A little bit something

 During the summer of 2013 I started the experiment of growing food in our garden. Tomatoes, potatoes, zucchini, beans, herbs, carrots, leek, radish, red beet, red and white beet, different lettuce, in pots, in growing beds and into the ground.

In the beginning, seeds in pots, a lot of them. Paprika, peas and dill.. and an apricot tree that I had nursed since late winter seen in the background just added from the pot into the soil.

And after a lot of digging, into beds and into the ground..

Potatoes planted in front of this picture and also a new apple tree!

I bought some bigger plants from the store. Zucchini was quick to flower! But later we had just too much zucchini.

And Ruccula, a lot a lot in a pot during all summer.

And everything else started to grow. Potatoes to the left and in front of next picture.

And during the mid summer, everything grew to much.

 Salad is served! As I was doing an experiment aswell with food, eating only raw vegetables for a month, I could go here everyday and take some to the daily meals. Tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, radish, parsley. Salads, and smoothies and vitamix-mixes!

And in the autumn, we got so much zucchini to quick-fry in the pan! I gave away vegetables all summer and last tomatoes was taken in just before the first frost came. Below: my sister in the tree; we are picking the plums of the year. And next year we have a hope for raspberries, blueberries, currants and apples! We dig more than 20 larger plants into the garden, to have for next season. The experiment for this year will be to plant more in shade as we have a bigger garden, a bit further away from the street.

 Just a few more pictures from the area around; people who are having their small vegetable garden right outside their door! After winter, spring comes and then it is time to start over again!

Read more about growing food in the city in this blog! Especially here: Theme- urban agriculture

Always is now

Lifestyle housing

 An article from todays paper. A restaurant, a hotel-like entrance, gym, swimming pool and so on. Just like the hotel but at home.

"130 Gothenburgers live in the city's first lifestyle living. Health and active life stimulated by jointly spa, gym and a restaurant with organic food. If one gets tired of neighbors and activities, many just sit back and look out over Sannegårdshamnen and Södra Älvstranden."

Ending Overfishing

Small film about overfishing, pretty nice

squared life

What is the link between today's buildings and today's ideas? If I say the squared thinking, can you see it?

Often we hear linear thinking contra holistic or system thinking. But to think inside the box or outside the box is more than that. System thinking is to see that the forest is built up by trees and connections between. But to think outside the square is to use knowledge from other fields to understand that the forest is not only trees and connection between but from another point of view it can be something else. For the forester, the forest is money. For an architect, a growing forest is most likely seen as something huge, magnificent in or outside a house. For the biologist, the scientific names are important. For a gardener the order and structure and somewhere to walk. For the naturalist is the wild and untouchable. And for a dog owner some privacy. What would happen if all these people would come together to discuss the forest?

Conflict? Some of all is some kind of consensus?

A house is usually built with four similar walls and a flat or leaning roof. Square-shaped. Rooms are squares in different sizes. If you are lucky or unlucky you get a room with a different shape. Maybe a room very hard to furnish. Because book shelves are squared. Beds too. And tables mostly.

What would happen if all people in a multistory building would discuss what to do with the house? Would it be all crazy?

Human is all covered with structures and laws and "this is wrong, and this is right". How exactly sure can we be, and with who's perspective? The collective? Or some people with the master plan or the most powerful?

We are as much as buildings are built as squares, squared in our minds. We know better with buildings, showing a lot of examples here in this blog. Why do not do the same with thoughts? And in the time we work with construction.

Truths is not out there, except some physical laws. But how we work together and how we see each other should and have to change. Because we are no squared robots even if it seems as communities have to be built up very simply to be usable.

A lonely man. Doing exactly the same procedure every day, eating breakfast in the same order, taking the same bus/road at same time, doing same job, calling same people, talking to same... Is mostly more respected, even if he is a bit crazy, than a man with a mess around. Coming too late and so on. Is this because even if we are not involved in any of those two men, we do understand what is going on in the first place but not in the other. We just love simple stuff with easy numbers to measure. That is why this world look like it does. Other things not measurable are not as important, or very very hard things to measure; happiness, ease, comfort. We construct a house or a bike road or a bus line and say "hey!! you have one now. be happy!". Things are not as easy as that. Buses have to be connected to other buses. Bike lines can't be with dozens of crossings. High-rise buildings can not be the solution for a happy life if it does not include social networks.

I think we need complexity around, different thoughts, challenges, interdisciplinary workspaces. Simple is not good enough. Mind is not squared from birth.

Design as you give a damn

This is the cover to the book "Design as you give a damn 2" by Architecture for humanity. If you read about the buildings you will find out how they made these buildings from sand bags. But if you look at the picture it look as a very bad design to me. What happened there at the red building next to the green?

One of the best examples of a good design is in Malmö in Sweden, see some pictures from one of my trips here: Ecocity Malmö and the post from Tübingen in Germany; Französisches Viertel.

The book "Design as you give a damn 2" is full with great examples of design in a collaboration with the people living in the area. And it is worth to see some picture from it here; inhabitat.

Continuously wrong

 

I dont want to tell you whats wrong in this blog, but want to show examples of how to do it instead. Well, sometimes we need to tell you whats wrong. And that time is now. When wrongs continuous with time, a continuously wrong. 

We are talking about buildings. But buildings are not just something to live in, if so, we could live in small houses instead of big houses. Big buildings are there to be practical. A lot of people close to city center, close to every-day-needs. Big houses also changes the look of a place, it is like a new landscape, a new view. I dont mean now, that we have to build lovely architect drawn beautifully buildings, no its not that, its all about how to thrive, how to grow up as a child, how to live a life around your home. 

And everything else, where to work, how to go there, were to buy food, were to relax, were to walk your dog or to play with your kids.

Buildings nowadays, "modern buildings" looks almost like these pictures everywhere. These pictures shows a new neighborhood in Göteborg city. Everything from scratch as this was an industry area before.

Squared blocks.

 

 The buildings are so narrow, and I just wonder why is it two different buildings and not one?

 

 You see, exactly the same view again but two other buildings. Another great view! People can watch each other brush their teeth there in the morning.

 Squared and a broad road in the middle. Is this how we want the kids to grow up? (and I can't imagine really that they would change it to grass or anything like it).

Last picture- "there was the playground, so it was not missed". But really how fun does that look? It is worse than the Million programme (Swedish: Miljonprogrammet) view. If we want to build big buildings with a lot of people in the same place, these people needs to have it great there. The shape of these buildings are not made for a human mind (well, only for an engineer, easy to draw in a computer program). And when they build in this way, people in the buildings have no private space at al (check the picture with the windows so close to the other building), and the surroundings does not give you that either (or can it be "fixed"?).

Ok, now, how to do it instead? Take a look of some of my posts before. You find them in the menu "eco-projects" and here are some of them to click at:

Make'n a good feeling in the city
Move people to build a better world?
Houses and green spots in Copenhagen
Vauban, Freiburg, Germany
Französisches Viertel 
Greening the streets
Let’s build cities for people (not cars)

and a must read:

What is an ecocity?

ALMA a film by Patrick Rouxel

Patrick Rouxel France, 2011, 65 mins. The second in a trilogy of tropical rainforest destruction films. Beautifully shot, alternately joyful and horrifying, Alma captures the ecological, and even spiritual, cost of meat, dairy, and leather production in the Amazon. Since 2003, Patrick Rouxel has dedicated his time to making films aimed at raising awareness of deforestation, loss of biodiversity, and the ethical treatment of animals. The multi-award winning GREEN presented a heartrending account of the life of an Orangutan against a backdrop of palm oil production and natural habitat loss. In Alma, Rouxel continues his cinematic journey into the world's forests and the industries that are destroying them, this time heading to Brazil to explore the devastating impacts of the cattle industry. Here he creates a powerful statement about the global industrial economy and the speed with which virgin forests are being cleared for timber and new grazing land. The film offers a unique and visually stunning exposition of a colorful cowboy culture and the millions of animals used to satisfy our voracious global appetite for meat and dairy products. In almost-wordless contemplation, the film wanders from forest to pasture to rodeo to slaughterhouse to market to tannery. In essence, Alma is a journey into the soul of humanity and a testimony of the damage inflicted by humans on the natural world. ~ Rachel Caplan
, San Francisco Green Film Festival

Ron Finley: A guerilla gardener in South Central LA

More to read: How Guerrilla Gardening Can Save America's Food Deserts

Facebook

Check our facebook page and share your own experience!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Environmentalist-on-a-mission/187185524634850?ref=hl

What if money was no object?

Ernesto Sirolli: Want to help someone? Shut up and listen!

Allan Savory: How to green the world's deserts and reverse climate change

Michael Pawlyn: Using nature's genius in architecture

Jae Rhim Lee: My mushroom burial suit

What if money didn't matter?

Gone in 60 secs

Gone in 60 secs Parts 1 & 2 (LETS FIGHT BIKE CRIME) on Pinkbike

Earth Days (2009)

"No external force is imposing these environmental problems on us.

They have arisen because every morning 6 billion people get up and have breakfast, and go to work, and do their thing, and come home at night...

Environmental problems emerge out of daily life and the solutions for the environmental problems are also rooted in daily life."

Dennis Meadows, "Earth Days" (PBS 2009)

Aftermath: World Without Oil

Dr. Bernie Krause: The Great Animal Orchestra

Dr. Bernie Krause: The Great Animal Orchestra from California Academy of Sciences and California Academy of Sciences on FORA.tv

"Dr. Bernie Krause, creator of Wild Sanctuary, demonstrates that every living organism produces sound. This presentation focuses on the symbiotic ways in which the sounds of one organism affect and interrelate with other organisms, local and regional, within a given habitat."

He is author of the book from this year; The Great Animal Orchestra: Finding the Origins of Music in the World’s Wildest Places. He show in this presentation how sounds effects organisms calling it the soundscape ecology. Dr. Bernie Krause has records of animals which are no longer present in different areas, he also show how the range of sounds change when the ecosystem change.

Trees Communicate With One Another, Connected by Fungi (Video)

'singapore: biophilic city'

Hazel Borys: Confessions of a Former Sprawl Addict

Willie Smits restores a rainforest

"Willie Smits works at the complicated intersection of humankind, the animal world and our green planet. In his early work as a forester in Indonesia, he came to a deep understanding of that triple relationship, as he watched the growing population of Sulawesi move into (or burn for fuel) forests that are home to the orangutan. [..]
"Smits believes that to rebuild orangutan populations, we must first rebuild their forest habitat -- which means helping local people find options other than the short-term fix of harvesting forests to survive. His Masarang Foundation raises money and awareness to restore habitat forests around the world -- and to empower local people. In 2007, Masarang opened a palm-sugar factory that uses thermal energy to turn sugar palms (fast-growing trees that thrive in degraded soils) into sugar and even ethanol, returning cash and power to the community and, with luck, starting the cycle toward a better future for people, trees and orangs." Ted.com

“If we want to help the orangutans- what I actually set out to do – we must make sure that the local people are the ones that benefit. I think the real key to doing it, if you want a simple answer, is integration.”

The Big Green Idea project

Transition 2.0

In Transition 2.0 is the new film from Transition Network, capturing inspiring stories of Transition initiatives around the world, responding to uncertain times with creativity, solutions and 'engaged optimism' - http://www.intransitionmovie.com/

Paul Gilding: The Earth is full

"It takes a good crisis to get us going. When we feel fear and we fear loss we are capable of quite extraordinary things.” (Paul Gilding)

Permaculture - A Quiet Revolution

Planning an ecocity

Pic. 1. The compact living is the key to explain the ecocity. No energy- efficiency program is that efficient.

Pic. 2. The ecocity concept should integrate the old in the new to get a feeling of settlement. Personal integration is needed for the human mind and orientation.

Pic. 3. Eco means householding and also relations. In the ecocity, many relations is necessity. Bigger trees and not only plantations should be there. Save old trees!

Pic. 4. Space for room. Rooms for feelings. Three- dimensional thinking in whole city.

Pic. 5. Compact living and not too high. Take a look closer to the picture and you see that there are spaces for recreation on top of the roofs and in between buildings.

Pic. 6. Green, compact and several dimensions.

Pic. 7. Open spaces with shade and places to sit should be planned in the ecocity.

Pic. 8. Water gives more life in form of birds and life in itselves.

Pic. 9. Kids should have spaces where they can behave like kids.

Pic. 10. Use all different kind of levels in the city and make places where people want to go. Up there, its a playground with a view over the city and the ocean.

See more about ecocity planning at What is an ecocity? and What is an ecocity part 2.

Trail run camp Fuerteventura

Fuerteventura. A moon-like canarian island. The only green larger area is the golf course close to the hotel- and apartment resort. We took the flight six hours from home, just to run here for a week. Breakfast buffet and dinner buffet, pure sun, Olympia pool and sport events everyday. We rest and we use our bodies, and we ate good. Expect the flight (bad, bad, bad), we now transport ourselves several miles a day by foot. One important question doe, is were the hell the food comes from and the water we have to buy (that might be an answer for that later). Now the feeling of cycling at the moon!

Above the village of Las Playitas you can find a fantastic viewpoint at the Faro de la Entallada.The road to the Lighthouse is 6,5 km long and is made of asphalt and large sharp pebbles. The sport center down in Playitas told me it was easy to take a road bike up, but gritty and bad, a mtb-bike would go better on that ground. Wind blow hard in all uphills on my way there, wind blow hard in all uphills on my way back. 

One of many attempts to photo myself and the view (unsuccessfully but there is the light-weight bike))! My running group was here just one hour earlier. Cheater as I was, I rented a bike and cycled slow up with tired legs. After six days with runs and body exercises my legs did not want to run one more step. To cycle up in my own tempo worked, and what a landscape! When I was on my way down from the Lighthouse, two cars met here and they could almost pass each other.

Close to Playitas; The red bike line was like a long racetrack beside the car road. And very easy to follow and to see it in the grey landscape; we are only 5 km from the hotel. Quite clever and not so busy trafficked.

In the small town Gran Tarajal the traffic was so calm and considerate, there was no problem to cycle on the street. A good rest in the shade from the trees.

Now on top of the mountain between Playitas and Gran Tarajal. Moon-like and beautiful in large scale and the island is pretty fine to road cycle and the hills are magnificant to walk. What I was there for- to run- was not too fun in the hot climate! An interesting trip anyhow:)