The Crash Course is a condensed online version of Chris Martenson’s “End of Money” seminar. This is without doubt, the only useful course that you will ever take. it takes 20 chapters, so “Gambatte kudasai” !

http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse

I hate cities. I really do. I’m a country boy and feel foreign to so much concrete, non sense and distance to reality. 

I dreamt of living far from it, in my own eden. A dream of green pasture, self sufficiency and slow life.

But is this dream real? No. Cities won’t disappear just like that when sliding down the peak oil slope. They are hungry; hungry for development, expansion and more turmoil in our environment.

So what is the solution? Well… perhaps it is time to empower cities in being self sufficient with their greens, produce locally to avoid transportation or massive industro-agricultural production in the neighboring country side (not to mention deforestation).

Yes. City farming. Crazy? Certainly but the image is tempting. Picture yourself being in a city with green rooftops that inhibit the summer heat by evapotranspiration of the crops yielding food for the tenants of that building. Diminishing runoff in rainy seasons. Toilets separating faeces and urine that will be composted and used as fertilizers instead of treated in energy intensive waste water treatment plants, as sludge buried in a landfill and treated water dumped in rivers… no more synthetic fertilizer needed, no more loss.

Country side produces for the country side and cities produce fresh greens for the city. Transportation cut in half. Excess city sludge and urine back to the country side for staple food production (wheat, rice, potato, corn…)

Of course such ideal cannot work under a free market. But we can try, as a hobby first. Convince people that “shit” and “pee” is valuable free nutrient for food. Convince people that alternatives are there.

I hope the economical crisis will shake people’s head hard enough to make them seek those alternatives.

Let’s green up balconies with food and not just alien species of cosmetic value. Let’s reclaim lawns and parks that are monocultures of wasted water and space ! 

Unemployment ? Homeless people? let them grow food on these public lawns and sell that food for a living ! To convince the city council of doing so… let’s go “guerilla farming” those areas ! They will soon see the economical value it holds!

Let’s walk, cycle and unbuild parking lots of non sense supermarkets.

Let’s go back to nature !

In a more realistic way, we could use hydroponic principles on roof tops or undergrounds. Given the fact that we use solar radiation or lighting powered by solar energy for it. Home made fertilizers with tea compost and urine. Low energy, low water consumption (rain fall collectors) and home made fertilizers.

Are you “in” for it?

Short comment on “Building the Amazon’s economy“, a bbc news interview of Brazil’s Strategic Affairs Minister, Roberto Mangabeira Unger, about plans to protect the Amazon rainforest while developing the region economically.

Available HERE

I would like to comment shortly on two arguments that Mr Unger used for talking of the dilemma between conservation and economical development. I do understand the compromises but i have to say that those arguments are really the worst for someone who understands a little about ecosystems ( i’m not referring to him but others) … and saddly may appear credible for someone who has no clue (that surely involves him).

Mr Unger said: “The Amazon is not simply a collection of trees” [...] “Many countries that exploit their forest intensively like say Finland… end up having more trees rather than less trees.. so we do not see any contraditions in principles…”

“The Amazon is not simply a collection of trees,” indeed.. it is much more than that. Trees are a medium for thousand … millions… of other species (be there in the micro or macro world), that humans haven’t discovered. And even if known, very little of those species today, … have their relationship to one another understood.

“Environmentalists” do not want to protect trees… they want to protect something that we don’t understand and perhaps never will… an untouched sanctuary for species to thrive…
This concept overcomes the cartesian reality, or science… it lies in the realm of spirituality and global vision. Ecosophists call it the “Self” with a capital S.

Regarding the second argument involving Finland… indeed Finland has a lot of trees. I live there and I can stand for such argument… but what that argument fails to clarify… is that Finland is covered by magnificent commercial forests that are DEAD of any biodiversity. Most of Finland’s endemic species such as the Flying squirrel, Tetraos Urogallus, Tinder fungus, etc… cannot thrive on a commercial forest, as the rest of the key elements to their sensitive niche (biotope) have been removed or distroyed.
Let me illustrate that simply: If you play “Jenga” (a stacking game, where the one that makes the stack collapse by removing one of its piece, loses) … how long can the stack remain if you start by removing the elements making the base of that stack…. the answer is: not long !
Forests are the same… what matters isn’t the wood… wood is dead matter anyway… but it’s the life that develops on it, under it, above it, within it…. it’s a complex network for which the removal of one single species will affect others undoubtely. These affects may happen by:

- removing competition, thus enabling the profusion of another species that will devastate the area…
- removing a key element for the subsistence of a certain species… that will disappear and affect othersdue to its disappearance.
- islandification… making a road through a forests disturbs the habitat and may restrict a species from migrating.. thus making it over-eat its limited food supply, and die… Some species of birds are said to be extremely sensitive to direct light and thus cannot venture “outside” of trees… the road may be only few meters wide… but that distance forbids these birds from migrating…
They are thus forced to feed on the last elements of their food stuff…. and facing death.

Now … if you have read James Lovelock’s theory of Gaia, and hopefully a better material such as those from and inspired by Arne Naess (Founder of Ecosophy or Deep ecology) : What if the role of the Amazon had a much bigger importance than just a sanctuary ? … what if it had a vital one for the chemistry of our planet?
In a warming, intoxicated planet, what if this was what held it all from a sudden collapse ?
Is it really worth to let it go? Is it worth to let them gamble and dare devil… just for the sake of “humanity” ?
Who’s more human, the one that let’s 25 million to die or the one that makes 6 billion go along with all living species ?
Now on the question: “do I really care about 25 million of Brazilians?” … You surely know my answers!

Here is a video of Amelia Hazelip (FR) who has adapted the Fukuoka technic (natural farming) along with other permaculturist skills (Bill mollison), to temperate climates such as Europe. It lasts 30min and has been divided into 8 sequels.

Credits:

Emilia Hazelip

Synergistic gardening

Here is an excellent lecture from Dr Albert A Bartlett

Albert A. Bartlett is an emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder, USA. Professor Bartlett has lectured over 1,500 times on Arithmetic, Population, and Energy.

about his most popular subject: Arithmetic, Population & Energy.

Please do take some of your time to watch this… it’s VERY interesting. Even thought you are not fond of maths.. he will go on over and over with many practical examples. You just can’t miss it. I’ll guarantee you that your vision on percentage, growth, interest rate or any number will radically change !

Note: this is only part 1 (21min). For a full copy of the video (60min) check the link below

Link to This Video (permalink)

Enjoy!

I just discovered on Youtube while surfing for Dr Bartlett’s video to post, a videoblog that i found very inspiring since it seemed easy to me for everyone to grasp, and neutral enough for all to agree with.

His name is Greg, and known as “wonderingmind42″. USA.
Here is the introductory video:

You may also check the sequel on his page: here

Enjoy.

Now, in order for you to know who I am and what I seek, I will simply depicture my dream.

My dream is to have a simple life, close to Nature, autonomous from corporations yet strongly connected to a local community. However I believe that full autonomy as a target, can only contribute to enrich one’s experience through learning forgotten skills…

Yes forgotten skills… I don’t know for you but I feel very bad for not knowing how to actually live without all this assistance…
we have made a society of assistance/assisted. We cannot dress ourselves, feed ourselves, … and even THINK for ourselves…cause yes we aren’t… that is seen in what is called “fashion” … ideas are inspired to you, but not by you. Try to see as far as possible and you will quickly encounter someone that has done or thought what you just believed to have “invented”.

Anyway… i have a tendancy (as you will surely see later) to leave out the subject I was talking about and drift away with ideas that were raised, …
so… forgotten skills… can you make a fire without matches or a lighter? (not even a lens) … difficult isn’t it… do you know which berries / mushroom, wild plants are edible?
What if there’s no doctor around… or pharmacy .. cause yes, western medicine is pretty useless unless the whole petrochemistry follows behind…

So getting back to “my dream”. Autonomy, genuine skills, and relearning what globalisation and market pressure erase everyday. I want to grow my own food, with no chemicals, no heavy machinery (no.. not even free labour), but the help of Nature itself. I want to be able to build a house and fix it by myself, yet it would be very little in need of external inputs such as electricity, water, sewage. I want to learn of Nature, so I can learn of who I am. I want to make my own clothes with the natural fibers I would grow. All of this so I can consider myself a MAN… not an assisted, dependant idiot (please note: self criticism here).

So in this blog I will go through alternative technics of growing food such as the Fukuoka technic of no plough no additives (fertilizer, pest control … even organic ones); alternative crops to grow or eat, seeds, natural fiber and textiles (weaving, threading,…); preparing for “collapse” economically and physically. Analysing the energy crisis and gold investments; Analysing how, where and when buying property; Spirituality; etc…

I will keep my identity undisclosed. However I have to say that I’m European, from one country that has the biggest nuclear energy investment per capita in this world. Yes.. you got it… sorry! I’m not nationalist so any comments on that nature are irrelevant. Anyway… all this to say and precise that I have been living in a country up North of Europe for 7 years until now (the one where the Coca Cola dude rides a reindeer sledge)… but right now I’m in Asia… far east …
I might settle (temporarily?) in the country of the rising sun, for my love one is one of its citizen. That said, I have to add that there are remarkable people living and trying themselves at homesteading in Japan…Gaijin (foreigners) i mean and organically for the most… and therefore I believe that many references in this blog will point back to that area of the globe.
However, if you live in Europe or else… I believe that all information and tips that will be available here are still useful in their concept … giving the fact that YOU adapt them to your environment and political landscape.
What? you didn’t think everything would be given to you and you’d live happily, simply, ever after?
No! the truth is… we all have to experience it and discover it by ourselves, for all parameters are changing and,… most important… the best of it is not in reaching the goal, but travelling the journey towards it.

-end for now-