Intro to Pc

While it's now one day later, it's worth reflecting on yesterday's intensive introduction to permaculture.  

Still a bit jet lagged from my overnight trip and arrival the day before, we played host to a modest class of four here at Stamatina and Alex's lovely apartment here in Athens.  Manolia - a graduate student in Ecological Engineering from the island of Lesvos, Artemis - a translator by trade and enthusiastic student of life enhancing practices, Demetra, and Stamatina - our gracious host and ecological artist engaged in an in-depth exploration of permaculture design principles.  We took time to discuss a systematic ecological design process and then talked about the development of edible forest gardens and agroforestry systems - looking at slides that helped illustrate the concept, talking about the roles and identity of various multifunctional plants that while prevalent in the cold temperate northeastern United States, also have spread to the warm temperate mediterranean climate of Greece (or at the very least have familiar ecological analogs here).  

I certainly gained as much of an insight into the climatic and ecological realities of this region as I was able to impart.  I learned about the rain shadow in which much of eastern Greece lies, left to the dregs of precipitation that aren't squeezed free by the

 north-south mountain range dividing this national watershed divide and thereby contributing to a much more water rich western coastline.

Given the urban nature of our site, we took some time to discuss how permaculture principles can be applied in areas without access to any sizable tracts of land.  Having been delving deeply into The Transition Handbook by Rob Hopkins lately, I gave his work and the vision that is Transition Towns significant lip service, hoping to convey the essential need to work and organize on the community scale to ultimately bring about the vision of the future that we seek to create.  I feel honored to have had an opportunity to share my insights and ideas with this group and more than anything, hope that I may have helped to instigate a network of motivated and active members of the Grecian community.

Feeling rather worn after a full day of discussion, Stamatina and her two youngest children, Hermes and Anna, and I went for an evening walk through the streets of Athens to a nearby hill upon which we watched the sun set across a bay to our west.  

Within a block after leaving her house, I found myself musing over the perennial production potential I saw along  the street with pomegranate, olive, fig, lime, citrus and black locust trees neighboring each other.  This place has an incredible productive potential, despite the fact that likely all of the native topsoil has been washed away from this landscape more than a millennia ago, the ever-productive spirit of life seems all-pervading.  

We are currently nearing the beginning of fall here, which should bring more consistent rains after what has likely been a dry summer - one of the primary causes of the rampant fires that have consumed acres of the rocky countryside.  Countless yards of drip irrigation tape lie about the urban landscape - very actively in use at one point, though it's certainly unclear to me both how and when.  Undeniably yet another testament to the precious nature of water here.

Tomorrow I plan to meet with Nicos Anastasopoulos, Athenian architect and newfound activist to discuss his work and vision for a new Athens.  (Which is actually today - I slacked on writing yesterday's post until tonight - so 2 posts in one night).