Wild Vineyard Permaculture Study Notes (1): The Last Hippie

The Last Hippie

I once thought that growing my hair long, being a slacker, never turning down cigarettes, alcohol, or marijuana, being antisocial, and playing a bit of music made me a hippie. For a while, I even thought I could count myself as a hippie, until I met Yamana, and then I knew I still had a long way to go!

Yamana is the owner of Wild Vine Garden, a permaculture farm, and he is one of the first group of people in Taiwan, China to study permaculture. When I first went to Wild Vine Garden for a work exchange, I thought he was an Indigenous person, because he looked quite a lot like Bei Yuan Shan Mao. Only later did I learn that "Yamana" is Sanskrit, the name of an ancient yoga practitioner.

Yamana has pursued a natural way of life for ten years. He once did very big business, at the level of hundreds of millions coming and going. Later, because of one sentence from his daughter: "The world has become like this, and isn’t it you adults who caused it?", he began to change. He traveled far to India to study local natural therapies, went to Wuhan, China to study traditional Chinese medicine, studied Shumei Natural Agriculture and BD biodynamic agriculture, took courses at many agricultural improvement stations, and only in the end chose the method of permaculture to practice his natural life.

What is permaculture?

At Wild Vine Garden, more than 70 percent of the food eaten is grown by himself (if he pushes it, maybe it can reach 90 percent). Rice, wheat, vegetables, fruit, and herbs are all grown by himself. Soy sauce, soy products, wine, vinegar, and bread are all made by himself. He does not use gas, and burns wood to cook, bathe, and bake bread; he does not use tap water, relying on mountain spring water and rainwater harvesting, and he also treats wastewater himself. For a while, even the Delica he drove ran on biodiesel he made himself from restaurant waste oil. I feel that in his whole body, only the lenses of his glasses are something he cannot make himself.

Each of Yamana’s skills can be called that of a master. Many people in Taiwan, China who claim to be kiln-baking masters or hand-brewing masters are Yamana’s students, or have studied and exchanged ideas at Wild Vine Garden. But the permaculture sustainable design he teaches is a design method that links all these things together into one system. It teaches people how to learn from nature, use efficient inputs to get outputs, and use local resources and energy, so that while living and producing, they are also protecting the environment.

It is hard to imagine an uncle who could live in a mansion, turn on the air conditioning, drive a luxury car, and eat delicacies from land and sea every day, yet still split firewood to make a fire and labor in the vegetable garden every day. He is practicing his "Way," and he wants to change the world, even if only a little. Such romance is moving.

Borrowing a song by another hippie, John Lennon:

You might say I am a dreamer, but I am not the only one. I hope someday you will join us, and the world will be as one.

Maybe you think I am dreaming, but I am not the only one who thinks this way. I hope that one day you can join us, and then a world of great harmony will no longer be a dream!

If you want to learn permaculture, you can sign up for Wild Vine Garden’s Permaculture Design Certificate course PDC at the end of May.

More about Yamana

• Teaches permaculture at Da’an and Xinyi Community College
• Protects the last water terraces in Yangmingshan and launched the "Eat Rice You Grow Yourself" plan
• Holds Green House Workshops, teaching traditional handmade skills such as kiln-baked bread, brewing wine, brewing vinegar, and brewing soy sauce
• Lives a self-sufficient life at Wild Vine Garden in Yangmingshan
• Sells herb plants at the Taipei Jianguo Flower Market on weekends