Hivers share collective living inspiration south of the border

Exciting things underway in Bellingham, Washington as they are forming a Network of their Collective Houses (known as Co-op Houses in the US).

Jeff from Sushi Tribe requested that someone from the Vancouver Collective House Network present about what we've done in Vancouver to build our network. El T and rSara took up the challenge and rode bikes to Bellingham one fine February day. Once on the road we certainly did not need our jackets in the warm sunshine.

We left at 10:15am and arrived at our destination at 4:45pm, after a skytrain ride, a bus, and a 50+km bike ride along country roads and river trails. What a way to go!

Once in Bellingham, Jeff gave us a tour of the Sushi Tribe House. Then about 50 people joined us from at least 10 different houses, and we gave a brief presentation about the VCHN: on the history, what are current roles are within the Network, projects that have brought us together, and why we continue to be inspired to spread the skills and inspiration of Collective Living!

Potluck dinner followed, with much local home made food and a long line up to get some, but with plenty enough deliciousness to go around, and for all to eat their fill.

Excited to see what Bellingham comes up with, and have no doubt the inspiration will continue to spread! Yay for collective living.

ONWARD! South to the border

bus to WhiteRock with bikes leading the way

bikes skip the 2 hour border wait

sun & sea south on the coast

fording streams

closer to Mount Baker

path along the Nooksack River

very narrow trail, without clear signs that other bikes use it. eee

muddy single-track

El T stops for a snack

Doug our guide, knowledgeable about erosion, birds, bikes and bike routes. We picked him up along the way and he escorted us on the back routes into Bellingham. Thanks Doug!

We Made It! El T and Jeff outside Sushi Tribe. They run a seriously inspiring Alternative Library, with neon sign and all. This is in addition to a collective house with 15+ people living together.

One of the two rooms of the Alternative Library

Into the foggy night to catch the Train home after a resplendent and nourishing community potluck. We have a tired meeting planning workshops on the train, and bicycle home (checking the dumpsters along the way of course!) and fall into bed by 11:30pm.

A Story of Rutabega, Cabbage and Saurkraut YUM!

This story starts on my bicycle.

In December I rode my bike in search of two rare birds that had been seen near the Reifel Bird Sanctuary in the Fraser Valley. Ah... farm fields, local production of food, snow geese, and the largest wintering population of raptors in Canada.

I digress on birds:
See, I was on a personal challenge in 2010 to count the bird species I could find without using any motors. The answer is 183! (Tho including public transit I saw 232!) I wrote about biking and birding in Momentum Magazine, and this is the link to the bird article. Anyways, I did see the birds I went looking for that day (a Northern Hawk Owl and a Yellow Chat).

AND...at the edge of a farmers field I also saw truck-sized piles which were surprisingly coloured... one green, and two purple. Hunh?


(LT and a fraction of our salvaged cabbages and rutabaga's)


The answer is CABBAGES! Hundreds of pounds of offcuts from cabbages after the harvest.

The compost piles were mostly outer leaves, sliced off and left to turn back into dirt. There were also many cabbages that were minorly damaged, sliced by harvest machinery, or with spots of blemish. One pile was entirely rutabaga, with some kind of miner insect that had scarred their surfaces.

Now these piles were up to my head. They were big. This was serious. What should I do?
!!!!!THESE VEGETABLES ARE TOTALLY EDIBLE!!!!!

Did you know in France there are laws that permit gleaning in the fields after the harvest? It is a tradition, and it is mandatory that owners allow access to their fields post harvest, or so I learned from a great film called "the Gleaners and I", by Agnes Varda.


I digress on tresspass:
I salvage from urban dumpsters, which is technically trespassing. But now the question of whether to salvage from Farmer's fields? I believe it is one thing to trespass from an urban corporate back alley, but I tremble at the thought of doing injury to an individual farmer or their family. How could I know if this is an individual family farm, or a corporately owned farm? I want to do no harm to individuals. Even individually-owned farms are subject to the pricing of the industrial food system. I wonder if these rutabegas were out-competed by some rutabegas from california? Can I justify this trespass???


So I filled my bicycle panniers, rode to the bus stop and come home (probably with the most weight I have ever carried on my bicycle). Several days later a car-trip was taken to the field, inspired by a story told by Sister Chan Khong about a Monastery in Vietnam during the war, where hundreds of people survived an entire year by eating pickled vegetables that has beed donated. The monks and nuns had spent a week processing them themselves.

We can do this, we thought!


Saurkraut & salted vegetables.
These are the old ways which have allowed people to survive for centuries without depending on industrial food systems.


Step 1: Prepare the food for storage. Cut off damage and exterior leaves. Likes 95% humidity and air movement, so we've got it outside on the back porch. Vancouver is perfect for this! The photo above is Travis preparing the veg's for longer term storage. We made the kimchi and kraut together one afternoon in December.




Step 2: chop! For our Kraut we used about 1/3 grated rutabaga (traditionally when salted is called Saurueben) to 2/3 red cabbage chopped finely. The Kimchi was a bit untraditional as we used red cabbage rather than savoy. Added carrots, black radish, garlic and chilles. Plus Salt.


Fortunately, our resident fermenting expert Kyle, aka Garliq was at home, who provided the instructions on massaging, appropriately salting, and weighting the kraut to make it perfect. (Check out Garliq's website The Living Medicine Project)




Step 3: Pack the Kraut fiercely, and store under a plate with weight on top. Cover and tie with a bit of bicycle innertube. My hands are appreciated for this labour of love and transformation!



Step 4: It's working! Wait for a few weeks, or sample whenever you like.



EAT IT!!! We've got rutabaga-garlic pickles, kimchi, and saurkraut with caraway seeds. Li and I just finished a second batch of kraut because our first one is already gone. In jars in the fridge makes it easy to pull out at meals. Hard to keep the jars full around here!

The great Abundance of Collective Living

Things accumulate at the Beehive!


These thirteen umbrellas are one example of the surprising abundance of collective living! Who's unlucky?

There were times before I lived here when I did not have an umbrella when I needed one. I don't have that problem anymore! We've put a few surplus umbrellas in the Free Box (outside on sunny days).

Bees don't really need umbrellas right now because it is SO COLD in our city! Come over for dinner, or to drink tea and be warm!

Car Free for a Week?

What would your life be like if you chose to live without your car for one week?

Here are a few of my thoughts on this question, but really... this is up to you to imagine for your own situation.

I am not really suggesting that you try living carfree for a week, because there are HUGE systemic barriers to living car-free, and change is not only about individual choices. We have built ourselves into this situation collectively. Powerful interests determine development priorities, and over time decisions accumulate into life-work realities and fundamental life choices where cars are the lubricant.


So, what would your life be like carfree?

Would you have to get up earlier in the morning to catch a bus? Waiting on the street watching the cars streaming past. Zoom, zoom, raow, grrr, zoom. Fumes. Feel blasts of smelly moving air as trucks pass at speed. A seat. Tea and a book. Almost all of the way there.*

Would you get some fresh air deep into your lungs, walking under autumn coloured trees? Yellow maple leaves drift in unpredictable arcs, smallest birds hang and pick for insects by the spider's single thread. Shoes on feet on legs working as you move.

Would you first step outside to consider the weather at the moment? Perhaps look ahead at the forecast and think about what you will need to be warm, dry, suited, casual, layered, cool, warm, just perfect for the day and its many turns and situations. Bag it up, sling it on. Out into the world. As a cyclist I think about this lots. I am amazed by myself and my friends who are always prepared. We think ahead and consider the journey part of our journeys.


Carpool? Not sure if this counts as carfree, but at least you can look around and see the landscape through which you are travelling. I notice as a passenger that I watch the road and sometimes even flinch, noticing closecall judgements, risks, and my fundamental lack of control in the flowing stream of ordered chaos. Relax and look around at this place that you participate in.


Shopping? Maybe you get what you need before your car-free week begins, because depending how deeply into cardependence your life is, shopping can be massive! Surrounded by acres of asphalt parking lots and cloverleafs, this space is hostile even bumper to bumper.
For pedestrians there may be few activated crosswalk lights: WAIT advance green, right turn, straight through straight through straight through, yellow turners, advance turners, WALK.
As you slowly cross the parking lot dodging cars frantic to be abandoned, notice the buzz of the giant signs as they collapse time-space to the speed of car urgency. Imagine the 18 wheelers hidden out back, and maybe even the bins! Tee hee.


Imagine through your week in your head.
Where would you experience challenges?



NOTES:
*Sometimes buses are as fast as driving particularly where there are Priority Lanes.
**I really really love to ride my bike, and have made my personal life decisions to facilitate this: I live in the city within 10km from where I work. This is not an accident.