.com/groups/284108593272592
- The Medical Futurist (2021) https://medicalfuturist.com/are-you-going-to-wake-up-from-cryosleep/
- My own imagination
Children park in 1983
How the park was planned in 2004
Recent situation in 2021
Social movement in April, 2021
By Nasreddine EL Guezar
CONFERENCE
“Have a good day, love! I hope you like it out there, I hear that Morocco is a warm and welcoming place!”
I read the message my husband left me as I was heading to the conference room at the University Campus of Technology and Expertise in Oujda, Morocco. It was only seconds before an usher welcomed and guided me to the main conference room. I entered the place and found my way through to my seat next to a young blonde woman, who was scanning a pamphlet of the conference. I sat and observed calmly the spacious room. I could easily distinguish the languages and accents I heard around me.
The young woman next to me seemed restless.
“I am not usually a whiner, but isn’t it way too hot in this country,” she said to me, longing for a conversation. “I was boiling outside!”
I smiled and nodded in agreement.
“It is not what I expected; there are no green spaces in here; besides, everything seems artificial and phony.” She continued. “When I go back to my town in Switzerland, I will hug the trees in my yard.”
“I guess we are living in the Wall-E world,” I responded in a humorous tone.
She looked puzzled for a moment but acted like she understood my analogy. Perhaps she was not familiar with classic environmental movies. Nobody watches movies these days. I wanted to lighten the atmosphere with a relevant fact.
“I learned that the city of Oujda has become one of the hottest cities in the Mediterranean.” I sensed that I did not express the degree of discomfort she felt, but I went on and introduced myself to her: “I’m Márcia Amaral, an environmental photographer and artist from Brazil, but my husband and I have been settling in Sweden.”
“Interesting, I never understood why real people are still doing photography jobs these days, to be honest,” she said. “AI Drones have been taking care of that for ages now!”
I felt a little offended, and I wanted to give her an idea about my art project, but she continued:
“Kate Reber from Switzerland, you can tell I’m the youngest here,” she said proudly. “I was invited here after leading a protest group in my high school about a tree they cut down in the schoolyard.” She chuckled. “People who saw my protest video called me names like the future environmental activist. Oh, look, the screen is changing!”
OUJDA
The large screen displayed a video about the host city, Oujda. The North-Eastern Moroccan city was chosen to hold the Mediterranean Climate Conference for the 2190 edition. Every year, the conference organizers selected an environmentally vulnerable city from the Mediterranean region to host the meetings. The conference had been home to politicians, policymakers, engineers, scientists, activists, artists, and scholars from different parts of the world. They came together to converse and reflect on the environmental situation of the Mediterranean region, which had warmed 30% faster than the global average.
Besides its vulnerable ecosystem, the cultural diversity and Mediterranean closeness of Oujda made it an ideal city to hold the MCC conference this particular year. The city is less than 60 km away from the Mediterranean basin, and it has been characterized mainly by its border position. The video put on view several sites that used to be the landmarks of the city, namely the old medina, the great mosque, Lalla Aicha Park, and Sidi Maafa Forest. The video then focused on the last site, Sidi Maafa Forest.
Moments later, the screen changed again. This time it showed two short videos with two dates, 2020 and 2190. Both dates were for the forest of Sidi Maafa, and the videos that were shown next were staggering. Some people in the audience chattered audibly after seeing them. Along with the first date, the video showed a woody green forest, rich red soils, and flocks of birds chirping on a variety of trees and plants. The second video revealed a completely lifeless desert.
The display was then followed by an IPCC report about the climate in Oujda. In 2020, the climate was generally influenced by the interior Mediterranean climate, mild with dry, hot summers. The hottest month was July, when the max temperature was about 35℃. Things, however, changed in the last century as the report demonstrated. The inhabitants of the region experienced episodes of drought coupled with a phenomenon of desertification. Rain did not fall for the last six decades in the whole oriental region of Morocco, which made Oujda and its peripheries look deserted. The report concluded that Oujda had become the hottest city in Morocco, hitting its highest temperature ever recorded: 50.8°C.
Following other videos, images, and reports, the audience participants were invited to a field excursion at Sidi Maafa to see with their own eyes the changes that had occurred in the place.
“An excursion to the Sidi Maafa Desert? They must be kidding!” Kate Reber shook her head in disbelief. “I am heading back to the hotel,” she added before she slowly disappeared among the moving crowd.
SIDI MAAFA
We boarded big, hydrogen-powered tour buses. The buses were obviously new; I wondered if they had even been used before. The passenger who sat next to me was a local resident. I learned from him that the Oujdi community did not appreciate the introduction of ecobuses. Water scarcity made them resentful towards governmental initiatives. Through the massive windows of the bus, I could see many WaterForAll signs on the walls of the buildings we passed by.
On the excursion, we were given juice and water. I put a bottle of water in my pocket and started taking photographs of the sites we passed by in Sidi Maafa. I was immersed in a photograph that captures all the visible features of the land until someone nearby asked me:
“There isn’t much here to take photographs for, is there?”
Turning to my right side, I stood up in curiosity to meet a bald, middle-aged man with a badge that said Smith Beard, a British environmental scientist. I felt the name was familiar.
“Uh, well, the extinction of a whole forest is a thing after all, isn’t it?” I replied in a friendly manner.
“Right! As scientists, I wonder what more we could give as proof of the gravity of climate change effects.” He seemed upset. “I have researched the past climate of this city; Rainfall was at least 400 mm per year. After 170 years, look what we have here, arid land with scorching temperatures and no rainfall.”
“I like your recent work on the climate of the region, Dr. Beard,” interrupted a man in a gray suit, with a self-assured smile. “Sean Harddy, with double d, a US AI investor. Friends call me Hux.”
I introduced myself in exchange, but Dr. Beard did not. He did not seem comfortable in the presence of Harddy. The two seemed to have met before.
“You like science, Mrs. Márcia?” Harddy asked me with unquestionable confidence.
“It gives us the data!” I answered in short giggles.
“Data isn’t doing anything nowadays.” Harddy reacted with a smirk. “We are on the threshold of a new century, and the environmental changes are still taking place.” He noticed a slight annoyance appearing on the face of Dr. Beard. “Science has been giving us data and facts, but data were just numbers, and facts were misled by people’s emotions and anxieties. Confirmed information that climate scientists give is nothing but climate fright to people.”
“And of course, you AI investors pursue the profit, wherever it is,” Dr. Beard responded. “I saw your company’s last ad about that app that claims its users can instantly feel environmentally optimistic and less anxious about world problems.”
“That’s how it works, Dr. Beard, don’t blame the investors! Look, I love trees and clean air, with pleasant weather too, but scientists in recent decades did nothing but scare people about the Earth’s climate. They fed the thirst of environmental activists, politicians, and even us, the investors.”
“Are you saying we need a new approach, Mr. Harddy?” I intervened.
“I don’t think we can do anything about it,” replied Harddy. “It is those folks who think we can change that are deluded. Humans aren’t responsible for climate changes and even if they were, they could do nothing about it. What humans can do is maybe prevent pollution, rethink resource consumption, and improve recycling. Controlling the climate opposes a true environmental sense!”
“Okay,” Dr. Beard commented. “So, every climate scientist is nothing but a scaremonger, according to Mr. Harddy, with double d.”
“Do you wanna know how many ‘the world is ending’ meetings I had to take up?” Harddy said calmly, looking at me. “I have been hearing those alarming calls backed up with numbers and reports from scientists that the signs of ecological collapse are so imminent. The warnings were basically the same in the last two centuries. Nothing happened, humanity, my friends, has been adjusting to environmental changes.”
“Harddy, or as your friends call you, Hux, aren’t you simply speaking from the playbook that the climate change deniers spoke from two centuries ago?” asked Dr. Beard with minor agitation. “While many cities in the world are having the worst summer storms in decades, wildfires destroy land on three continents and islands are being swallowed by the ocean, you say we just sit there and watch? I think you got it all wrong. You speak as if science spread environmental fear and terror, yet it is people’s ignorance and uncontrolled emotions that were behind that!”
“You are a photographer, right?” Harddy turned to me, ignoring Dr. Beard’s last statement. “Why don’t you take a photograph for us to commemorate the date. Beard and I have different views, but we like debating with each other, just like siblings, right, Smith?”
Dr. Beard did not respond but reluctantly agreed to take the picture. I took the photograph and promised to send them a copy.
The groups dispersed as we headed back to the hotel.
HOTEL
I sat in the lobby of the hotel. It was a delight to listen to the soothing music that was mixed with the quiet murmurs of the people in the background. I sensed it was a convenient moment to type a text to my husband about all the details of my encounters today. Right after I sent the message, notifications from Kate Reber were popping up on my phone screen. She posted several shorts expressing her support for the misfortunes of the Oujdi people who protest every day for equal water distribution.
I turned off my phone and felt a deep need to reflect on everything that happened in my day. I reviewed the data shared in the morning presentations. Then I looked at the photos I took, examined them carefully, and pondered the forest that was drastically transformed into a desert. I also thought about my conversation with Reber and the one between Beard and Harddy. The local protests came to my mind too. Unhurriedly, I tried to put it all together and connect it to see what I could learn from it all.
My moment of reflection was then interrupted when my husband called.
Saloni Sharma
Hybrid Technology offers mirroring and reprogramming of the natural gametes enabling single organism production of offsprings via external fertilization in our state-of-the-art-laboratories set in all major rehabilitation facilities. Originated at Chengdu’s Science City, the technology is now adopted by all major sovereignties. In the 4th phase of restoration of the third 10-year plan (2120-2130), Hybrid technology will be implemented in animals, both human and non-human after the succesful results in plant hybrids. Hybrid plants have ensured food safety for the implementation and generation of more hybrid species. The present plan aims to reinstate the ecological balance with the production of human and non-human hybrids and restore social order.
(Manual for Social Restoration, published in 2120)
Why would have they accepted me? I am not accepted here, how could I expect otherwise on the opposite side of the border? Have I not got any place in this world?What is my business really? Who am I? I’m a vagrant, a migrant, a hybrid…
These thoughts kept haunting Aasha as she lay on the floor of her facility unit.
It was time for strength training and she couldn’t even conjure enough strength to get up off the floor. But in an instant she erected her limbs and stood upright parallel to the wall. The thought of missing her food pills instantly charged her up with energy. Her stomach growled in anticipation as she made her way towards her meal. She swiped her card in the common pantry to dispense her pills. Today’s menu included Schezwan Potatoes and Sour Cream Onions. She swallowed two pills of each. The third one — Gulab Jamun, she sneaked in her pocket to plant outside.
This is not even remotely close to the actual sichuan flavour.
Aasha couldn’t help recall the first time she tasted the sichuan flavour — in wholefood rice form — at a rickety shack in Chengdu. Rice crops were banned in all tropical sectors many years ago when water was over. That is when hybrid fruit production was accelerated. In China, there’s water prosperity and even the poor can eat rice. When Aasha took the first bite, she smelled and tasted multitude of fragrances in a single bite — garlic, pepper, lemongrass, ginger. She can never forget the overwhelm. Excited and hungry, she gulped down three wholefood bowls. But the food couldn’t sit in her stomach for long. She experienced excruciating bowel movements that expelled the feces immediately after.
Wholefoods are unhealthy. They cause polarity in the system.
*
At the gym, she stood in the digestion position for exactly five minutes for her food to expand. She was already beginning to feel full and felt better about showing up for the strength training today. If not anything, it’d keep her guilt and shame at bay — at least for a while. She turned on the floating visual and connected with the Sportzone channel. Others were already there. She sent apologies to the e-captain and quickly began her static running.
After 5 minutes. Her sugar levels began depleting. Limbs were losing coordination. Something was wrong.
A message popped open in front of Aasha. EC: Aside
Aasha immediately logged out of the Sportzone and connected in a Direct Meeting with the Captain.
“You called for DM, Captain?”
“Your functions aren’t optimal.” “I’m sorry captain.”
“Psychic stability! Now!” “Yes, Captain”
Aasha swiped off the floating screen and wiped off her sweat. Then, she scanned her pulse and oxygen. The numbers didn’t feel accurate. She made her way back to her unit and scurried to change herself into comfortwear. She looked herself in the mirror. A pale reflection stared back at her. Their eyes were locked and tears began welling up. Aasha lowered her glance to read the tattoo on her reflection’s right arm. It read 真.
“Truth”, she muttered.
***
“There’s a storm approaching again. The power might be out for sometime. Let’s wrap up quickly. Tell me, Aasha. Your e-captain states FUNCTIONS NOT OPTIMAL.”
Aasha enlarged the floating screen to get a close look at Dr Shantaram. He had a black mole in the crevice between his left nostril and cheek — the size of a chickpea, Aasha estimated.
“You cannot serve the nation with an unhealthy mind, you know. Do you remember your goals?”
Aasha kept silent. She knew the drill. It wasn’t her first session in psychic stability. There had been multiple such sessions with the previous facilitator before her relapse over a year ago. However, this was her first encounter with Dr Shantaram.
“State your goals!” the voice was sterner this time.
Aasha surrendered, “Perform the tasks, provide for the facility, prepare for the calamity, protect the sovereignty.”
“System spots dissonance in your voice.” Aasha was silent again.
“I see in your file that you’ve been rehabilitated thrice?” “I relapsed, then re-registered.”
“You left the facility! Thrice?!” Aasha did not respond.
“So I see. You were last rehabilitated on 16.07.2201. So you’ve just returned it seems. That explains why your performance isn’t so… let’s say desirable.”
Before Aasha could respond, the screen vanished — power cut.
*
“My parent’s name was Aasha too.”
Aasha tried to study the expression on Dr Shantaram’s face. This time he seemed more candid and relaxed. The session ran on backup power and the lights in each of their background was very dim.
“Do you know the meaning of your name?”
Aasha didn’t have to respond. Dr Shantaram would respond anyway.
“Hope. And my parent did have a lot of hope I tell you. That’s why they had me in the first place. Otherwise why subject a poor spirit to the miseries of this world by conceiving them in a beaker! Perhaps, they didn’t know that the moment I’d be born, I’d be the property of North-East Indian sovereignty.
Anyway, I digress.”
He’s a hybrid!
Dr Shantaram read the expression on Aasha’s face and softly uttered, “Ya, I’m a hybrid.”
Aasha was not sure how to respond to this; she didn’t have to as Dr Shantaram continued.
“I’m a hybrid, a fortunate one at that! Fortunate to be serving this facility, the nation and inspiring young misguided hybrids like you! Do you know how I got to this position?”
Aasha was getting used to his style of communication.
“I was transferred to so many units in far off facilities… But I was determined to prove myself and be useful… So many challenges… I was tested for not just physical but mental stealth…”
Aasha zoned out and began painting her own picture of Dr Shantaram in her mind.
Perhaps, he doesn’t have any mind at all. For the mindless, it’s a smooth-sail — mindless does not resist. Head of the psychic stability — Hah!
As he was nearing the end of his soliloquy, Dr Shantaram interrupted himself to ask Aasha with a keen look, “Why did you go to China? You could go to Upper Europe, or Antarctica. Although I know UE and Antarctica haven’t taken
any migrants for many years and trafficking is also impossible via sea and air now. But why dare flee to another sovereignty? You know you wouldn’t have been accepted anyway.”
“There exists a history as old as 6000 years. And we don’t have any history at all — we’re fighting for the sovereignty of individual sectors that we don’t even belong to. And I wanted to find a community of my likes.”
“Community!” Dr Shantaram chuckled. “Child, you’re so naïve! We hybrids do not have any community! Our community is our service. That’s our survival.”
Aasha felt unsettled. She could feel the rage taking over her mind, but she was determined to not let him win over. With an exhale, she lowered her blood pressure. Dr Shantaram must have noticed the shift in her mood measurements.
“Did you go via the land route?”
Aasha fixed her gaze at his image on the screen and blurted. “I walked the path of my ancestors.”
*
“These powercuts make operations so difficult! No wonder the facilities in
N.E. sector are underperforming,” Dr Shantaram complained.
“So tell me quickly why did you relapse and go to China? You were seeking hope too, let me guess?”
“Seeking truth!”
“Ironic, I’d say. Hope seeks truth!”sneering he continued, “Hope is living in falsehood!”
Then in an instant his eyes looked away, as if in recollection from a past life, then with a raised eyebrow questioned — as if to himself, “Or is hope in the truth?”
Aasha’s eyes lit up.
***
The blaring siren shook Aasha off her sleep. She checked her wrist. It read 1600 hrs SUN EXPOSURE. Dr Shantaram prescribed a two hour sleep session and she was grateful to him for that at least as she didn’t have to toil in the production today.
Slipping into her hazmat suit, Aasha made her way towards EXIT A which opened in a wide landscape with hundreds of trees erected in straight lines alongside the long walking track leading to the Dietary Lab.
Rays of light disoriented Aasha’s vision. She felt the heat in her body radiating through her shining body suit. Queasy and unsure of the way, she found fellow trainees in the distance ahead. They were all teenage hybrids, like her — but younger and immature.
A dozen or so hybrids had gathered in clusters of two or three. It had only been ten days since Aasha was rehabilitated again to the N.E. facility. All the fellow inhabitants were new to Aasha. Old compatriots were already stationed in Environment Security Bureau. Some might have also joined the Protection Forces. She had very limited recollection of the past. However, this was not the cause of her present uneasiness. She was consumed by thoughts on another matter — a matter reverberating in another space and time.
Shaking herself out of the daze, she began treading forward.
Fellow inhabitants were walking ahead of her on a bricked path laid out in a
an uneven herringbone configuration. Aasha followed, looking down. She amused herself by stepping on every third intersection of the bricks below her feet. In her mind, she rewound the conversation with Dr Shantaram.
How can service be a community to anyone! Community builds on a place with people sharing the same context. And I don’t have a place to call my own. I don’t have people that I could say are mine. And I don’t have purpose to belong anywhere.
Anywhere but here, perhaps — back to NE Rehabilitation Facility.
She felt the urge to swipe open the floating screen and go through the transcript to corroborate her self-judgement about the performance she gave out at psychic stability. However, she could only do so after returning to the unit when surveillance was lower.
After continuous walking in peripheral compound for half an hour, tired, thirsty, Aasha paused to catch her breath. As she looked around to find fellow trainees, her gaze fell on a tree in some distance from the turn of the track.
Was it here before?
All the trees around the N.E. Facility were hybrid — producing artificially flavoured fruits which were harvested and sent to dietary labs for synthesising food pills. N.E. Facility was known for its sweet and spicy flavourings. Their Masala Tomatoes and Pickle Mangoes were exported to all the habitable continents left. Aasha’s parent worked as a harvester and this is how she knew where her food came from. In fact, it was her parent, her mother, who nurtured her interest and curiosity in non-human hybrids.
This tree before Aasha however, looked different. It had a slender trunk and an unnatural, but a natural, bend towards the solar sky. As she walked closer, Aasha observed that its trunk was slightly grazed and charred at the edges below. She went and stood under its foliage. Then, took one step closer and reached her hand out to touch the grainy bark with her gloves. Lowering herself, she examined the charred edges and stroked them gently.
This tree was a non-hybrid non-human.
***
As soon as she was back in her unit cell, Aasha read the transcript of her session with Dr Shantaram. She scanned through the bottom of the page almost immediately because apart from her vital signs and goals, the entirety of the conversation was redacted.
She again rewound the conversation in her mind.
“Hope is in the truth!” She ascertained after deep thought.
It was time for supper but Aasha chose to ignore the alarm. Instead, she ducked under her bed and reached out for her bag. An olive-green vegan- leathered diary fell on the floor.
She picked it up with a deep sigh and began flipping the pages.
*
Guanghan, Deyang, CN
18.07.2200
19:37:43
City of the 22nd century — Chengdu.
I’m here in Chengdu — the city of miracles — almost here. It was a tumultuous journey but, I made it. Spirit of my parent would be so proud. I will recreate my life here, as promised.
Seeing her radiating smile next to this diary entry, Aasha couldn’t help but smile back into the page. So very excited she was to learn the truth about her existence. Chengdu is the epitome of Hybrid Science and Spirit, and the genes of her ancestors were created right there.
Guanghan, Deyang, CN 23.07.2200
21:30:15
I ate Sichuan curry with rice today in whole food form! It was very hot and very heavy. I felt polarity in my body right after though. Nonetheless, it was an experience worth remembering.
Migrant hybrids are stationed outside the city at the subarban altitudes. This is where I live.
Next to this entry was the picture of Aasha’s in her bedspace unit. Her neighbours came to Chengdu with the same intent as hers — to find a space for themselves. Living there was temporary until years passed and they could not get the permit to enter the city.
Guanghan, Deyang, CN
7.08.2200
23:41:03
I’m recruited as a handyman to collect twigs for fire generator. This is a temporary arrangement which will assure shelter and diet. A girl next door has got the pass to the city. I might get mine soon.
That girl’s pass was stolen, Aasha recollected. There were countless migrants living in peripheries, trying to gain entry.
Moving to a new place and making adjustments in alignment with the new environment is very difficult.
So is coming back.
Aasha kept her diary aside only to pick it up right after.
*
Guanghan, Deyang, CN 31.03.2201
00:38:19
I’m here for 8+ months now. I work and sleep. My only interaction is with human- bots. They are not kind.
Guanghan, Deyang, CN
05.04.2201
01:06:45
I collect twigs from the trees for my food. I give my water to them in return — in secrecy, of course. Water is gold and hybrid trees are efficient. They do not require water, they say. But I know that they do. The human-bot doesn’t understand that this earth is depleted of water.
Guanghan, Deyang, CN 06.04.2201
00:55:19
A human bot came and said, I cannot plant my seed here. I cannot water the trees. It’s their trees. The earth is theirs. The sky is theirs. I do not belong here.
Was it the human-bot or a huMan who said this?
Guanghan, Deyang, CN 07.05.2201
02:14:57
I was placed in detention camp for planting my seed. I’m back now. I came here to find my truth and realise my potential — to trace back the footsteps of my ancestors. I think, they were not real. Nothing is real.
A bright moon hangs on moonless nights. This moon does remind me of my family when I look up in the face of this moon — and long for my family that doesn’t exist.
The trees are artificial, the moon is artificial, the earth is artificial. And if it is so, huMan made it. It belongs to them. Not me. So where do I belong? What belongs to me?
Am I artificial too?
Chenghua, Chengdu, CN 10.05.2201
01:45:43
I got the tourist pass today to enter the city. My tokens are over but I’m going back. I went to the Panda Retreat instead of the Science City. Something in me said, that I wouldn’t belong there. So, I chose to visit pandas.
I looked at many. All of them had traces of life — preserved and survived by huMan. We cannot survive without our body suit. Countless non-humans died. Panda lives — victory of culture.
Aasha could relate to the panda, she too lived in a cage, closely monitored. She too was preserved for her gene. Looking at the panda, she felt a desperate urge to return back to the cage she’d come from.
***
A yellow-white leaf fell out in Aasha’s lap as she closed the flap of her hard bound diary. A buddhist monk had handed this leaf on her journey in the silk
route tunnel at Jibin. It was a brief encounter, but she remembered it vividly.
She stared at the leaf and saw in it the dingy tunnel that she spent twelve days walking in.
The journey was tiring and Aasha did not have the strength to go on, yet she persisted. There were hundreds of others moving along on foot with her. Without proper sources of hydration and sun exposure everyone just kept walking like zombies. There were people from all corners of the subcontinent — trafficking themselves collectively in small groups to avoid any kind of suspicion or threat. Some had lost their lands and livelihood to the sea, some were hybrids or other lesser minorities hoping to rebuild their identity, some were fleeing the new strain of viruses, but all were migrating with the same hope.
At a junction which branched out in all directions, her group was made to stop at a threat signal. Some were panicking and some were too exhausted to resist. Amidst the congestion, they decided to climb out into a connecting village that was on the border of Tibet and Sichuan — to rest and refuel their spirits.
The place was alive and everyone in Aasha’s group suddenly felt alive themselves as they walked past it. Aasha was walking on a street unknown, towards an unknown destination with people she barely knew. She was nervous but excited with anticipation.
Then, Aasha spotted a tattoo parlour on the way. She was determined to go inside and commemorate this moment on her body. A renewed Aasha who will rebuild a new life henceforth, she ended up spending all her tokens to get a permanent imprint that would remind her to keep going.
As she came out of the parlour, everyone in her group turned to look at the hybrid’s tattoo. At that moment, Aasha met the eyes of a buddhist monk who was travelling in the preceding group — that had to cross the tunnel a day
earlier; however, because of a landslide, the exit was blocked and they were stuck with the same lot as Aasha’s.
The monk walked over to Aasha and expressed admiration for her spirit. He gave her the leaf as a symbol of luck and said — remember who you are.
Soon after, they parted ways to go in separate tunnels.
There was nothing on the leaf, nothing written. It was an old dried leaf of a rare non-hybrid tree or plant.
Aasha looked at the leaf and recalled his words “Remember who you are…” Then she repeated the same words in a question to herself.
***
It was the middle of the night. She needed to oxygenate her mind. Aasha climbed out of her bed and slipped into her body suit.
She had escaped the facility check countless times, although in the records, she had only absconded thrice, which couldn’t have been left undetected as they were longer than simple overnight escapes. Aasha was masterful at cracking the security checks of the facility — a useful skill passed down by her hybrid parent. And tonight was yet another night to flee into the open sky.
*
Aasha ran out of the facility from EXIT C and circled her way around the periphery towards EXIT A.
It was dark, but she had worn her night glasses to navigate her way forward.
She was going back to meet the tree she had discovered in the afternoon.
When she got there, she took the Gulab Jamun pill she had dispensed for breakfast and in a small hole in the earth that she made with the heel of her shoe, carefully sowed it. This would become a hybrid tree of a rose flavoured jamun.
Hopefully.
She looked up at the non-hybrid tree from where she was still squatting. She rose and walked up closer. In an impulse she hugged the tree, feeling the uneven bark touch against her chest through her body suit. She took off her gloves, and once again caressed the charred edges of the tree. And as she did, she whispered, “You are my hope.”
And I am yours.
***
The Hanging Gardens of Morro da Babilônia
By Natasha Augusto Barbosa
Universidade Federal Do Rio De Janeiro
Laboratório História E Natureza Labhen Ufrj
English version (Portuguese below)
The Mutirão Reflorestamento project is an initiative of the city of Rio de Janeiro implemented in the late 1980s. This project is an offshoot of a previous project, Mutirão, which aimed to urbanize favelas with the help of the residents’ workforce. of the communities served. Reforestation becomes part of this main project with the purpose of recovering and maintaining the vegetation cover of the city’s slopes, contributing to the promotion of biodiversity, in addition to controlling the expansion of slums.
One of the favelas covered by the project was Morro da Babilônia, located in the Leme neighborhood, close to Copacabana, which during the 17th century housed fortifications to prevent invasions of the city. The intensification of the occupation of this region and the recognition of the hill as a favela dates back to the beginning of the 20th century, a period of great urban transformations in the city of Rio de Janeiro. During the process of occupation of the hill, the Atlantic forest gave way to the colony grass, and the instability of the soil, associated with heavy rains, caused the community to experience tragic episodes, with human and material losses, in this way, the relationship of the favela with a biophysical environment for a long time was crossed by fear.
In 1995 the reforestation project was installed in the favela of Morro da Babilônia. The basis of the reforestation project in slums is the cooperation of the residents of the areas served, both for the knowledge of the region, of the people, as well as for the subsequent support for the maintenance of the plantations. There were attempts at reforestation carried out by private companies, however, in slum areas it did not prove to be a viable option for decoupling from the space. Even so, this is an alternative for regions where reforestation cannot be implemented with local participation. The preparation of the soil and planting of tree seedlings carried out by the Mutirão Reflorestamento in Morro da Babilônia was completed in 2000, and then maintenance of the reforestation began.
The residents who participated in this work together with forestry engineers, agronomists and biologists from the city of Rio de Janeiro did not have employment relationships, and to remedy this instability the Municipal Environment Department (SMAC) and the Labor and Employment Department encouraged the creation of a reforestation cooperative, thus, the Cooperative of Workers in Reforestation and Provision of Services of Babilônia Ltda, COOPBABILÔNIA was born. From that moment on, reforestation was the responsibility of the cooperative, formed and managed by the residents of the favela, with technical support from SMAC and with private partnerships and incentives.
Mutirão Reflorestamento remains active, protecting and planting throughout the city of Rio de Janeiro. The project reconciled social and environmental initiatives, helped to strengthen and create a new vision of local identity, in the face of the complex interaction between favela and city.
Residents of the Morro da Babilônia favela are proud of the project, its success has become a tool for defending the plantations. They recognize the improvements in the environment, which has become safer in the face of the impacts of rains, reduced the occurrence of landslides, improved the microclimate, and gradually restores the Atlantic Forest ecosystem, but even with the success of the project and the resurgence of this forest urban, the opposition between favela and city does not end.
Reforestation in Morro da Babilônia is a successful model that can be improved and replicated according to other local needs and realities. The Reforestation Mutirão is a way of reflecting and acting on the urban space in dialogue with the environment, recognizing the positive interaction between communities and public authorities.
Mutirão Reflorestamento obtained national and international recognition, such as selection in the UN Megacities Project in 1990, composing the publication Environmental Innovation for Sustainable Mega-Cities: Sharing approaches that work, and the Projeto Modelo award by the Society for Ecological Restoration in 1999, among others. In more than thirty years of reforestation, the project was reproduced in 92 neighborhoods, more than 10 million seedlings were planted on hills and slopes in the city of Rio de Janeiro.
Portuguese:
O projeto Mutirão Reflorestamento é uma iniciativa da prefeitura da cidade do Rio de Janeiro implementada no final da década de 1980. Este projeto é um desdobramento de um projeto anterior, o Mutirão, que objetivava a urbanização de favelas com auxílio da força de trabalho dos moradores das comunidades atendidas. O reflorestamento passa a integrar este projeto principal com o propósito de recuperação e manutenção da cobertura vegetal das encostas da cidade, contribuindo para promoção da biodiversidade, além de controlar a expansão das favelas.
Uma das favelas contempladas pelo projeto foi o Morro da Babilônia, localizado no bairro do Leme, próximo à Copacabana, e que durante o século XVII abrigou fortificações para impedir invasões à cidade. A intensificação da ocupação desta região e o reconhecimento do morro como uma favela, remonta ao início do século XX, período de grandes transformações urbanas na cidade do Rio de Janeiro. Ao longo do processo de ocupação do morro a mata atlântica deu lugar ao capim-colonião, e a instabilidade do solo, associada as fortes chuvas, fizeram com que a comunidade vivesse episódios trágicos, com perdas humanas e materiais, desta forma, a relação da favela com meio biofísico durante muito tempo foi atravessada pelo medo.
Em 1995 o projeto de reflorestamento foi instalado na favela do Morro da Babilônia. A base do projeto de reflorestamento em favelas é a cooperação dos moradores das áreas atendidas, tanto pelo conhecimento da região, das pessoas, bem como, pelo posterior apoio a manutenção dos plantios. Houve tentativas de reflorestamento realizado por empresas privadas, porém, em áreas de favelas não se mostrou uma opção viável pela desvinculação com o espaço. Ainda sim, esta é uma alternativa para regiões onde o reflorestamento não pode ser implementado com participação local. O preparo do solo e plantio das mudas de árvores feitos pelo Mutirão Reflorestamento no Morro da Babilônia foi concluído no ano de 2000, e em seguida foi iniciada a manutenção do reflorestamento.
Os moradores que participaram deste trabalho em conjunto com engenheiros florestais, agrônomos e biólogos da prefeitura do Rio de Janeiro, não possuíam vínculos empregatícios, e para sanar esta instabilidade a Secretaria Municipal de Meio Ambiente (SMAC) e a Secretaria de Trabalho e Emprego, incentivaram a criação de uma cooperativa de reflorestamento, assim, nasceu a Cooperativa de Trabalhadores em Reflorestamento e Prestação de Serviços da Babilônia Ltda, COOPBABILÔNIA. A partir deste momento o reflorestamento estava a cargo da cooperativa, formada e gerida pelos moradores da favela, com apoio técnico da SMAC e, com parceria e incentivos privados.
O Mutirão Reflorestamento continua ativo, protegendo e realizando plantios por toda a cidade do Rio de Janeiro. O projeto conciliou iniciativa social e ambiental, colaborou para o fortalecimento e uma nova visão da identidade local, frente a complexa interação entre favela e cidade.
Os moradores da favela do Morro da Babilônia têm orgulho do projeto, o seu sucesso se tornou ferramenta para defesa dos plantios. Eles reconhecem as melhorias no ambiente, que se tornou mais seguro diante aos impactos das chuvas, minorou a ocorrência de deslizamentos, propiciou a melhora do microclima, e gradualmente recompõe o ecossistema da mata atlântica, mas mesmo com o êxito do projeto e ressurgimento desta floresta urbana, a oposição favela e cidade não se encerra.
O reflorestamento no Morro da Babilônia é um modelo exitoso que pode ser aprimorado e replicado de acordo com outras necessidades e realidades locais. O Mutirão Reflorestamento é uma forma de refletir e agir sobre o espaço urbano em diálogo com o ambiente, reconhecendo a positiva interação entre comunidades e o poder público.
O Mutirão Reflorestamento obteve reconhecimento nacional e internacional, como a seleção no Projeto Megacidades da ONU em 1990, compondo a publicação Environmental Innovation for Sustainable Mega-Cities: Sharing approaches that work, e o prêmio Projeto Modelo pelo Society for Ecological Restoration em 1999, dentre outros. Em mais de trinta anos de reflorestamento o projeto foi reproduzido em 92 bairros, mais de 10 milhões de mudas foram plantadas em morros e encostas da cidade do Rio de Janeiro.
Sources
Sedrez, Lise; Barbosa, Natasha Augusto. Narrativas na Babilônia: Uma experiência de história oral e história ambiental, reflorestamento e comunidade (1985-2015). In: MAIA, Andréa Casa Nova. (org.). História Oral e Direito à cidade: Paisagens urbanas, narrativas e memória social. São Paulo: Letra e Voz, 2019. p. 79-99.
Barbosa, Natasha Augusto. Os jardins suspensos do Morro da Babilônia: o mutirão reflorestamento na perspectiva da história ambiental urbana (1985-2015)130 f. Dissertação (Mestrado em História) – Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Instituto de História, Programa de Pós-Graduação em História Social, 2020.
Mutirão de Reflorestamento celebra 33 anos com mais de dez milhões de mudas plantadas em morros e encostas. Prefeitura do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro, 20 de junho de 2021. Disponível em:< https://prefeitura.rio/meio-ambiente/mutirao-de-reflorestamento-celebra-33-anos-com-mais-de-dez-milhoes-de-mudas-plantadas-em-morros-e-encostas/>. Acesso em: 20 de agosto de 2021.
Secretaria Municipal de Meio Ambiente. Refloresta Rio: Programa de Reflorestamento do Município do Rio de Janeiro. Disponível em: <https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/7afa6040cd4e46b48720e280b7238434>. Acesso em: 20 de agosto de 2021.
Nicolás Cuvi
From the silent cockpit of the aircraft, with a 360-degree view, Francisco the peacemaker watched as the Quito plateau slipped away. Directly ahead it was clear, with no signs of rain, at least as far as he could see. Neither did the ship announce any storm alerts, so he decided to relax. After a verbal instruction, the machine confirmed the autopilot connection. He snorted twice, his particular way of ending something.
He glimpsed the mountainous landscape. Some of the colossi had a small white hat, a result of the previous night’s snowfall. They were ephemeral covers, which would last just a few hours until the snow melted and the typically arid landscape of the XXIII century Andes returned. It was pretty, no doubt. But neither that beauty, nor the prospects of a pleasant climate for the trip, alleviated his recurring uncomfortable thoughts: the certainty that he was fulfilling, perhaps, his last official mission to the islands. In the lower cell, he was transporting who was, possibly, one of the last rapists in his city. Maybe the last one, he thought. “It’s not bad, maybe just for me.” He called out loudly for two coffee pills and blackberries, then moved his burly six feet to the hot water station, dissolved the tablets in a thermos, and snorted again three times.
A month hence would be his seventieth birthday. It was impossible to postpone his retirement any longer, much to his regret. He didn’t feel old, but he was. His shaggy hair, disappearing in places, had turned gray a few years ago. But with a minimum life expectancy of 100 years, what would he do in the next 30 years? He hadn’t made plans, perhaps because he perceived that the moment would never come. He liked to capture the bad guys, but also had to accept that each day it was harder to do so. His muscles were toned; it was his speed that was diminished. That had become clear countless times, like the day before, during community workouts in the park, when he had finished among the last places of the two-kilometer race. It used to be he arrived first, and with a considerable lead. He snorted upward twice, waving a rebellious gray curl that fell on his forehead. He inserted the frozen blackberries in his mouth, and felt his teeth explode.
Below, the city, or what was sensed of it, was getting lost. From the continuous lining of the surface emerged some modern buildings, covered in vegetable green and yellow, distinguishable by their pointed shapes and sharp corners. Also, some ruinous masses of concrete and iron, abandoned for a long time because they were uninhabitable. Once luxurious apartments with views, they were now properties heavily exposed to intense daytime radiation. The buildings suffered from more than 100 years of human neglect, ever since outdoor activities had been limited to dawn and dusk, or walks and work at night. Some ruins had been covered, a few years before, with modern bio-solar panels, an ingenious way of reusing the obsolete infrastructure. Others were occupied by condors or birds of prey that, like humans, had adapted to twilight and nocturnal life.
The extensive vegetation was uninterrupted towards the wild areas. It was made up of trees such as pumamaqui, cedar, and hundreds of other species. Several showed leafy tops and were over 100 years old. They were called “guardians” because they protected the people from radiation and pollution. Francisco felt identified with these forms of life; he was also a guardian who protected the cities and their people. But most people were unaware of these elder green guardians. They preferred to stay underground, with artificial light and stable temperatures, in rooms, community centers, or recreational sites located two or three levels below the ground. “Cities of moles” they were called, alluding to an extinct species, with tiny eyes, which used to build and inhabit extensive underground galleries.
Among the outdoor structures, Francisco preferred churches, sites of spiritual worship in the past. He went alone, as his two daughters, like their mothers, preferred the virtual reality scenarios underground. When he suggested they go outdoors for a while, they called it old-fashioned. He assured them that these historical places helped people to relax, meditate, find themselves, recharge for community life. Sometimes groups were formed to share doubts, fears, insecurities, projects. There was a time when he reproached those important women in his life for being hooked on fantasies, ignoring the outside world, so different from the underground. “They haven’t even taken the few opportunities to fly a hovercraft,” he sighed. For them, the other cities and regions, not to mention the islands of plastic, formed by the accumulation of these materials over almost three centuries in certain points of the sea, were places to which it was unnecessary to move. When it came to reproductive sex, it was the men who traveled, although most women preferred their couples to be from the same city. It was not worth traveling, sometimes for long weeks on foot, facing the risks of bad weather or rural robbers, lawless people, bandits, who attacked the walkers. They preferred to know of other cities through virtual reality boxes, and from the tales told by people from other places when they arrived in Quito. They argued that encounters in virtual reality boxes, where you could have three-dimensional views and experiences with multiple speakers, were less expensive in terms of energy and less risky for the spread of epidemics. Those looking for adventure and long journeys could embark on cruises to other planets, asteroids, or megacities floating in the void of space, or travel the world on foot and by boat.
Eventually, he stopped complaining. They were a product of their time and the past. The Great Disconnection, characterized by energy shortages caused by the unique and strong solar pulses of the mid-21st century, together with the Era of Epidemics, promoted isolation, and autarkic urban processes. When the satellites fell to the ground and all electronics stopped working, there was chaos. Not even the countries with the largest reserves dared to go beyond their borders. When electronic communications were restored and power generation, always limited, was improved a couple of decades later, travel was resumed on a limited basis, mainly to maintain the spirit of planetary cooperation. Some individuals voyaged more: peacekeepers, diplomats, and students. Each citizen was also allowed to travel once every five years by collective aircraft to a nearby city, or every eight years to a distant city. And whoever wanted to could move at will on foot or in sailboats of different sizes. Many young people organized groups to see the world in this way. Several never returned, fascinated by other places. Francisco had used each of his trips to visit nearby cities. His goal was to walk and strengthen ties with fellow peacemakers in Lima, Cusco, Trujillo, Cuenca, Guayaquil, Cali, Bogotá, Medellin, Cartagena … He had studied his career mainly in virtual reality boxes and had trained martial arts in local dojos. He took exams for five years, and then spent a similar time training with several master peacemakers. Many things had passed in front of his eyes, but the women in his life did not even want to go to Guayaquil. He wanted to snort but held back.
Francisco left the cockpit and headed for the cargo area. He stood in front of his partner and apprentice of the last three years, the peacemaker Selena. She gazed absently toward the energized cell with translucent bars, where the prisoner seemed half asleep and lost. “At least the man doesn’t scream or cry.”
The anguish that this would be his last trip between Quito and the plastic islands, where the aggressors from all cities were sent, uncomfortably returned. A fundamental part of his life was moving in an aircraft over cities, mountains, and seas. He had undertaken more than 100 of the five-hour journeys between Quito and the vortexes of the Pacific Ocean, where the plastic islands floated. What would happen to his position? Urban peacekeepers had been a very important guild, but today it was a profession headed towards extinction, like fossil fuels or intercontinental travel. Capturing and transporting violent types, forest or plantation arsonists, animal torturers, and above all femicides and rapists, was less and less necessary. “These days, rural robbers give more work,” he said. “But they are not a priority, dispersed as they are, and because they limit themselves to stealing batteries and food, never raping or murdering. For now.”
Every so often the so-called “anomalies” appeared, people who were violent towards women in cities, known as such because cases were rare. They were mostly men who, for reasons unclear to him and much of the public, used force as a mechanism to get what they wanted. Why didn’t they go to the public rings to bring out that fierce energy, desire for blood and domination? The dynamics of the rings were similar to the ancient Mayan ball games, although the losers were not sacrificed. They revived the jousts of the Roman coliseums, whose stories of gladiators continued to be successful in virtual reality boxes. But they weren’t fighting to the death. Why did the anomalies not use those spaces? They wanted to dominate without consent. More than one influencer with millions of followers in the virtual reality boxes claimed that the anomalies had been driven mad by watching too much aggressive content produced until the beginning of the 21st century. They saw women, other species, minors, and elders, as objects. Several influencers, good communicators and journalists, clamored to restrict access to certain contents of the Pluriversal Library, although everyone knew it was impossible. There were Library mirrors all over the Earth, on inhabited planets and on space stations, everywhere. Most people, Francisco included, considered them in bad taste. But they were there and had regular consumers. “I hated reviewing those videos in my peacemaker courses.” He snorted twice.
-The world has changed fast. Too fast for my liking- he heard himself speaking towards Selena, who barely twisted her face a little.
He liked this apprentice. She was really big, something unusual and intimidating, ideal for chases and captures. And attractive, although he wouldn’t have the slightest chance of her choosing him to date. Selena was staring at the prisoner while chewing lavender pills. Her neutral look could mean anything. Francisco appreciated that neutrality, the scent of lavender, and the silence. It helped him to avoid the waste of useless conversations. The few moments in which they had talked served, from the first day, to make clear that she cared little about the whys of the work. Selena wanted, above all, action. Persecutions, arrests, inquiries, even false alarms. They had not stopped a real rape attempt in Quito for three years, which seemed eternal to him. In other cities, it had been like this for more than 30 years. The last real rape in Quito occurred 50 years earlier, when Francisco was an apprentice. The last femicide happened a hundred years ago; the subject was alluded to as savagery before the Age Shift. Maybe that’s why Selena was a statue before the prisoner, her first actual transfer and capture. “Do you hate it or do you feel compassion?”
Francisco returned to the upper cabin and monitored the weather. Meteorologists were not to trust; weather was more complex than a series of measurements, and experience had taught him to be vigilant.
The aircraft maintained its cruise elevation, two kilometers high. They flew over the city of Manta and headed out to sea. Yellow and dry, this coastal area was less inhabited than the highlands. Below, some ruins looked like old 21st-century periferal neighborhoods. These dystopian territories were of interest to him. In Quito, they had been made up of thousands of fragile rooms built with cement blocks and thin, rusty iron rods. Population decline after the Era of Epidemics and the later Age Shift had led to the abandonment of these precarious homes. A few families had stayed on, rebuilding some spaces as the facades of entrances leading to underground rooms. Houses built on slopes, previously abundant and always affected by landslides, were not even good for that, so they had been completely reclaimed by the Andean and opportunistic vegetation coming from the lowlands due to increased temperatures. Why had people built such insecure houses?
Many flat parts of the Quito plateau, previously covered with asphalt and cement, were regenerated as orchards. Farmworkers took turns at night, under artificial light, inside greenhouses or outdoors, sometimes supported by fans and heaters to ward off frost. In the orchards, animals, vegetables, and mushrooms flourished. Their main promoters, the urban agropops, argued that in addition to good food the orchards provided a way to cool the planet and create carbon sinks. Their biggest detractors, the robopops, argued that machines could do it. Agropops also pointed out that it was harmful to people to spend long times in the virtual reality boxes, that this way of living was dangerous for their own subsistence. They remembered that those kinds of disconnections, when people believed that food grew in markets or vending machines, or that it magically arrived in aircraft to cities, had accelerated epidemics and the Age Shift. The agropop movement emphasized that eggs were laid by chickens, that those chickens controlled pests in crops, that bees fed on real flowers, and that all this helped to have healthy food. Repeatedly, they alluded to the brutal impact of pesticides, known above all from a 20th-century book, Silent Spring. “No one wants to use poisons as in the past”.
He called out for an updated weather forecast. Storms obsessed him, especially over the ocean. Those sudden and intense curtains of white water, in the form of very strong waterspouts, fell without warning. In the mountains they did not at all help the aircraft and could disrupt communications, thus many rapists took advantage of them to act. But at sea they were deadly. A map unfolded before him. Zero rain. He headed back to the lower deck, where Selena continued in the same position. Was she analyzing the prisoner or just watching over him? Now the anomaly was drooling a little and muttering. He wanted to go over and ask him about his musings, but quickly regretted it, and instead decided to entertain himself for an hour. Back in the cockpit, he put on his helmet and searched one of his favorite repositories: “The Age Shift.”
Francisco´s ability to understand history was limited, and he always had doubts regarding the interpretations of documentaries and influencers. There was too much information and at times he felt lacking in filters to select it. He understood more about persecutions, arrests, and violent anomalies. There were some things that, however, were quite clear, such as the role of epidemics and solar pulses. The epidemics of the 21st century were crucial. Viruses first appeared in Asia and then from almost everywhere. Some said it was the revenge of nature, because people treated domestic animals badly, especially those that were useful for food, fiber, vaccines, or medical experimentation. Wild animals were being eaten everywhere and deforestation accelerated, taking away their places to live. Cows, chickens, pigs, and other animals lived huddled and stuffed with hormones on farms. “How unpleasant to eat a chicken with hormones, almost as much as a tomato with pesticides”. The first great pandemic was the Covid in 2019. It spread quickly. The resulting mourning and confinement left behind all kinds of consequences. The worst came years later, however: a deadly virus that was transmitted through water and air. The survivors began to think more locally and to subsist under more peaceful contracts. New epidemics arose, some contained at continental levels. Traveling became difficult, as entire countries closed their borders for years. They let you out, but do not re-enter. The stories of people trapped far from their homes were dramatic and no one dared to go far. If you left, it could be forever.
Then came the solar pulses and the Great Disconnection, the end of communications. It seemed somewhat metaphysical and strengthened the appeal of whatever was local. The first cities to make radical changes were those with lesser violence and corruption indicators in the 21st century. Populations, fed up with states and politicians who did nothing but give flowery speeches, took the reins. They were not violent, although some things did require a certain use of force, particularly in the face of those who continued to applaud the cult of violence and domination. One of the first actions was imprisonment for femicides. As more urban territories were transformed, there were fewer femicides and rapists. In order not to waste efforts, it was decided to create a few global spaces to bring together the anomalies and, incidentally, improve the situation of the oceans somewhat. Since the 20th-century, various ocean vortices had concentrated vast spaces where the debris of fossil fuel civilization floated: the “plastic islands”. These degraded and released undetectable and toxic microplastics. In each vortex, huge machines gathered these plastics into large, compact islands, several meters high, floating like gigantic, multicolored rafts. The anomalies were banished there, condemned for life to collect the floating plastics around them, using collected flotsam to build-up the island they lived on. Food and water were regularly sent, and social organization left to their discretion, albeit with certain limits. Stories about those places were a mixture of myth and legend, even for recurring visitors like the peacemakers. It was said that at first they were chaotic systems located nowhere. Unable to reproduce, the populations of those islands slowly declined, and in some cases became peaceful. Those floating jails, the potential banishment for life, functioned as deterrents. Corrupt practices and, more slowly, rapes, ceased.
The peacemaker Francisco decided to view one of the documentaries on the change in relations between men and women. It was called “Cities of Free Women.” Before, urban areas were dominated by men, in a system called patriarchy. But his grandmother had been free to choose, as were his mother, couples and daughters. His granddaughters would be as well. They had chosen whether or not to have children, how many, when. No one had forced them to be mothers using physical or social violence. Before they had been raped, from a very young age, or forced for metaphysical or religious reasons or, simply, due to an abuse of power. Raped in their homes, in churches, on the streets, on the roads, even in educational centers. Raped on television and in art. “Being a woman was living at risk” Francisco thought. The Age Shift left those ideas and practices behind, in good measure with the aid of peacekeepers and the sending of violent anomalies to the islands of plastic.
In the documentary, it was explained that among the first people opposed to women’s free will, were those at that time self-defined as “socialists” or “progressives.” They were concerned that this would undermine their chances to decide the fate of many based upon the State´s authoritarianism. In Quito and other places, this group needed vast poor populations to dominate, and it was essential to control women, to make them reproduce sadness and submission. And it worked. Some women even publicly declared themselves submissive to their male leaders. As the Age Shift came about, those who called themselves “capitalists” were happy to see such futile and desperate resistance from their longtime opponents. They speculated that, as on other occasions, markets would finally adapt and impose themselves. But they did not count on the powerful inertia that the Age Shift had brought about. As the socialists fell, the capitalists went with them, since both were sustained by the domination of others. They all practiced obsessive violence against nature, which they called “a resource”. “It was a world too confused, manipulated by a few and settled into sterile, dichotomous thoughts.”
Others who opposed the end of patriarchy, aligned with socialists and capitalists alike, were the Catholics and their preachers. Francisco found it difficult to understand the religious practices in so-called churches. There was a kind of psychological collective control, based on fear, that allowed for the accumulation of land and money for at least two thousand years. Some historical videos from the Pluriversal Library showed their rites: people moving up and down, singing in unison, kneeling, making huge lines to receive a very thin cookie, sometimes flagellating themselves. According to the influencers and other less famous communicators, their ideology was more patriarchal than socialism and capitalism. In their books, women were punished, pointed to as inferiors, accused of human misfortunes for something called the original sin, incapable of leading spiritually, and, above all, exhorted to have many children.
According to some documentaries, societies of the past had opted for numerous populations that grew at an exponential rate. To a large extent, this was due to recurrent and socially accepted sexual abuse, the rape of girls and adolescents. Dark times when they weren’t even allowed to have an abortion; if they did, they were even held criminally liable. The video ended with exciting phrases about the present and the future. Still distracted by the information, Francisco removed the helmet, checked the meteorological information, glimpsed around without much conviction, decided that there was no risk, and went back to the repository. The repository had that ability to transport him and even dangerously distract him from his obligations. He chose an archive on the history of new martial arts and rings, sites that, according to influencers and other documentaries, were decisive in the transition to a postpatriarchal society.
As images of fights from the beginning of the 21st century passed, a thick voice-over slowly recounted: “Violence, blood, conflicts, adrenaline… Common for a long time, they still are, but now accepted by the parties involved. No one is hit or assaulted without wanting to. All thanks to … The rings!” The video was of course sponsored by the ring managers, in almost all cases, city governments financed by selling tickets, broadcasts, and multifaceted paraphernalia of objects and associated products. The blood and collective euphoria, the passionate and hysterical shouting, the dazzling advertisements, had replaced other coliseum, stadium, and track sports that were ultra-popular in the 20th and 21st centuries. Fights between men, between women, mixed. Anyone could participate from the age of 20, under very clear agreements. But they also confounded some people, who were content to go to the dojo to train, sometimes with simulators, without blood or noise. A minority.
Combats and conflicts were limited to the rings, under the acceptance of the participants. Never before had so many people been trained in martial arts. Academies and dojos offering courses in karate, taekwondo, kung fu, aikido, and judo, abounded. The rings were even more visited than the underground virtual reality boxes. People loved to see, hear and participate in fights without deaths. The recently invented fu-ta-ya included ingredients of ancient wrestling and had to be quickly regulated by the many accidents at home during unsupervised practices. Francisco was an expert in ancient and modern martial arts. When he felt the desire to hit someone, he approached the local ring, chose the soft mode with protectors, and ended up hugging his rival and a beer in silence. The video ended by emphasizing that, since it was not happening against the will of anyone, rings had become a good way to prevent the appearance of anomalies.
In a neutral voice the ship announced the arrival at the oceanic airport in 30 minutes. Already flying over the huge plastic island, in the distance Francisco could see the mountain of accumulated materials and the many structures built by the residents. Although new plastics were no longer being produced in the world, they continued to arrive from everywhere, compacted and placed as additional blocks on the mountain.
He switched off the automatic pilot and maneuvered to cross, at a height of 500 meters, the threatening electric fence that isolated the runway. In previous years there had been attempts by exiles to capture ships, and although they had been quickly prevented by the protocols for using aircraft, the fence was reminiscent of potential problems. Only one-way tickets were obtained to the islands. Human rights groups considered it cruel, but no city was open to receiving such people back.
The aircraft unfolded three wheels and landed vertically. Selena deactivated the cell and raised the prisoner, who remained crestfallen and silent. Francisco didn’t care who he was; his curiosity about anomalies had long since disappeared. Before, he had tried to help them, being empathetic to their state of shock. Some were repentant, asking for forgiveness, claiming that they had watched too many videos and gone mad from experiencing domination. They started by destroying trees, then clandestinely killing animals, finally women. The sequence usually repeated itself. This anomaly, about 50 years old, had tried to rape a woman in an abandoned area of a metropolitan park, attacking her while exercising at dawn. The young woman activated the help button on her watch and in less than five minutes ten drones had arrived to make noises, film, and disperse some stun gas. The man was prepared and managed to take down five, but more arrived. Everything helped buy time. The victim had studied martial arts and liked the ring, so was able to defend herself. Fifteen minutes later Selena and Francisco were chasing the anomaly through the vegetation. She caught up and subdued him. Francisco arrived a minute later.
A concrete fortress was the only structure on the electric fence. There a door was opened that allowed a glimpse of a long tunnel through which the prisoner walked. In the background, another door opened and he entered the territory of anomalies on the floating plastic island.
Gabriel Redín
Among green bushes and reddish myconias, hundreds of small flattened mounds, side by side, move slowly. They are the shells of Galápagos tortoises, the giant tortoises of these equatorial islands. A deep heat that announces rain pushes the Galápagos tortoises toward the mud puddles to cool off. Alejandro counts, again, the more than 200 tortoises that he herds. It is the fourth time he’s lost count, between images and questions that haunt his mind over an event the island can’t stop talking about.
It is the year 2222. The Galápagos Islands, as they are still called, hardly receive visitors from the outside world, in part because there are no ports at which to arrive. Humans live in the highlands of three islands, where they have fresh water and fertile land to farm. Those who seek to become “friars,” or local priests, practice the type of “herding” for which these islanders are known: in Cristóbal, the easternmost island of the archipelago, Galápagos tortoises are herded. On the other islands, friars herd sea lions and mockingbirds.
Alejandro has been herding tortoises for six years. This consists of caring for and accompanying Galápagos tortoises’ movements between the dry and rainy seasons–of course, without himself approaching the coasts, which is forbidden. The exercise of accompanying tortoises is considered a form of meditation, a way to connect with the origin of the families of Cristóbal, who are said to be linked to the tortoise. Those of Cristóbal are known for their quiet gaze, their slow speech, and, in general, for their serenity, which they consider their greatest virtue.
—
It has not been a day of contemplation or serenity today. With his long legs and quick breath, Alejandro walks across the grazing plain in the same untidy meander of his thoughts, which ponder what the event that has just occurred might mean. Finally, an aroma of freshly roasted coffee tells him he is arriving at Tres Palos, the town where most of Cristóbal’s families are concentrated. Every household is debating: is this a premonition of some untold thing about to transpire? Is it only a simple sea turtle?
What has happened is this: a few days ago, Raquel, another shepherd, went to town to spread the news that a Galápagos tortoise had gone into the sea. Quickly, the news spread throughout the island. Everyone knew the old story of the tortoise that hundreds of years ago submerged herself in the sea and, in so doing, flooded the coasts. It was one of those legends that grandparents told children, and that, although respected as a sacred story, most doubted could actually happen. It just seemed unlikely–that a ground giant like a 300-pound Galápagos tortoise, with a large shell and fat legs, could swim in the sea.
There was also the matter of who had recounted the event. Raquel, restless and disheveled, had abandoned the friar’s training, though not herding tortoises. Contrary to local norms, she even continued accompanying the Galápagos tortoises to the coasts, which according to strict tradition should only be done by the most prestigious friars. After the great rise in sea level that started some two hundred years ago, traveling to the island coasts, except on special days, was treated as a taboo–a provocation to the ocean. Raquel, in her stubbornness and frankness, considered it aberrant that islanders did not approach the sea. She insisted that the tortoise’s idle way of being – el estar de la tortuga – replicated itself in the rise and flow of the sea, that it was natural for humans to spend time at its shore. Because of these positions, Raquel was expelled from the community, which did not prevent her from sneaking out to visit her friends on certain nights.
—
Alejandro wanted to see it with his own eyes. He could not satisfy himself with the rumor of people who built the walls of their houses with their backs to the sea. Why would a Galapagos tortoise dive into the forbidden sea now?
As children, Alejandro and Raquel fantasized about what could be beyond the sea. It was a secret game, because just naming the sea was frowned upon in the town. As they grew, Alejandro kept a careful distance from these ponderings, while Raquel became more and more intrigued with the relationship between the tortoise and the sea. In reality, Alejandro often found himself wondering about the wide blue of the ocean that he caught glimpses of while herding the Galápagos. But no one could know that.
“I have to go to the coast, but I can’t do it alone,” he thought. “I need to talk to him.”
Elderly, with a speckled white beard and tanned skin, Julio was another friar, and the mentor to whom Alejandro went with his doubts. He had also been Raquel’s mentor, and it was even rumored that he secretly agreed with several of her positions. Julio certainly went against the tide many times, but he did it so peaceably that he was rarely blamed for it.
“Today, in the contemplation of the Galápagos tortoise that I was teaching to the children, they asked me again to tell them the story of Sister Tortuga,” said the old friar, tying the Franciscan cord around his waist while receiving Alejandro on his wooden porch. “It was like telling it for the first time.”
Although he appeared stoic in character, Alejandro thought Julio seemed troubled. Sister Tortuga, as the legend was known, marked the turning point in the history of all the families of Cristóbal and, indeed, the entire archipelago. About ten generations ago, when there were only a few Galápagos tortoises on the island, one of them had landed on a beach and plunged into the sea.
“It was at that point that the sea began to rise, and with it, people began to leave the island and not return. It was then that we stopped inhabiting the coast,” Julio said, with a look of nostalgia for something that he had not experienced but had thought about thousands of times.
“They say that Sister Tortuga was so big she caused all the waters to rise,” Alejandro said.
“Yes, and, well, it has been told in so many ways. What my grandfather told me, that his grandfather told him, is that it was actually all slow, very slow. There was no big wave. It was imperceptible. The sea began to rise little by little, inch by inch, day by day. And suddenly the town’s old boardwalk was no longer walkable. It was all quieter than what is usually said. But no less painful for that.”
The silence that ensued was immediately interrupted:
“So, Alejo, will you come down with me to see the tortoise?” the old man proposed, with the mischievous look that had distinguished him since childhood, and the certainty of knowing what Alejandro wanted to hear.
—
An enveloping nightly drizzle made it easier to leave the town unnoticed. Crossing a small forest of scalesias, with their rhizomatic branches loaded with mosses, they came to an overlook where they could sense the immensity of the ocean, and the dark profile of the island. Julio specified with authority the route they would take: “We stop, first, at Cristóbal Viejo. Then we continue to Playa Baquerizo, where Raquel is.”
Alejandro completed: “Raquel and the tortoise.” They both smiled like children.
At a leisurely pace, near dawn, an old path led them to the rubble of the abandoned city, Cristóbal Viejo. Dozens of rusty columns could barely be seen amid the swaying of the sea. Alejandro and Julio walked down a street that still stood between the outlines of old rooms covered in matazarnos, black rocks and small dry bushes. Cristóbal Viejo was a holy place, to which a pilgrimage was made once a year from Tres Palos and other hamlets in the highlands. One of the arrival points of the pilgrimage was La Concha, an esplanade on the shores of the sea that filled and emptied with shallow water in accordance with the tide. It was known for being the place where “the last assembly” had taken place, the one in which the people decided to leave Cristóbal Viejo.
“I believe what my grandfather told me. Right here, those who did not want to go to the island highlands took the last boat to the mainland and did not return again. The few that remained, our ancestors, went up. That last goodbye was so sad that people grew suspicious of coming back down to the coast. It was painful to leave families and friends, but so was leaving this place behind. In the highlands, with those giant tortoises, we found consolation,” said Julio, looking at La Concha.
They took a break in the rubble of la Catedral, another of the pilgrimage stops, very close to La Concha. It was said that the rubble of the Cathedral’s columns depicted the skeleton of a tortoise, and it was considered the original church of the friars. Indeed, the religious men who originally came to these islands were known as Franciscans. With the grief caused by the abandonment of the island, a few friars stayed and accompanied those who decided to inhabit the upper part. From that insularity that disconnected them from the rest of the globe, a new type of spirituality structured around the question of how to relate to the non-human. New meanings of “reuniting” with the transcendental began to emerge from a conception of brotherhood with the rest of the creature world: the sister tortoises, brother bat, brother mockingbirds, sister sea lion, sister finches and others. In those centuries, each island seemed to have turned that fraternal understanding toward the contemplation of specific species through herding. Thus, in these islands a different relationship with nature had been built, or, rather, a relationship between all those who inhabited the islands, be they humans, plants, animals, stars and even objects.
All this did not cease to captivate the lost or curious mainlanders who rarely came to the archipelago. Certainly, things had changed in the Andean continent after the rise of the sea, but there was an archaic prevailing premise of fragmenting everything between those with spirit, the humans, and that which they considered to lack tremendous quality. Some Andeans branded the islanders totemists; others, more sensitive, said that it was an ontological matter.
From this new spirituality, in addition to meditative herding with animals, the friars also carried out contemplative exercises with holy places, such as the rubble of the Cathedral. It was said that it was a sacred place and that the materiality of the rubble could vibrate and reveal meaning. Julio and Alejandro contemplated the rubble of that church facing the sea. Alejandro’s anxious nature, however, hampered his meditation efforts. Finally, he said:
“But then, did the Sister Tortuga exist or not? Is it a real or a figurative story? How is it possible that all this we see now destroyed was inhabited once?”
“Of course, the Sister Tortuga existed,” Julio answered with forceful calm. “What I do not believe is that she caused the ‘great wave’ that is often talked about. It was more of a sign, a message that things could change more than one thinks. Even if you spend 4 lives and you never see a Galápagos tortoise go into the sea, it doesn’t mean it can’t happen. Sister Tortuga existed. I believe it. And more deeply now that this other giant tortoise has come down to the sea.
“But if so, what can happen now? What relationship did Sister Tortuga have with the abandonment of Cristóbal Viejo?”
“I’m not sure. But we know two things: one, Sister Tortuga existed, just as our grandparents have told us. And, two, as we see these ruins, this city got under water and was abandoned. What can we learn from these two things?” The friar paused, caressing the rust of an old iron between his fingers. “That unimaginable things can happen. It can happen that a giant tortoise goes down to the coast and swims in the sea. It may happen that the largest city on the planet gets abandoned. It can happen that the sea rises and falls. It can happen, as we have been told, that the Galápagos tortoise almost disappeared before; and it can happen, as we see before our eyes, that there are hundreds and thousands of them today.”
“Then, it could be that simply, at the time of Sister Tortuga, people were starting to notice something that could have been happening for a long time: the rising of the sea. Remember, also, what grandparents told us: in the past, the people of the city lived in a hurry, busy, without stopping. They said they couldn’t be alone in a room, that they couldn’t stand themselves, that they couldn’t… be. Some say that those of the mainland, even today, continue like this. Remember why we contemplate, why we do all this now. Because we learned from the Galapagos tortoise that it is necessary to stop, walk slowly, contemplate. If we value something now, it is to be able to be, estar. As you say, perhaps long before Sister Tortuga, the sea was already rising, but people didn’t even notice it. And perhaps Sister Tortuga’s message was that the extraordinary can happen slowly, it may even be happening right now, if you look closely, if you just observe, if you feel.”
—
They returned to the road to Playa Baquerizo. The conversation with Julio felt like a revelation to Alejandro, but his long and hurried steps betrayed his haste to reach Raquel’s mysterious beach. Together, since childhood, they had been unified in their vocation to become friars, with Julio’s mentoring. Alejandro could not forgive the path she had taken by leaving, almost without hesitation, the formality of community life. They had not spoken to each other since.
A slight salty smell announced a small white sand beach. There was Raquel, with her characteristic sun-tanned skin, sitting near a mangrove. And there, too, it was: an adult Galapagos tortoise submerged in water. As on land, he was calm.
Julio greeted Raquel affectionately, and without saying anything, he walked away to the other end of the beach where he observed the tortoise swimming. Alejandro and Raquel were alone for the first time in several years. Raquel’s brand-new smile undid the tension with which Alejandro initially approached her.
“So you came down to the coast? You had to see it by yourself, huh? Man of little faith.”
“So this is where you have come to live?” Alejandro replied with a certain masculine awkwardness, neutralized by Raquel’s response:
“I was waiting for you.”
Raquel began to walk, showing Alejandro part of the beach as if it were her house. They did not approach Julio; they understood he wanted to be alone with the Galápagos tortoise.
“Well, yes, I had to see it, I had to see it.” Alejandro shuddered, and restless, as always, he asked: “And what is the tortoise doing?”
“Nada,” Raquel replied with a nostalgic laugh of the old humor of friends, but she continued more seriously: “He is simply there. The tortoise has gone out to the beach, but reentered the sea. Maybe he wanted to cool off. Alejo, do you want to go for a walk to Tijeretas to catch up?”
“And if the tortoise comes out of the sea?”
“Hey, we’re not here to watch over him, but to accompany him. Also, Julio will be here and will want to be alone.”
Alejandro had forgotten these random twists while talking with Raquel; he recalled that internal voice, driven by social norms, that had judged Raquel for her unpredictable behavior. Still, he followed her, wondering if it made sense to have gone to see the tortoise and to now leave him so soon.
They took a path towards the cove that they called “Tijeretas.” It was a clear day. The fresh green of the coast, which opened with the drizzle of recent days, contrasted with the deep blue of the ocean. From the cove you could see small heads of sea turtles coming out to breathe. Young sea lions played chasing each other. The frigates flew overhead, wagging their scissor tails. Raquel and Alejandro approached a shore. She sat up and stretched her feet out into the water.
“The water is already starting to get cool,” Raquel began.
“Hey, you have no respect for anything. How can you not mind touching the sea?”
“Why? Don’t we believe in acting like the Galapagos tortoise? Well, right now there is one nearby swimming in the sea.”
Alejandro blushed. He knew Raquel well enough to know that she wasn’t looking for a fight. She was just being serious.
“Ok, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to complain. But I don’t understand why we came here and left the tortoise. What happened is not trivial. Didn’t friar Zarathustra once say to the sun: What would your happiness be reduced to if you did not have those to whom you shine!?”
“Hmm. You’re still the same, Alejo. You have something of the Andean people who think that their immense mountains exist only to be admired. My grandma used to say, ‘Flowers do not bloom to please others, they bloom for themselves, for their own joy.’ And, well, yes, we have decided to herd Galápagos tortoises, contemplate them, learn from them. Certainly, they should be happy, as we are, for that company. But it is very different than their reason for being is to be the admiration of others.”
“Well, but then what is the revelation of the Galapagos tortoise in the sea?” Alejandro insisted.
“If there were a revelation, it’d be the fortune to share the joy of that flower that blooms or, now, to be able to share this exceptional happening of a giant tortoise swimming in the sea.”
“But we’re not there sharing this fortune with the tortoise. We must return.”
“You know, before, people moved without observing. Now, let’s not observe without moving,” said Raquel, shaking her feet in the water. “Look, if Sister Tortuga taught us to observe that the sea could rise, how could it mean that we stay locked up there in the highlands fearing the sea that surrounds us? Please, do not force me to get stuck.”
Alejandro sighed, torn between the discomfort of returning to a straightforward Raquel, and the sweet suspicion of making sense of what she was saying.
“The sea that surrounds us,” he repeated timidly, with a short step towards the shore. “Without being afraid of the sea? But it is immense, unpredictable!”
Raquel answered with a smile.
“So” continued Alejandro, “what you say is that if people from the past never stopped to contemplate because they were busy all the time, we should be careful not to stagnate in contemplating without moving?
“Just like the Galapagos,” she answered.
They both paused. Alejandro took a step closer to the shore. He sat up and stretched his legs towards the water with the strangeness of a thing done for the first time.
“It’s cold, huh?”
“Now I understand why the tortoise has gotten into the sea,” Alejandro answered in a low-childish voice.
“Exactly! Now do it with all of your body. Come on, the sea is calm.”
Suddenly, Raquel got up, took off her old Franciscan habit and, naked, jumped into the water. She called Alejandro.
“You know I can’t swim. How did you learn, Raquel?”
“It took me a while, but I learned by watching the marine iguanas. I suppose that is what the tortoise saw. The question is how these iguanas learned to swim.” They both laughed.
The hours had passed, and the sun was just over the ocean, plunging towards the sea. So did Alejandro. With suspicion, held by the rocks on the shore, he slowly introduced his body. The cold of the water was transformed into an internal heat that seemed to be enlivened by the movements of his feet. He took a deep breath, while feeling the penetrating taste of the sea splashing on his face. “The sea that surrounds us”, he whispered, letting himself be enveloped by this enormous being.
Jayanth Venkatachala
30th October 2200
Well, this is my first ever diary entry of my life. I’ve lived for 205 years now, although the last 105 years have been in silica form. They installed me into a new robot, sophisticated like a human. I am still getting used to it. For some reason I finally decided to do this and in the old-fashioned way of typing on a laptop. I don’t think these people even know what a laptop is. I it found yesterday in the carton with all my other human memories. It feels weird to feel like a human again after being in a mechanical robot for over a century. It still amazes me that I’m alive, thanks to science. I had lost my complete touch with typing, but the software allowed me to improve my proficiency. It feels like cheating, but hell, works for me. I feel lucky and grateful to be one the few who still gets to live this way. I didn’t buy this, they put me in it as an honour for the work I did for the environment. I can’t thank them enough. I’d like to start by writing about these past years as a summary in a few pages. This doesn’t do it justice, but this the first entry, so I’ll keep the details to another day. Let me today talk about this amazing town, Mysore. This is where I grew up as a kid and did most of my work. They like me here I think, and I owe everything to this city.
The city of Mysore, also now famously known as the “model city” wasn’t the same about 200 years ago in 2018. We didn’t have these transportation pods, hyperloops and trees everywhere. It was simple, people now won’t even be able imagine what it even looked like. We had tar roads, petrol and diesel cars, two wheeled bikes, trains that ran on diesel that took days to go to the capital, there was air and water pollution, there was traffic jams and people died in vehicular accidents, and that was normal. Life moved at a much faster pace. Adults were busy with their jobs. Students had home works (yeah, they had to study at home too). Kids from this age, must hold candles to those kids from the past. We had cash for money which we used to keep in wallets and purses. Each country had its own currency. The world and the city have changed significantly now. To appreciate the current state of this city, I must explain how the city looked way back then. I’ll talk about what my role was in changing the city to as it is now, in this entry.
Mysore, was exactly where it is now, well the tectonic plates don’t move that fast. The weather was relatively good compared to other cities, considering that global warming had started to show its effects. It was one of the cleanest cities in India. It was known for the Royal palace that has now survived the time. It stands out now more than ever compared to these modern buildings with glass windows with solar panels. The Chamundi hill had a temple on top, which thousands of people visited every day. Hardly anybody goes there, now that religion has lost its prominence to science, ever since the multiverse theory was proven. The hill was losing its flora and fauna to deforestation. The forest ecology was under threat. There even used to be forest fires on the slopes. The two lakes, Kukkarahalli lake and Karangi lake were the home for migratory birds every year. But their numbers were declining every year. People also used to jog along the perimeter of these lakes. There were environmental activism going on around these two issues for decades, but nothing was done about it.
The city was well planned for that day and age. The economic hub was in the centre with the academic areas, residential areas and finally the outskirts surrounded it in that order. The city
had much less people as it did not have as many industries, like in Banglore which was then then the Economic centre of the state. But now we are it. Ever since we starter cleaning up our act in Mysore with regards to sustainability, it attracted the attention of the multi- national companies to shift their country head- quarters to here. Banglore became too crowded and polluted. Locals even migrated to Mysore, bringing their knowledge and expertise. I saw both positives and negatives in this shift in the early years. The city was bound for a rapid “environmental” change. With us not being able to meet the 1.5 degree celsius mark, thanks to all the sceptics and so called “leaders” who did not understand how science worked, the problem of coping with the changes in Mysore compounded. There was chaos in the beginning. People needed direction and guidance to move forward. This is when I came back to Mysore, quitting a well- paying job in Sweden, which was all peaceful and living life at its own pace.
I was a product designer back then, who had immense interest in the impact of climate change in the future. Most of the work I did, was to design products to attain sustainable development. People knew me for that in Mysore and respected me as their local hero, even though I wasn’t even there. As I kept a close eye on the situation back home, I decided that the city needed me more than I need that job I had, so I decided to come back home. It looked, bad. The city was not the same anymore. The kind and peaceful citizens of the city were agitated due to all the changes happening around them all of a sudden. One can understand that. This is when I saw the need for guidance to the people of Mysore, and to most major cities undergoing the same situation. I started a podcast in English, which now most people understood in India, talking to experts from around the world almost every day about the possible solutions. By now, the academics had projected what would come ahead of us and how to resolve the situation. My aim was to disseminate the information objectively to the masses. The major news channels in India were busy covering the petty antics of politics in India and they didn’t do a good job with that either. Number of podcast listeners grew rapidly, and by the end of few months at least one person from every family listened to it.
The first thing I made sure with the podcast was that I pressed the need for cooperation among people of all kinds of background and differences. This was the toughest job as the previous governments had made sure to play identity politics, creating a wide gap and hatred among various sects of people. I stressed every day on the need for cooperation and that it was the only way going forward to live peacefully. It took time, but people realised it. The random floods, and landslides as a result, in the neighbouring districts in the Western Ghats took its toll killing thousands of people over years, but this brought people together. People shared their resources with the affected, knowing someday there will be others who would have their backs. Also, the long-lasting, inter- state conflict over the outlet of river Cauvery into Tamil Nadu was resolved due to heavy rains. Now Karnataka had excess to even store it in dams. So, those two goods came out directly from this grave situation. I brought in experts, activists, environmentalists, geographers and scientists from India and abroad, who had predicted these flooding decades ago. They systematically laid down the story of how corruption and political agendas supressed the necessary actions to prevent the future catastrophe. People realised their lives were disregarded by the system and their elected representatives. They had lost hope in their leadership. What could one expect from the uneducated leaders who each had folders full of criminal records. It was all money and fame they wanted. Now more than ever, the facts hit people hard and they took the ownership of the mistake of electing them. Afterall India was and is still a democratic nation.
This is when the great “Party of the Future” then, now known as “People’s Party” was assembled in the state of Karnataka. I was invited to join the party. I had my reservations in the beginning but having seen that it was comprised of just experts and highly knowledgeable people who knew what they were doing in their field, I decided to join it. We first laid out an objective system of self- regulation within the party to keep in check the personal goals of its members. Everybody in the party was motivated to do the right thing collectively no matter what, for the first time in the history of the world. Our main aim was to create a sustainable future in every which way. We didn’t play identity politics but rather stressed on the action plan on how we would solve the current distress. People finally had hope. In the elections we cleanly swept all the other old parties winning by 98% majority. That was some election. It showed people cared about their future and were ready to do whatever it took to fix the current problems. I was made the minister of the Environmental Protection and I was honoured and was ready to take authority over the situation.
The first thing I did, was assembled a board of members which included senior environmentalists, activists, academics, graduate and post graduate students from various engineering fields, scientists, people’s representatives, state environmental historians and political ecologists to discuss and take decisions collectively based on science and objective data. I hired an objective mass media house who shared our principles to cover each decision and meeting we had about the environmental issues so that public was up- to- date with what was going on. We maintained transparency with the public as they had trusted their future in our hands. Two cities in particular had most of our attention. Banglore and Mysore as they were changing rapidly. Like I mentioned earlier Banglore was losing its charm and Mysore was gaining all of it. Both had their environmental issues and I’ll talk about Banglore another time, but for now I’ll stick with Mysore. I laid down the two major environmental issues with the city earlier.
I deployed local students and academics, committed to our cause to study each issue in depth. They conducted deep studies about the issues by studying historical records, talking to people around the hills and people who exercised and lived near the lake who had observed the changes in the lake’s ecosystem. The activists readily jumped in to help with the information they knew. The problem turned out to be a corrupt system which was lethargic to take actions. In case of the hill, the older parties took bribes to ignore the encroachment of the hill slopes by local timber companies. The forest fires were not due to natural causes, but due to uncontrolled burning of the left-over trunks by them to create easy paths to encroach more forest. The lakes saw the decline in migratory birds due to eutrophication of the lakes. The sewage water from nearby localities were disposed into the lakes. The lack of food for these birds made them to go elsewhere. The lakes also did not have constant inlet of fresh water.
These issues were easy to solve with our committed and aspiring youth, who were the majority of the population then, whose human resource was wasted due to high rates of unemployment. They got a job now, so we took care of that aspect of sustainability. We banned the timber companies near the hills, as a matter of fact, we banned illegal deforestation for good. Locals who observed illegal activities readily informed us pro bono, about those nefarious activities out of their new-found respect for their environment. Some even tried to catch loggers and sometimes successfully did, before our team even showed up, putting themselves at risk. We reforested large areas of the hill, the city and the Western Ghats with the help of locals and school students. The Western Ghats (not part of the city) recovered over time and floods were
mitigated. For the kids it was a game to see who planted more trees. For the future of Mysore and the state of Karnataka, it was new hopes. I tired to involve locals in every possible step for it was a matter of their own future.
The lakes were cleaned over a couple of years. The sewage water was re- routed to the new sewage treatment plants around the city. We used the then available technology to produce biogas from the sewage and biodegradable wastes to be used for cooking and powering vehicles. We planned a network of underground canals to collect and feed rainwater from around the city to the lakes to replenish it with fresh water. The excess water from the lake was sent to the nearest agricultural areas around the city. Thus, a constant flow of fresh water was maintained. The migratory birds slowly started reappearing. Waste treatment plants were setup outside the city to recycle the non- biodegradable wastes. We already had good waste collection system, hence was named among the cleanest cities back then, but the treatment plants needed attention and improvement, which we did. People helped the cause by doing their basic duty of separating thrash and using recycled products and avoiding food wastes in many ways, enthusiastically.
Our party grew in the national level rapidly. The system worked very well, and we were elected into power in the centre. They recognised my achievements in resolving environmental issues in the city of Mysore and in the state and appointed me as the Central Minister of Environmental Protection. I gladly accepted the new challenge and did my best. You can see the results of that now I guess. That story is for another day. Mysore drew attention from all around the world. The people’s enthusiasm and dedication to take care of their local environment inspired people around the world. The environmentalism and the new cosmopolitanism instilled in the people of the city through mainly the two issues above, sustained, resulting in the shift of the centre of economics to Mysore from Banglore in just two decades. People felt rewarded for their good deeds. The growth felt natural and people adjusted to it smoothly now that they knew how to. The new migrants adopted our way of living and everybody lived happily here. The city still is growing, and I am happy that I played a small part in this process, after all it was the will and action of the people that was paramount in this development.
I’ll end it here for today, it’s almost time for the cricket world cup finals between India and Pakistan. Somethings never get old, like me since I was installed in this robot. Haha! Anyway, I’m glad our countries resolved our personal relationships. I liked typing out this diary, no wonder why people did this. I’ll be doing this more, but see you for now.
Jayanth
Photo by Akshat Vats on Unsplash
Bruno Venditto
It was the dawn of a new day, etango rose slowly from behind the mahangu field. The sun was particularly rosy, as if his high frequency waves had to travel an even longer distance. It has been like that since the member countries of the Reformed United Nations (RUN) signed the Global Pact on climate change.
Meme Hope had just woken up and was ready to go weeding the field. It seemed that life was going on as nothing had changed in Onangholo. Gestures that were handed down from generation to generation were repeated tiredly. She had learned how to look after the mahangu field from her mother, who had passed down the family knowledge to her. But now there was no reason to hand over this skill to the family’s youths; from tomorrow Onangholo would be part of the Great Outapi Dome 2121, (GOD) and life would not be the same. Besides, she did not have children of her own, and her only grandchild, Ndakalako, soon will go to varsity in Chile.
Meekulu’s mother, Kashibimbwa, and grandmother Ndinelao? were part of the Y generation and Meekulu remembered when she explained to grandmother MeeKulu Ndinelao how climate change would have, in the end, transformed Onangholo, as it had already started to impact small islands in the Pacific Ocean. Those big words, however, were alien to her mother’s mother, grand Ma had seldom left the homestead and the mahangu field; but she was wise and did acknowledge that raining season was not the same anymore, and droughts were longer and frequent than before.
Then in the year 2002 Onangholo was not even a proper village. Yes, electricity had just arrived, there was a combined school, few shebeens selling basic foods and drinks, and a church, but for all the rest one had to go to town, which was still at least an one-hour journey away, although it was only 15 km away. Meme Hope of course, had never seen all that. She was born in the year 2032, when Onangholo was a posh suburb of the regional capital Outapi, 5 minutes away from the car-airport. Her mother Meme Kashibimbwa was a social media addict and a journalist. She had terabytes of data, plenty of pictures that were passed from mother to daughter as a treasury to maintain. Meme Hope had downloaded all the relevant data on a microchip which could be slot in the wrist media-port and by a blink of the eye could be scrolled. It was like going back to a fantasy world, where cows and oikonbo were freely grazing in the now dry and disappeared oshana.
Today was an important day for Ndakalako as well, she was turning 17, the 5th generation of the Oryx clan. Having completed the second level of technological education, she was supposed to spend 3 weeks in what remained of the Etosha conservancy wild area, because of the Olufuku, the rite of passage for the youths. The ancestral purposes of Olufuko, as girls’ initiation to womanhood, had long been lost and transformed to an adulthood’s test for boys and girls. Three weeks in the veld without the assistance of any Artificial Intelligence (AI), to experience animals augmented virtual reality and help the Rob-Range to trace and track the few wild creatures that remained in the conservancy. That is why she had to go and see Meekulu Hope. Grand Ma was a scientist, a renowned professor, she had taught in many Universities around the world, but was one of the few remaining in the Land of the Brave, who remembered how to do things in the old way. She was not against AI, and in fact she did use CP Robots to help her cataloguing, but as a field historian she believed that no AI could ever substitute the human brain.
“Apo Meekulu” Ndakalako greeted her using the now disused Oshimbaanhu greeting. She knew Meekulu loved to hear the ancestors’ words, as so few nowadays used them, “How is the mahangu growing?”. “Apo ngheaange” answered Meekulu smiling, “Eewa, mahangu do not look promising this year, it is like in the old, old time, when the elders were looking at the sky to understand if the rain would have been enough to understand if they had been blessed or had to go begging for government handout. Water quotas have been further reduced, so I only planted a few lines, and the governor has declared open farming in our zone as recreational activity, so it is now impossible to cultivate crops. Besides, from tomorrow Onangholo will be fully included into the Great Outapi Dome 2121, so nothing will be the same”.
Dome 2121 was the latest apparatus developed to protect humans from land aridification which materialized in full force by the end of 20th century. It began slowly, in the late 1990s when the days with temperature above 50 degrees had increased from a few weeks in the year, to more than thirty days alone in 2021. Since then, the number of extremely hot days had increased exponentially. Globally days above 50 degrees now averaged to 130 per year, but in many Southern African countries their number had reached even 200 in a year. Here the Kalahari and the Namib had merged in what the geographers renamed the KalaNam, virtually creating a huge desert that divided the North from the South of the country.
The Domes 2100 were introduced just before Meme Hope was born. They were the latest evolution of the first domes conceived in the year 2030 to protect people working mostly in the Central Business Districts (CBDs) and those living in the elite residential areas, from extreme heat stress and for this reason strongly opposed by the World Climate Action Now, (WCAN) of which Meme Hope mother, Meme Kashibibwa was an activist. The idea was simple in principle, to create in the countries mostly affected by extreme heat stress, a network of self-sufficient artificial bubbles, the domes, empowered with stellarator fusion energy performer, to harness solar power without any nuclear waste. Connection between the different domes was made possible thank to the car-fly transport system, which had virtually reduced distance of 100s of miles just to a few minutes’ drive. However, the domes created an exclusive protection system mostly for the elites; access to them was policed and only allowed for working reasons. For that reasons WCAN fought against the bubbles and their global popular mobilisation led to the transformation of the UN into the RUN and ultimately to the new dome 2100.
“Tomorrow I am going to travel to Etosha” said Ndakalako, holding grandma Hope’s hand tightly, “I am scared”. “Why ngheeange?” answered Meekulu, softly patting her back. “I have never seen a live wild elephant” she said “But thinking of it, I have never seen a live chicken as well” and both laughed to that last observation.
“There is nothing to be scared of, dear, and do not forget, … your great, great grandfathers were hunters”. She led Ndakalako in the library-cum studio; Ndakalako knew that now she would have an adult, woman to woman conversation with grandma Hope. The studio was where all family vital issues were discussed.
“Do you remember what our family totem is?”. “It is the Oryx”, retorted Ndakalako, she had been told that so many times, but she failed to figured out what that could have to do with her going in the wild tomorrow. “There were plenty still, before the last heatwave, now only few remain in the wild, and that is because they could live easily even in the desert scorching heat… this if …water was available. The Oryx symbolizes our nature, the capacity of facing even the most difficult challenges, beside you will have loads of water at the camp. You can even get a full bath twice a week. That is one of the advantages of turning 17 and going to the Olufuku”. Ndakalako smiled, she did not remember when was the last time she bathed in water. That was an extravagance only few could indulge, and often a treat child got at their birthday.
Meekulu asked CPR1 to fetch Volume 1 of the Etosha collection edited by van Zely. It was a very rare copy, the first combining text reading with tact-sensorial experience. Of each animal the reader could touch the body and smell the scent, as if it was there in front of the person. Meekulu indicated the animals she would have found in Etosha and those who were now extinct, explaining how to recognize the different spoors. It was a mesmerizing experience, the right induction for what Ndakalako was going to experience tomorrow.
“Grandma, what will happen tomorrow to Onangholo?” enquired abruptly Ndakalako. It was long since she wanted to ask, but she had always been hesitant knowing that it was a very sensitive argument. It was because of the dome that Grandma had stopped speaking with her mother, great grandmother Kashibibwa, who she accused to have been a sell-out. She could, however, not forgive herself of failing to reconcile before her mother passed away.
“Tomorrow Onangholo will be connected to the 2100 domes’ system and be part of the Great Outapi Dome 2121. I do not know if your great-grandmother Kashibibwa would have been happy or depressed” replied Meekulu. “As you know, being part of GOD 2121 means that we will spend even less time in the open sky” Meekulu, started explaining. “People will also be less free to move since entry controls will reach level 8 but yes, now even the little villages have been included and will be protected from both extreme heat and excess radiation, but is this really what my mother had campaigned for?”.
When the domes were introduced, Kashibibwa was 28, one of the founders of WCAN Namibia; she had always been an environmentalist. Just when completing her MA in investigative journalism, she was busy probing the rational of the domes’ idea. What puzzled her was that the oil giant corporations were both the initiators and the implementers of the domes. She was disturbed by the fact the domes were ultimately thought to maintain the system of production’s status quo. A modern revisitation of Tomasi di Lampedusa’s quote, “everything has to change if we want things to stay as they are”. But ultimately it was the proposed introduction of the Entry Pass (EP) which she fought the most for. The domes were leaving out more than 80 % of the population, those in the rural areas and in urban suburbia, practically protecting, and basically isolating, the rich from the other citizens. A reintroduction, only 40 years after independence, of an apartheid system based on wealth and not directly on race. But why a government who had fought for the country’s freedom, had agreed to such a scheme, was what she was investigating.
“Grandma, why did you clash with Meekulu Kashibibwa?” asked Ndakalako out of the blue. “My mother was very stubborn, me as well. Neither her nor I wanted to admit that we were both wrong”.
After the approval of the domes’ programme by the regional authority, WCAN mobilized the youth, who represented the majority of the country’s population, against it. The battle lasted two years, the police made a large use of the newly introduced RobCops and often the demonstrations led to violent clashes. Kashibibwa, as many other leaders of the movement, was often arrested. Just before giving birth to Meekulu, Kashibibwa’s opposition campaign against the domes almost stopped. Few WCAN requests were accepted, mainly on the right of free movements in and out of the domes, and the abolition of the EP. Oddly Kashibibwa also agreed not to publish the investigative report on the link between the government and the corporation behind the dome project, and, more relevant for the prosecution of the battle, she resigned as WCAN Executive officer. It was a shock, a blow for the movement. Few days after the birth of her daughter, named Hope, on the 6 of August 2032, Kashibibwa left the country, leaving Hope, Ndakalako grandmother, to the in-laws. WCAN ceased its activities.
“Grandma Hope, why did great-grandma leave you?” enquired Ndakalako? “She said it was for my own sake. She returned in the country when I was almost your age. Even if in that period we did communicate a bit, she never revealed where she was, and we never spoke of the domes. When I saw her for the first time, I was happy and distressed at the same time, she was a stranger to me”.
By 2032 the construction of the domes had started, aiming to cover the commercial and residential parts of the main regional capital cities. Movement passes were scrapped for accessing the CBDs but were maintained to access the residential areas. The reason was simple: the size of the dome, in order to ensure internal stability, had to be proportional to the number of people living under it. More people meant bigger size and hence higher costs. WCAN’s principles of equality was forgotten. Alongside introducing the domes, following the global trend in innovative food production, the government had launched the Food Thermo-stabilised (FooT) programme, spearheaded by one of the major producers of genetically modified seeds (GMS). The idea was to artificially produce nutriments for human consumption, reducing to the bare minimum use of water, which by 2030 had officially declared an extremwly scarce resource. Agriculture production had drastically changed, and the impact on rural areas such as Onangholo was devastating. Subsistence agriculture almost disappeared and influx of people to the urban areas skyrocketed. The movement was, however instrumental to the construction of the domes and their maintenance which was a very labor-intensive activity.
Volume 1 of the sense-reading Etosha collection was published in 2032, the same year Meekulu was born. Her mother bought the book and kept it with her until Meekulu turned 17, when she sent it to her with a note: “In this book you will find all your answers”. Meekulu never had the chance to ask her mother the meaning of the note, she died in a strange car accident a few months after her birthday. The book was one of the few things left to her by her mother and was very precious.
“Can you sense the smoothness of hippo skin? It is funny how the hippo was always underrated in terms of danger, maybe the sleepy face” said Meekulu, “They were even more deadly to human than the crocs. Now both are only visible in the few protected areas, I am sure you will be able to have a glimpse to them tomorrow”. After completing her Olufuko, Ndakalako was taking six months leap as a RUN volunteer at the Preventing Artic Meltdown project, to then enroll at the Ice Regeneration Institute in Santiago, so she didn’t know when she would have seen Meekulu after today, and she wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to get to know as much as possible of her great grandmother.
All of sudden Meekulu’s wrist chip started flashing, she had completely forgotten that the city governor had invited her for dinner to discuss tomorrow’s Dome 2121 inaugural ceremony. Meekulu was asked to give the introductory speech. “Oh dam!, I am supposed to have dinner with the Honorable governor Tate Levi, he asked me to give an historical presentation on the domes” Meekulu said apologetically, “In reality what he really wants from me, is to give a eulogy of the programme and what we have achieved as human race. I do not think he would be happy to listen to what I have to say”,they both laughed, “It will be a surprise, I am not a sell-out like my mother…You can take the book with you, consider it as my birthday present, we can continue our conversation after Olufuku” concluded the overthinking Meekulu, while kissing Ndakalako on the cheek and leaving the studio.
Ndakalako was left alone, she would have loved to continue speaking with grandma Hope, she felt that this time she was going to open up about great grandma Kashibibwa, but no… this would have to wait to the next time they meet again. With the book tight in her hands she asked CPR1 to call a taxi for her. “It will not take me much to pack up for tomorrow, if I hurry up, I can arrive to Etosha Park before dinner is served”, thought Ndakalako while waiting for the taxi.
“But your mother agreed with the government’s idea about the domes” Tate Levi was saying nervously, “Actually I do not know what made my mother change position on the domes, but… Tate… I am not my mother. You cannot ask me to say something in which I do not believe and against the way history went. Do not worry, my speech will only put in the right perspective what we have done to make earth a hostile environment for the future generations” restated with a sarcastic smile Meme Hope. “And now, if you excuse me it is time for me to leave, I want to be fresh for tomorrow’s show”.
The moment she received the invitation for the inaugural speech from the office of the Governor, Meme Hope knew what she would have said. That was in her eyes the opportunity to rehabilitate her mother work to the world. Great Outapi, had been chosen among the 10,000,000 cities in the world which would have been connected to the dome 2121 system. She was one of the few African female experts on the history of climate change, so even if her views were very unorthodoxy they had to invite her. That were Professor Hope Endada’s last thoughts before falling asleep.
The beeping on the under skin wristwatch was getting louder, Meme Hope did not want to get up yet, but she had to prepare for the ceremony. She got a special permission on water usage to bathe even if she had already used her monthly quota that could not be missed. She felt bad having ended sharply the conversation with her niece, but on the other hand, she was asking too many questions. She was not yet ready to open the wounds of her past. Time to get ready and most of all to enjoy a bath in warm water.
Ndakalako was woken up of birds’ chirping, it was a recorded sound but the setting made it as if it was real. Virtual reality at Etosha camp was one of the most advanced in the world, those few who had experienced the real natural setting, argued that it was even more real than the real McCoy.
She had driven straight home after last night’s meeting with grandma. She was a bit disappointed, since she had longed to know something more about great grandmother, and she was sure that if they had kept talking, grandma Hope would have opened up, but it least she had the book.
Grandma was right, it was a precious and valuable book, even more since it belonged to great-grandma Kashibibwa. She was her role model, Ndankalako had gone through all the available archives to find information on her life. She could not understand how, after all she had done and all the fights to change the dome programme, on the last mile she had capitulated, and disappeared for so many years. That was not the great-grandmother she had learned to know from the records.
Ndakalako was sensorially going through the book’s pages once again. Suddenly she stopped at the Oryx, the family clan. On the skin there was an odd little bulge which seemed out of place, interrupting the smoothness of the touch, she scratched it and there it was, … a little microchip.
How could grandma not have noticed. Ndakalako slots the chip into her internal wristwatch and there she was… great-grandma Kashibibua. She was lying in a hospital bed, she had just given birth because grandma Hope was at her breast. “My dear daughter, if you are looking at this clip, it is because I am no more and for one reason or another, we did not have the chance to express our feelings. I could not explain to you what really happened and why I had to quit WCAN. It is not as it may appear, or how they may have told you in my absence. I am going to name you Hope, because I am sure you will see the truth and will continue my fight.
I was forced to choose: either continue to struggle for a sustainable planet or not to give birth to you. They knew I would have chosen you”.
She is not a sell-out, she is not a sell-out shouted Ndakalako.
“It is with great pleasure I am calling Prof. Hope Endada, to give her remarks on this particular occasion, the inauguration of Dome 2121, another testimony of the genius of mankind capability to overcome in this past 2100 years all difficulties nature has set in front of us”, silence felt in the auditorium. Grandma’s wrist phone vibrated, she looked at it and could see Ndakalako’s face, automatically she activated the hear-phone and she heard a loud shout “Grandma, I know the truth Kashibibwa was not a sell-out, she did it to keep you alive”.
With tears descending from her face grandma Hope started her speech: “Contrary to what Mr. President has just said, Dome 2121 is not a testimony of mankind genius, rather the proof of our stupidity…..”
——-
——-
Glossary of Oshiwambo names
Etango= Sun
Mahangu = Millet
Shebeen = Liquor shop
Oikombo = Goat
Oshana = Flooded field
Olufuku = Rite of passage to womanhood
Neheaange = Last born
Eewa = Yes
Apo Meekulu = Greeting for elderly women
Tate = Suffix used to indicate an adult man followed by his first name
Meme = Suffix used to indicate an adult woman followed by her name
Etosha = Namibian Wildlife Natural Reserve
——-
Family Tree
| Name | Family link | Character Name | Born in | |
| Ndinelao | Ndakalako great great grand mother | Ndinelao | 1978 | In 2002 gives birth to Kashibibwa |
| Kashibibiwa | Ndakalako great grand mother | Meekulu Kashibibiwa/ (Hope/Meekul’s mother) | 2002 | In 2032 gives birth to Hope |
| Hope/Meekulu | Ndakalako grand mother | Hope/Meekulu, Endada’s mother, main character 2 | 2032 | In 2032 gives birth to Endada |
| Endada | Ndakalako mother | Endada | 2066 | In 2066 gives birth to Ndakalako |
| Ndakalako | main character 1 | 2104 | In 2121 she is 17 |
Aditya Singh
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the beneficiaries?
Biome Environmental Trust is a non-profit organization led by Vishwanath Srikantaiah (a water conservation expert), which launched the ‘A Million Wells for Bengaluru’ movement in the city of Bengaluru, Karnataka, India. This movement aims to have one million functioning open recharge wells in the city, allowing the recharge of aquifers and raising the underground water table.
A majority of the water requirements of Bengaluru are currently supplied by the Cauvery River flowing 100km south of the city. Cauvery water is pumped up about 300m (984ft) to reach the city, requiring large amounts of energy. The borewells in the city (although there are no official measures) provide 600-700 million litres of groundwater, making up about 35- 40% of the city’s water requirement.
Historically, open and shallow recharge wells (presently, only about 20,000 to 30,000) that access higher aquifers were the providers of water to the citizens. However, they have now slowly been replaced by borewells (presently, about 500,000), which are narrow boreholes that exploit and drain the lower aquifers (now gone down to about 1,800 feet).
In terms of rainfall, only about 3-10% of the city’s rains percolates into underground aquifers naturally based on hydrological patterns. However, land begins to ‘crust’ upon urban development and construction, bringing down the percolation to 0-1%. Precious rainwater flows down buildings and tarred roads as surface run-off, choking sewers and inundating low-lying areas (leading to urban flooding). Moreover, these problems have worsened over several decades due to climate change.
‘A Million Wells for Bengaluru’ aims to provide a solution to these problems, and in the process, secure livelihoods for the ‘Mannu Vaddars,’ a local well-digging community native to the region. The overall percolation rate of rainwater can be increased (up to 50-60%) using open recharge wells. Vishwanath calculates that 1 million wells will be enough to solve issues of water shortage in the city. If even a portion of the 3.5 million litres that falls onto each acre of land in the city as rainfall percolates into the ground, water requirements would be met without supply from the Cauvery River. Additionally, water from open recharge wells is more affordable (around 1% of the price of Cauvery water) than from borewells and the Cauvery, only being pumped up a mere 6m (20ft) to the surface, as opposed to a 100km length and 300m height.
‘A Million Wells for Bengaluru’ has been supported and promoted by native and local communities, institutions, citizen groups, and governmental agencies, given the wide-ranging benefits of the movement that can be observed by all citizens of the city.
Open recharge well in the city
Image courtesy of Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both, or other dimensions of climate change?
The movement is directly mitigating the impacts of climate change. Vishwanath explains that rainfall patterns in Bengaluru, like many other cities, have changed dramatically over time with intense showers within short durations, leading to larger volumes of water being dumped over the city very quickly, and in unexpected months.
The Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) has set up about 100 weather stations across every other ward in the city. Biome Trust, along with the KSNDMC, has been tracking the change in rainfall patterns due to climate change and has found an increase in the intensity of rainfall from 60mm per hour to about 180mm per hour. Additionally, the pockets of the city that were previously not getting enough rain are getting higher amounts now.
With recharge wells, rainwater can be routed into the shallow aquifers more efficiently, enhancing the groundwater levels gradually by mimicking the natural patterns observed decades ago. The recharge wells capture the high intensity of rainfall instead of allowing it to flood. The collected water then percolates into the ground and recharges aquifers, which are water-bearing formations that exist 10-100 ft underground, and are naturally replenished during rains.
Water from an open well requires 0.1 units of energy for every thousand litres of water supplied, in relation to the 1.5 – 1.8 units from deep bore wells and 2 units for Cauvery water. Therefore, recharge wells provide water that is 20 times more efficient compared to Cauvery water, with their carbon emissions being 20 times less.
Hence, the movement is engaging directly with the climate, responding to the vagaries of rainfall, and mitigating urban flooding, both consequences of climate change. It is recharging the groundwater table and lakes of the city through increased percolation to solve issues of water scarcity. Finally, open wells also reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions in providing water to the city, both important facets of climate change.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
For ease of understanding, the main objectives of this movement could be categorized into social and practical ones. Vishwanath explains that one of the larger social objectives is to provide and secure livelihoods for the well digging Mannu Vaddar community, native to Karnataka. This would allow higher rates of education within the community, giving the future generations the power to decide whether they would want to pursue well digging, or another field of their choosing.
According to Vishwanath, an important social objective is to raise awareness about the presence of open recharge wells in the city, the potential of shallow aquifers to sustain water requirements of the city, and the role of local communities in their revival. Within this, the hope is to build a water culture in the city where local citizens take collective responsibility for managing groundwater through community participation and the mainstreaming of bottom-up and traditional water harvesting practices.
Old stone-lined well recharged with rainwater
Image courtesy of Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
A practical objective of the movement, Vishwanath describes, is to bring up the water table in the city, where open recharge wells (and borewells) would then be able to supplement water requirements. With this, it was also important to ensure the productive use of rainwater and to bring awareness to the importance of rainwater harvesting practices to capture rainwater.
Another practical objective of the movement is to engage with the climate and mitigate the impacts of climate change. As explained previously, through recharging of shallow aquifers, open recharge wells will be able to prevent flooding, reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions, and solve issues of water shortage in the city, by ensuring water security.
Rooftop rainwater recharging a well
Image courtesy of Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
Understood as a movement instead of a project, ‘A Million Wells for Bengaluru’ was launched in 2015. As it is providing livelihoods, it does not follow a regular project timeline and is more open-ended in its scope. Since it is not possible to track every well that has come up in the city, there cannot be a definite start time to the larger process, given that well diggers have been digging wells for centuries. One million wells are an aspirational goal that has been set for the city and is not the end goal since the movement should continue to grow with urban growth and rising populations. However, the hope is to reach one million wells by 2025.
There are several instances at an individual, institutional and public level that highlight the visible effects of the increased awareness about the open recharge wells. Institutions have taken the initiative to set up recharge wells themselves. Through the restoration of 4 open recharge wells within the Wheel and Axle Railway Plant campus in the city, the wetlands around the wells were revived. With a variety of birds coming to the wetlands, one can observe larger environmental impacts of engagement with the wells. Most importantly, the wells now provide the plant with 300,000 litres of water, and they no longer require water from the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB). Similarly, in Cubbon Park, one of Bengaluru’s largest open spaces, defunct open recharge wells on restoration provide 100,000 litres of water to the park.
Who are the actors involved? What is their background?
As per the Memorandum of Understanding signed for the movement, Biome Environmental Trust provides the technical support for it through consultations with architects, civil and mechanical engineers, and urban planners; Friends of Lakes is the implementation partner that organises voluntary community engagements to clean the city’s lakes; India Cares Foundation is the enabler taking care of fundraising. All investments made within this movement are by individuals, institutions, and communities across the city, all crucial actors for the success of the movement.
Vishwanath Srikantaiah (of the Biome Environmental Trust) has been working in the water sector in Bengaluru for 34 years. He has travelled all across the world (to Iran, China, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Brazil, Chile, Sweden, Finland, Latvia, etc.) to study wells. He explains that large governmental infrastructural projects provide one type of solution for the water shortage, which occurs in the city every 20 years since the 1850s, due to its expansion. The other way is for the local citizens to participate in the solution through community involvement and action.
The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) offer policy support to the movement. Vishwanath, who has been a proponent of rooftop rainwater harvesting (RWH), has been working with BWSSB, helping them write the bylaws (based on the rainfall patterns in the city) to make rainwater harvesting compulsory in the region. Water from RWH can be filtered and supplied into open wells, which would then recharge the aquifers, supplementing the piped water supply of the city.
Mannu Vaddars digging a recharge well
Image courtesy of Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
The Mannu Vaddars (a sub-caste of the Bhovi community) have been historically digging tanks, lakes, and wells across the country for over 1000 years. They have traditionally found work given their knowledge of digging and maintaining wells. However, they are now running short of livelihoods since people have started drilling borewells instead of open wells. Biome began seeking out the traditional well diggers that constitute 750 families living in and around the city. Their skills and knowledge of the region’s hydrogeology (aquifers, pre-existing wells, soil types, presence of rocky layers) have been pivotal in achieving the goals for this movement.
Which limits (institutional, physical, social, etc.) does it encounter?
There are a few limitations that the movement encounters. The first social limitation would be the resistance towards understanding the impacts of climate change on the ecosystem. There can also be a lack of responsibility among citizens towards recognizing the importance of rainwater harvesting and open recharge wells as required infrastructure systems.
Topographically, certain areas in the city may not be conducive for recharge wells because of hard layers of rock and clay, creating an ecological limitation in specific locations. Additionally, appropriate mapping techniques like Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Remote Sensing are required to understand geological features to decide the areas where open wells could be feasible. However, these technologies are not available with civic and administrative agencies, constituting a severe institutional limitation.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
Since the recharge wells utilize bio-mimicry to imitate natural ecological processes, no negative effects have been observed since they are holding the water that would have been held by an un-built site.
One crucial point for the entire movement is that native well-digger communities must be provided with employment opportunities within these projects. It would be antithetical to employ modern technological methods, and people that do not belong to the Mannu Vaddar community for digging wells.
Mannu Vaddars cleaning and desilting a recharge well
Image courtesy of Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
The movement can and has been replicated in several other locations based on the specific needs and context of the region. Open wells, if recharged, can provide arsenic- and fluoride- free water to the regions where contaminated water is currently being consumed.
Vishwanath mentions that the aim of the movement is that it should not matter if the Biome Trust is involved in its continuation. Biome does not claim credit for the movement and considers their responsibility to provide an aspirational goal, and to bring awareness, encouraging individuals, communities, and institutions to dig wells within their localities, and share their stories with the Biome Trust, if they wish to do so.
Several cities such as Hyderabad, Belgaum, Sangli, Tiruchirappalli, Chennai, have launched their own movements or similar initiatives. Additionally, The Ministry of Urban Development has been in correspondence with Biome to officially incorporate this movement into the Jal Shakti Program under the Smart Cities Project for 500 cities across the country.
The revival of the shallow aquifer is being replicated – leading to an all-India movement, where the open well, as a representative of the shallow aquifer is reaching every village, town, and city in India.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes (law, institutional arrangements, long term sustainability or community preparedness, etc.)? If yes, which?
The movement has highlighted the importance of engaging with local contexts and features, talking to people whose livelihoods depend on the water (farmers, fishers, well-diggers), learning from their experiences, and involving them within the solution. The mainstreaming of this practice leads to better community preparedness for mitigating the effects of the climate crisis.
Individuals, institutions, large and small establishments, gated communities, have all taken up initiatives without the involvement of Biome. The movement has enabled individual citizens and communities to take action, brought larger awareness to how they can be involved within climate change action, which need not necessarily be at an administrative level through large infrastructure projects.
MLAs and Corporators (elected officials) across the city have started planning and making recharge wells in their respective constituencies and zones. The Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, C.N. Ashwath Narayan, initiated the digging of 100 recharge wells in the Malleshwaram constituency. The State Horticultural Department has taken this initiative to all the parks in the city including Lalbagh Botanical Gardens, which now has 500 recharge wells. The Bellandur Development Forum has planned to dig 2,500 wells in low-lying areas around Bellandur Lake that get inundated with rainwater during the monsoon.
A crucial part of the movement has been the mandating of climate change action by the government through the rainwater harvesting bylaws, highlighting how sustainable practices could be institutionalized through legislation and policy.
References
Interview conducted with Mr. Vishwanath Srikantaiah
Coushik, R. (2020). The Indian megacity digging a million wells. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20201006-india-why-bangalore-is-digging-a-million- wells
Gatty, H.R. (2020). Two years, one lakh wells: Can “Million Wells” movement help sove Bengaluru’s water crisis. Retrieved from https://bengaluru.citizenmatters.in/million-recharge-wells-biome- friends-of-lakes-rainwater-harvesting-43978
N.A (2018). Urban Waters Bengaluru: Million Wells. Retrieved from http://bengaluru.urbanwaters.in/million-wells/
Padre, I. (2019). A million wells for Bengaluru. Retrieved from https://www.civilsocietyonline.com/cover-story/a-million-wells-for-bengaluru/
Priya, L. (2019). One Million Wells for Bengalurur: Meet The Group Saving The City from Day Zero! Retrieved from https://www.thebetterindia.com/173853/bengaluru-ground-water-crisis-well- digging-day-zero-zenrainman/
Ramchandran, S. (2019). TEDdxBangalore: The Answer to India’s Water Crisis: Community. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxlKrJcg8KU&t=22s
Srikantaiah, V. (2020). TEDxMBSITM: A city and its waters. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=velaVjFWv1A&t=48s
Taha Mama
“The Green (CCU-2200)” by Taha Mama
Start with Silence.
The phrase bounced around Shahid’s head. He had contemplated maintaining a journal for over a year now. Shahid kept finding reasons to push the initiation. A month later – he’d tell himself – after he’s thoroughly honed his handwriting skills. Just a few days later: after he finishes the last chapter of the critically acclaimed novel around the Covid’19 pandemic. (A seminal text really, if one wants to seriously take up journaling) A week into working on his typing speed. Or after he gets his hands on the latest typing tech. Little did he know, his great-great grandfather in the summer of 2021 was faced with a similar journaling debacle.
Panic, Panic, Hope!
He’d fixed upon his ‘writing mantra,’ going back and forth between stages of panic without making the leap of fate into realm of Hope. Writer’s Hope. He flirted with fragmented ideas but saw no ink flowing on his screen. A cursor kept blinking at him from the first page of his blank book. Why should one journal? Cash? He’d turned twenty at his parent’s house a week ago. It seemed only yesterday when could he stop worrying about math homework and finishing the greens on his plate. It was too soon to be worrying about green numbers. Craft? He was told by teachers he had a distinct style of writing, “Write more!” said some “Write every day!” said the others. But he’d said enough, Silence was his spectacle now. Career? The world where he finds himself has moved beyond (or back to) the need for creating careers out of their lives, living was enough. The prestigious Calcutta Colleges had hung their English hats, dawned during the British Raj. Calcutta then was a bustling capital city where social customs were challenged to allow fresh ideas to flow. Now, one followed the path their parents had set out on or they would be left behind. Forward meant following. Choice became the unspoken C-word of the times. Coffee? Coffee!
Caffeine, Kaf · feen?Ka· faa · een?
Shahid struggled. Coffee could momentarily lift his spirits, till this C-word somehow got the better of him. Once again, on a gloomy Sunday morning his duel ended with defeat. Humbled, he waddled up to the Machine with three blinking lights. Red meant it Lives. Green said it was ready to Give. The third light, he was not quite sure. In fact, this was the first time he had even noticed it. Blue-black, blue-black, blue-black, it flickered. Red stayed stable; Green caved in as he pressed the button that spawns the warm beverage he craves. He pays the Machine a closer look. Its pockets were filled with coffee beans, it was adequately fed with milk. It seems like the poor old Machine had a classic case of being ‘simply thirsty.’ Shahid had nothing to offer, the Taps stayed stiff as the Machine mourned. He looks out of the window, in search of Life, that would sympathise, in search of Red. A decaying Green blinks back at him. He sees no humans, just malfunctioning Machines. It was 2200, and his kind had run out of water.
There was a War of sorts. A Water War. There were no guns or bullets, or sturdy looking tanks involved. A few men in suits called each other unpleasant names in a fancy room and suddenly all the pipes went dry. All that was now spoken about was: how to turn Sea water into Fresh water. To Shahid it seemed like a Salt crisis but his nephew on the other side of the world was taught Water Crisis instead. He did not protest, he remained silent.
Violence is a culture found in playgrounds,
Cities fall to let their children breathe
The lines ringed in his head when the Lake (Calcutta had many lakes, but only one Lake), after being saturated with that same Green for days caught fire on a Tuesday afternoon. It echoed in his sleep for weeks after he witnessed a building (not Building) ignite in flames without provocation. A group of people blamed another group of people, while some suspected the Green was the culprit. And the same lines filled his ears today. But no matter. For the Fire Crisis was over. The lines were now useless to him. He’d picked it out from a Collection of Poems along with other little bits and pieces he’d found from his Great Great Grandfather’s box.
The Box!
He summons the ladder and makes his way up the bathroom door to the attic. To where the Box sits. He empties it out, sprawling the same items again hoping one would pique his interest today a little more than the others. He picks out a Portable Air Quality monitor first. It didn’t really work, but its scale was visible. It assigned a word each for a range of values. It started with ‘Good’ and went till ‘Severe.’ Green to Red. He knew very little about Air Quality or Good and Bad, but he had spent many an evening with his math homework. He knew a set of numbers when he saw them. He was certain the Monitors today started where this one ended.
Shahid finds a couple of old photographs too. There wasn’t much to talk about them. Photography was a summer fad for the old man. He recognised some of the places. Only the chai shops with colourful tarpaulin roofs were replaced by Buildings. Yellow Hindustan Motor’s Ambassadors which operated as taxi’s were replaced by grey Council Cars. And you don’t see cycles, birds, dogs or any people on the street anymore. Surely Green cannot be behind this, perhaps the Salt has made its way to the air too, seeping into Water, making all Monitors flicker in Red.
Shahid then got his hands on a book, was it a journal? He couldn’t tell. It didn’t speak; the pencil marks have faded. Could he make it his journal? It already started with Silence. But the pages were on the brink of turning to powder. The photograph’s plight was similar. Is this how pages die or had the Box been unkind?
He was terribly partial to handmade paper.
Was all that was spoken about his Great Great Grandfather to Shahid. As he packed up the box it occurred to him: He was terribly partial to paper too!
Shops
Now, luxury items such as notepads and pens and protractors are only issued by the Calcutta Council, available only at Calcutta Council authorised stores, run by Calcutta Council employees. But you can also get them at Stationary Shops. There aren’t very many of them these days. Fortunately, Shahid’s house is directly across one. They had somehow unlocked the secrets of time travel years ago, for they were always outdated. Before the Council’s Takeover, before the Crisis, when everyone around them used calculators and Computer-generated receipts, they stuck to a pen and a notepad. Slowly writing the price of each item in a column. Before adding a neat plus sign beside at. A line struck below it would signify the Addition would now begin. Only a shaky hand of the aged shopkeeper could handle the phenomenon. Young blood would be overwhelmed by the pace of this craft. This was the game of the old folk. Even the Council couldn’t faze them, and it had some seriously old folks. The Shops stuck to their ways
Silent Streets
Shahid stepped out on the Street to see everyone around him with (along with half a dozen masks) a device. A Noiseless Mic. It looked like a lapel and cancelled out all the surrounding sound for the wearer. It could catch the softest of whispers, you’d just about had to think out loud and it would pick it up. The messages were transmitted to a fellow Noiseless Mic flaunter with the actual sound being lost. The receiver would hear a monotonous hum as the messages. One could obviously select from a wide array of emotions to flavour to your messages. Let alone noise, the Demonic Device had cancelled out all sounds. Everything but Silence. But Shahid’s Silence was different.
Father’s Son
He noticed he was being watched. Watched as his ‘Father’s son.’ It was his Mother’s colleague, across the street. He’d seen that scowl before. They must have picked it up from his Mother, who reserved it for the times she spoke of her Father. So, this Father of his, somehow makes tonnes of Money by selling Salt. He owns big Machines that do all the work for him. Sea Water becomes Fresh Water, leaving Salt and Money. To his Father this was Service, to his Mother it was Inhuman in times of a Crisis. To Shahid this was Routine. As a child his Father, would hold him down to unleash the Tickle Monster, only to let go if he admitted he was his Father’s son. An innocent activity?
Mother’s Son
He left their gaze only to run into a suited man at the Shop. He could smell the smirk on them through the layers of masks. A smirk he’d seen slapped on his Father’s face while his Mother would spend her days speaking at length about Ecology to whoever gave her a hear. All his Father would say, whenever he stopped smirking that was, “We live in a Silent World.”
My Silence
But Shahid believes his Silence is different. He just couldn’t quite point out what exactly was so novel about it. He buys a book. He buys a Pen. The shopkeeper begins the Addition. On his way out he is stopped, not by silence, but by sound.
“My name is Zariya and yours?” The raspy, sing-song speech, Human speech, is a carnival to his ears.
“Sh, Shahid” he squeaks. His throat numb, his mouth dry.
“Why were you named Shahid?” speech flows easily through little Zariya. Just as easy as the little fountain of hair gushing above her head, clipped in place by a deep Blue scrunchy.
He dusts off his vocal cords, the clouds around his conscious part. He feels lighter. His eyes are fixed on that Blue, glistening under the lonely bulb of the Shop. He is reminded he was named after his Great Great Grandfather.
“Listen,” his voice lingers, filling up the room. It catches the shopkeeper’s attention. Little Zariya’s mother lifts her eyes from a vintage book to that vintage young man, “It means beloved in Persian, Witness in Arabic”
Shahid rushes back to his room, the Machine still blinking. Shahid’s new book isn’t blank anymore.
Tu Zariya, hoon main Zariya,
Aur uski Kripa, Dariya Dariya.
(You are the medium, I am the medium
And their blessings are like the Sea, like the Sea)
__
References
[Text]
The first few pages of A Language Than Older than words Derrick Jensen.ISBN:9780285636248
The introduction of The Last Jet Engine Laugh by Ruchir Joshi. ISBN: 9780002570893
Agha Shahid Ali’s Call Me Ishamael Tonight. ISBN: 9780393051957
A bit of the style and humour from Andre Sean Greer’s Less. ISBN: 9780316316125
Adil Jussawala’s Land’s End. ISBN: 9788192923062
[Picture]
Cover Image by Taha Mama
[Video]
A Phoebe Waller Bridge Interview for the Writing Mantra (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3mmqLVi_QQ&t=423s&ab_channel=Vogue)
Zariya by Coke Studio and AR Rahman
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlaZSx6tqRo&ab_channel=CokeStudioIndia)
[Other]
Shahid’s Great Great Grandfather’s box, all of it.
Maazen Ahmed ( author & illustrator)
I – PLACE /pleɪs/
wʌn I believe an island is what it was called back then.
tuː Yeah, a land mass completely surrounded by water – but smaller than a continent. And ˈeɪʒə-saʊθ would _______classify as artificial. Man-made. It was made to be a perfect circle.
θriː I see. A circle was probably to cut costs, no?
tuː Right. Isolating the entire coast would have been much more expensive.
θriː Good move. There would be too much empty space if we had done that.
tuː Well maybe now it would be. But our population doesn’t fluctuate like it did before the 22nd century. I’d _______skimmed through some records in the Archiving Department the other day. Back then there was so little _______space, they’d start building vertically. Towers they were called. And sky…scrapers? Yeah, sky-scrapers.
θriː Like… to scrape skies?
tuː Who knows.
wʌn They didn’t have enclosures back then. I’m sure buildings could be as tall as they wanted them to be.
θriː Right, right. Everything was open. I’m pretty sure people used to travel on air to get everywhere because _______of that. The museum had an “aeronautics” exhibit last week. They seemed really dangerous to me. Hard _______to believe hundreds of people would be in them at once.
wʌn No, no, they didn’t always use planes. That was for when they had to transport large groups of people ______from one sector to another. Like ˈeɪʒə-saʊθ to əˈmɛrɪkə-nɔːθ. Or whatever they used to call those places ______back then.
θriː Transport… people? To different sectors? For what?
wʌn Ask the expert.
tuː The old sectors – ‘countries’ they were called – used to be very different from each other. And there _______were a lot more of them. We have 15 sectors now, but there were hundreds of countries. They all had _______different leaders, different languages, different currencies, different climates, everything. Some were _______probably better off than others, so people would tend to move around. Planes were just the quickest _______way for them to do so.
wʌn Guess they hadn’t come up with their ocean-lines yet. Or would they travel above water?
tuː They’d use the ocean for transport sometimes. On things called “ships”. But yeah, normally above the _______surface, not underwater for the most part. Mostly for moving goods – cargo – from one place to another.
wʌn Well then, at least that’s the same.
tuː Eh, people would travel on ships too sometimes.
wʌn What, why?
tuː Before the 20th century, that was the only way to get people across the ocean. After the 20th century…_______they traveled on them for leisure, I guess. Neither ships or planes were a clean way to get around _______though.
wʌn Hah. And people still wonder why we’re in these little bubbles of ours.
II – LIVING /ˈlɪvɪŋ/
“And now, on to the weather! We’ve been seeing quite the downpour for the past few days from six fifteen p.m. to nine forty-five p.m. – as per the Ministry of Agriculture’s schedule. But good news is, tomorrow’s marks the last evening of rainfall for the year! Starting Monday, these quiet greys are going to be turning a clear blu-
…
“It seems we have breaking news. There has been a minor road accident on H-14, leading to significant traffic pileup till the H-23 intersection. We have ˈoʊməɹ at the scene to provide a detailed description of the incident. Over to you ˈoʊməɹ.
Thanks ʤuːn. For those of you just joining in, I’m here at H-14 where there seems to have been a single-vehicle collision on the road. The officers inspecting the incident are reporting that the driver of said vehicle has no visible injuries. It seems the driver had lost control of his car and had crashed into the guard rail on the left side of the road. We will be able to provide more details on the victim shortly.
Furthermore, this accident has created a significant traffic jam all the way until H-23. Since this route is exclusively used by employees from the Ministry of Health, individuals that were scheduled to leave their homes at any time past 8:36 a.m. will be caught in this congestion, and will be facing delays in their reporting time at the Ministry.
We have just received notice that the Ministry of Health has carried out the relevant calculations, and are providing nine minutes of relaxation for each employee’s reporting time. This is to accommodate the necessary adjustments to each vehicles speed, and potential rubbernecking. Any delays beyond that will be added on to the end of the concerned employees shift.
And… we have just received an update on the victim of the car crash. It seems that the police are facing delays in identifying the driver. This has led authorities to assume that this individual has refrained from consuming his daily supplements as per the Ministry of Health’s instructions, and is therefore not visible on today’s census records. This is further demonstrated by the driver’s ‘sickly appearance’ – to quote the police report – and a lack of attention on the road. The number of days that the victim has avoided his supplements is also unclear, but considering the driver’s condition, authorities claim that it has likely been weeks. The police are now investigating the reason as to why the victim avoided his daily supplements.
And that brings us to the end of our report. We will now return to our regularly scheduled news. Back to you ʤuːn!
III – CONDUCT /ˈkɒndʌkt/
Identification Code: AS – 072 378
Welcome to your Annual Abidance & Regularity Examination. During the A.R.E we will be documenting your pulse and respiration rate for each of your responses. The testing will end if there are noticeable oddities in your vitals.
As directed by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, we will begin the testing by reviewing your consumption of the supplements provided to you by the Ministry. Please respond to each of these prompts in as succinct a manner as possible.
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Have you been receiving your daily supplements at 7:04 AM each morning?
Yes.
And have you been consuming said supplements as per direction from the Ministry of Health and Welfare?
Yes.
Have you experienced any negative reactions to the supplements provided, that may have led to failure or inhibition in consuming said supplements?
No.
Are you aware of any individuals within your household, neighbourhood or workplace that have failed to regularly consume the supplements provided to them?
No.
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Thank you. We will now move on to occupation-centric questions. The testing will end if you fail to answer any questions in regards and in relation to your position. Please state your place of work.
Ministry of Health. Department of Biotechnology, Pharmaceutical Division.
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Thank you. It seems that your respective Board have had some concerns in regards to a group of employees within your department. Your responses for this portion of the examination will be recorded and forwarded to the relevant authorities. Once again, the testing will end if there are noticeable oddities in your vitals.
Please provide a brief report of your divisions progress over the last quarter.
“Um… we had received records of people in ˈjʊərəp-wɛst and ˈjʊərəp-nɔːθ having a sort of allergic reaction to the supplements we’ve developed. We’ve made the necessary modifications, so it shouldn’t be an issue anymore.
Oh we’ve also worked with the Ministry of Housing and Home Affairs in əˈmɛrɪkə-saʊθ to rework the Population Control Scheme for each sector. Our sector is now going to have four natal dates instead of three from now on. They’ve now been set on the fifteenth of January, April, July and October. We’ve adjusted the supplements accordingly. We will see effects by the October period.
There was also discussion on whether or not people reaching the age of seventy should…pass away on the same days – as in the fifteenth of those same four months. The initial plan was to carry out the passing and the necessary procedures at the end of those same months. But in the end, they – we, decided that there’s no need to set aside a different day for those that are passing away.
This way we won’t have to worry about the effects of a population spike for those fifteen to sixteen days.”
Have you completed your report? The Board of Directors also mentioned completion on the ‘Five-Stages’ project. Please continue your report.
“Oh…yes. The five stages have been decided. We’re still yet to modify the supplements further. But it is almost complete. The body should adhere to the appropriate stages, as long as one takes the supplements as directed. These changes will also likely come about by the October period.”
A notable number of employees within the Department of Biotechnology have failed to recall each of the five stages and the corresponding ages correctly. Please dictate the five stages. The testing will end if you provide an incorrect response.
“Right… the stages are: birth to five for ‘preliminary development’; five to twenty for ‘education’; twenty to fifty- five for ‘employment’; Fifty-five to sixty-five, education – or ‘mentorship’ rather; and sixty-five to seventy for ‘retirement’.”
.
.
.
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Thank you. The relevant authorities are satisfied with your responses. We will now move on to a series of question regarding your ‘home-life’. Once again, the testing will end if there are noticeable oddities in your vitals.
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Anamika Sarker
Where is this grassroots initiative implemented? Who are the promoters? Who are the beneficiaries?
Veditum India Foundation is a not-for-profit research and media organization based out of Kolkata, India. Their work is at the intersection of environment, culture, and society, and is currently centered around Indian rivers, and life in and around these rivers. Their aim is to create publicly accessible records, which range from ecological, anthropogenic, hydrological, social, and more contextual layers of these spaces and of people’s stories.
The City Water Walks project by Veditum is a pan-India, multi-city project. It has taken off in multiple cities in the country, such as in Ahmedabad, Mumbai, and Chennai. It is also presently underway in other cities such as Kolkata. Recognizing that they are not the first, neither the only organization to map urban commons, they simply wish to provide a platform for people to host their information on after some basic vetting. When people from various cities are interested in conducting these walks, Veditum can provide them with a basic framework for it, should they ask for it. The City Water Walks project is entirely volunteer driven by curious citizens who are generally enthusiastic about learning about the urban realm that they inhabit. As such, the promoters would be the same individuals and groups who conduct the walks.
In terms of the dissemination of information and a growing awareness, the direct beneficiaries of the program are the common citizens. Yet, realizing that just a couple of guided walks are not sufficient to drive impactful change, the founder of Veditum India Foundation, Siddharth Agarwal believes that the persistence of these projects is the key to success. In allowing for the information to be open-source and accessible by people all over the web, citizens become more aware of the water infrastructure in their cities as a short-term objective. And in the long-term, in the presence of persevering demands from the citizens, they become the direct recipients of any administrative and development changes made in the city. Additionally, the global audience is also a beneficiary of this project, who can then use a similar framework to conduct similar studies and projects in their own cities.
How does this initiative engage with climate? Does it tackle mitigation, adaptation, both or other dimensions of climate change?
It is indisputable that climate change is real and very much upon us. But the changes which have been observed in recent years do not stay bounded within the geopolitical boundaries of any one country or region. Any changes to the local weather and climate of any area in the form of extreme weather events is bound to have global significance.
According to Pathak et al. (2014), “the hydrological cycle is intimately linked with changes in atmospheric temperature and radiation balance. A warmer climate may lead to an intensification of the hydrological cycle, resulting in higher rates of evaporation and increase of liquid precipitation. These processes, in association with a shifting pattern of precipitation, may affect the spatial and temporal distribution of runoff, soil moisture, groundwater reserves etc. and may increase the frequency of droughts and floods.” The director-general of the India Meteorological Department confirmed to Mongabay-India, a conservation and environmental science news platform, that the seasonal reliability of the annual monsoons in India has been changing. What used to be a steady combination of rains and sun is giving way to long periods of inadequate rainfall followed by intense rain; in short — drought and floods.
Reports from various parts of the country, for instance inadequate rains in Kerala and Karnataka followed by intense storms, bouts of strong rainfall of more than 900mm in Tamil Nadu in one day, weeks of flooding in cities such as Mumbai and in parts of Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Assam, and drinking water reserves running dry in Chennai have made it clear that these unanticipated patterns are a result of climate change. Such extreme weather events are expected to become commonplace in coming years, with an impending water crisis which is nearly upon us. Vast areas and populations living in them are being starved of water as the average temperature rises, worsening the number of people suffering from water stress. In addition to variable rainfall patterns, open areas which acted as major drainage points or forests in the past are being overrun by expanding cities. So, when there are excessive rains, cities are not able to drain the water, leading to widespread inundation.
For cities to expand in manners which are environmentally directed and sustainable, it is important to study the already existing infrastructure and patterns of distribution (of water). This is where we believe the City Water Walks projects fits in to the picture. By documenting water in the urban realm, including where the water comes from, how (and where) it travels within and city, and where it ultimately goes, it makes available a near-holistic understanding of urban water. An essential part of this process is to study the development of this network, which then makes it possible to map the changes which have taken place. Such research is carried out by often undertaking these walks in person, where citizens can see for themselves the route that the water they use and dispose on a regular basis, travels to and from. In addition to this, referring to academic and research projects, government archives, oral histories, narratives, and even literature from the region can add to the different layers of information one can gather for the program. In doing so, and by making educated estimates of what the upcoming years will look like for the city, the City Water Walks project will allow elected municipal and government officials to implement more efficient policies. Additionally, the walks which are a part of the City Water Walks project are different from regular walking tours which have become common in many cities today. This project urges us to be more mindful of the environment that we are in and is done from the perspective of record keeping and record making. In that sense, we believe that the City Water Walks project seeks to engage with climate change by helping Indian cities to better adapt to changing environmental conditions and preparing them to stay resilient against future extreme weather events.
What are the main objectives? What are the main values?
According to the Veditum India Foundation, the City Water Walks project was “born out the desire to understand how the urban [water] commons function and how are they affected by constant changes in governance and development.” In an interview with us, Siddharth spoke of the objective of the project as multifold- before the walk(s) is conducted, it is about building an idea to understand the context of where we as citizens and a society are situated. During the walk, the objective changes to a building a relationship with the landscape and with the water commons, which otherwise does not exist for us since it often remains hidden from view. This is especially important because citizen engagement is what triggers a mechanism towards accountability. The eventual goal is to contribute to smarter administrative and development decision making through their work. Their intent to amplify the voices of young Indians and push for collective action wherever required. The overall objective of the project can be understood as creating and revealing multiple reference points to understand and measure the changes in our cities, and to push for more comprehensive record-keeping.
What is the timeline? Are there already visible effects?
The timeline for the project differs from city to city. But a part of the birth of the project was driven by the smaller temporal scale of it. The founder of Veditum India Foundation was already walking along the river Ganga and mapping it, which was a 6-month long commitment. Around the same time, questions about how other people could get involved in similar projects within more localized contexts came up. That is when the idea of the City Water Walks came to be- as a one-day long commitment made by citizens who were interested in questions of the relationship between their cities and the water which quenches its thirst.
Who are the actors involved? What is their background?
Veditum, as an organization, is open to have individuals or other organizations approach them with proposals to conduct similar water walks in their respective cities. As such, the City Water Walks project is not a centrally led project, with a fixed team working on it. It is, in essence, led by curious citizens who want to know more about the cities they inhabit and want to make that information available to others. While speaking with Siddharth, we were told that most people who choose to get involved in the project are those who are interested in urban studies, working within issues of environmental and policy accountability, students, general enthusiasts, and citizen scientists.
Which limits (institutional, physical, social, etc.) does it encounter?
As independent researchers, often there is a physical restriction of access to spaces, regardless of whether these are publicly or privately owned, and can lead to policing of these spaces by those who implement and enforce laws. Additionally, in the absence of an education institutional affiliation, a lot of information in the form of city-level records and other records, is often withheld. In such cases, it becomes necessary to rely on citizen records to fill in the missing gaps. It can also often be difficult to ensure the involvement of the local communities at different levels.
Are any shortcomings or critical points visible? What other problematic issues can arise from its implementation?
Currently, the main shortcoming of the project is the limited number of partners that it has. Strength and collective action are more likely to build up and be effective only when there are larger numbers and more long-term partners for the same. As for implementation, since this is primarily a research-based project, there are no foreseeable issues which may arise because of the findings from the project.
How would it be potentially replicable in other settings?
The City Water Walks is a project that is flexible, both in terms of who all are involved in it, but also where it may be implemented. Since the project was first started in the city of Mumbai along the Mithi river, it has already travelled to other parts and cities in India, where the project has transformed to contextualize itself within the respective cities.
Is this initiative conducive to broader changes (law, institutional arrangements, long term sustainability or community preparedness, etc.)? If yes, which?
The project is carried out with a lot of hope in the hearts of those conducting these walks- hope that more people from various cities will become interested. Given that people from various backgrounds are, and can be, involved with the City Water Walks project, the dissemination of information within different communities is faster. And as the network and bandwidth increases, the framework to carry out these walks and projects can become directly workable. The City Water Walks project especially looks at questions and infrastructure related to water supply and drainage. These are essential components which need to be addressed, at institutional, policy, and community levels, to make our cities more sustainable and prepared for the climate crisis.
Explain which materials you have used for your entry and eventually add links.
Arcanjo, M. (2019). The Future of Water in India. Retrieved from http://climate.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/The-Future-of-Water-in-India.pdf
Gopikrishna Warrier, S. (2019, September 19). As climate change disrupts the annual monsoon, India must prepare. Retrieved from https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/as-climate-change-disrupts-the-annual-monsoon-india-must-prepare-commentary/
N.A (2021). Veditum India Foundation. Retrieved from https://veditum.org/
N.A (2021). City Water Walks. Retrieved from: https://veditum.org/citywaterwalks/
Pathak, H., Pramanik, P., Khanna, M., & Kumar, A. (2014). Climate change and water availability in Indian agriculture: impacts and adaptation. Indian J Agr Sci, 84, 671-679.
Prakas, A. & Goswami, A. (2020, August 29). Indian cities get drowned every monsoon. Here’s what can be done about it. Retrieved from https://scroll.in/article/971519/indian-cities-get-drowned-every-monsoon-heres-what-can-be-done-about-it
Sarker, A. & Agarwal, S. (2021, September 23). Where does Kolkata get its water from? Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvK6UQfaO3c