Community college urban farming: experiencing the joy of "body and soil as one" through growing vegetables
Text and photos / Chang Yen-ying, Chen Yu-wen. Header image / Caicaizi Farm album
Community colleges in northern Taiwan offer quite a few courses related to organic farming. The previous article, Urban Farming (Part 1): Community Colleges, Let's Grow Vegetables Together, reported on how Xinzhuang Community College worked to build an ecological farm beside a factory and its determination to give nature back a pure land, and how Wenshan Community College's Zhanghu Farm emphasizes natural farming that values people living well together with the environment.
This article introduces Shilin Community College's Caicaizi Farm, which promotes natural farming and has a teaching farm where students can experience being weekend farmers. The courses at Da'an, Zhongshan and Xinyi Community Colleges encourage students to value soil and emphasize "soil and body are one." The offering of these community college courses gives urban students a chance to get close to the land, which in turn influences their family and friends around them to support a land-friendly way of life..
The Happy Weekend Farmer - Lin Chun-yu and Shilin Community College
When you think of Shilin, perhaps all that comes to mind is Shilin Night Market, but if you head further into the mountains, follow the winding path and reach "Caicaizi Farm" near No. 108 Pingjing Street, you will discover a hidden paradise unlike the city. This large plot of about two thousand ping is split in half between the Homemakers United Foundation and Shilin Community College's teaching farm on one side and instructor Lin Chun-yu on the other, creating the landscape as it appears now.
Lin Chun-yu's family has farmed since he was a child, and he also worked in organic certification for seven or eight years, so he has seen all kinds of farms and plants and has a certain level of understanding of the basic concepts of farming. In 2007, he was invited by the Homemakers United Foundation to teach courses related to growing vegetables, and was later invited by Xinzhuang Community College and Shilin Community College to teach "The Happy Weekend Farmer." Because he grew up in the Shilin mountain area and has a special attachment to this land, he set up the teaching farm here, so that besides teaching, he can also grow vegetables himself.
The Homemakers United Foundation currently has 60 students, while Shilin Community College's course on average can only recruit 15 to 20 students. In the current term, Shilin Community College has 18 students, 12 of whom are returning students, and six of those already have their own plots in a citizens' farm but still want to keep learning farming from Lin Chun-yu. However, Lin Chun-yu believes that the level gap between new and returning students is already significant, and not offering separate beginner and advanced classes is actually a problem, but because the number of students is too small, he cannot really address this issue.
Apart from the practical farming class every other Saturday, Shilin Community College students can come check on their crops at any time, and Lin Chun-yu does not interfere much. He is only responsible for providing the land rented from others. Some students mainly practice natural farming and grow things very freely, barely tending to them at all. Some students have already gained enough experience that they combine four people's plots to grow various different crops, taking turns to maintain and manage them together, which also makes a mini small farm.
Lin Chun-yu also repeatedly reminds students not to weed too cleanly. If the weeds are removed too thoroughly, then the crops must be watered every day, and students certainly cannot go up the mountain every day to look after their crops, so having a few weeds is fine.
As for his expectations for students, Lin Chun-yu says: "Each person is allocated very little land, so just grow your own area well. You must also know how to let go and not insist on always getting a harvest. As long as you plant with a relaxed and joyful leisure mindset, the plants will naturally feel it, but this is usually not something an ordinary urban farmer can manage."
Lin Chun-yu also says that when growing tomatoes, for example, if two or three tomatoes rot, it is actually fine, because if you strive for just ten percent of the harvest, feel anxious and try your best to improve it, it would be better to take good care of the other ninety percent of good tomatoes, and not try to apply the industrial farming model here.
At present, the biggest problem facing the teaching farms of Shilin Community College and the Homemakers United Foundation is natural disasters, but Lin Chun-yu still maintains an optimistic attitude. He believes: "As long as you do the protective work well in advance, that is enough. Leave the rest of the harvest to heaven!"
Regarding pests and diseases, Lin Chun-yu has a different view. He says: "Why do we never think that we are stealing the insects' food? Instead, as soon as insects come to eat our food, we want to remove them right away. People and land coexist. People share this earth with the land and nature. If pests and diseases have not reached an exaggerated level of harm, there is no need to rush to get rid of them."
Chen Shu-hui, a student with the Homemakers United Foundation, believes that organic is a very important issue right now and that we must all care for the earth together, which is why she signed up for this course. She also says: "Only after actually growing vegetables did I realize there is so much to do, like weeding and fertilizing, but when I see the ripe fruit, it is very much like my own child, and when my family eats it they always feel it is especially sweet and especially delicious. For me, growing vegetables is a way of expressing support."
Where the people are, there the land is - Chen Chi-chun and the community college teaching farm
"Teacher, look, my cucumber has already grown this big!" A student happily shows the teacher the fruit of their work - a cucumber about fifteen centimeters long. Then, under the teacher's guidance, they harvest this plump, large cucumber grown with organic methods. Other students also concentrate on tending their own vegetable plots. Some spontaneously go nearby to cut bamboo to make supports, while others begin mulching, watering and fertilizing the crops.
This is a teaching farm on the mountain in Shiding, with about seven to eight hundred ping of space and about forty-plus students, including students from Xinyi Community College and Zhongshan Community College. Their instructor is Chen Chi-chun, who has more than thirty years of farming experience.
When Chen Chi-chun was in his twenties, he worked at National Geographic magazine, which gave him the opportunity to go to the Third World for interviews. Over ten years, he visited more than forty Third World regions around the world. There he witnessed people's destruction of the environment and their greed, and from then on he decided to become vegetarian.
In 1989, Chen Chi-chun decided to go to Australia to study "permaculture." Later, after Chen Chi-chun returned to Taiwan, he went to Hehuan Mountain (Ren'ai Township) to begin farming. Because the soil conditions were poor, for three years he did not grow vegetables at all, only pulling weeds and turning and piling the soil, waiting until the soil was adjusted before he began planting, and he cultivated using the "mixed planting" method. It took another five years before there was any yield.
Chen Chi-chun says: "Although at first I was mocked, by the eighth year my general yield was absolutely no worse than 'conventional farming,' and moreover I had no problems with natural or man-made disasters. At that time, Taiwan did not have so-called organic cultivation techniques. I count as the first person."
In 2008, Chen Chi-chun was invited by Xinyi Community College to offer the course "LOHAS Organic Farming." At first there were only seven students, and now the thirty places are not only full but he is often asked to add more places. The following year, Chen Chi-chun was also recommended to Zhongshan Community College to offer the course "Organic Farming, Even More LOHAS." Then this year Da'an Community College also invited Chen Chi-chun to offer the course "Organic Farming, Green Home." Besides classroom lectures that let students understand what organic cultivation is and what planting techniques are, students also get hands-on experience through the practical planting class every Saturday. But because they are at the same teaching farm, these community college students all know one another.
Chen Chi-chun has already taught more than a hundred students. Many students started out not knowing how to grow vegetables, and now several of them already grow at home themselves. However, because the number of students has increased, he currently has a teaching farm in Shiding for students from Xinyi Community College and Zhongshan Community College, while the teaching farm in Xindian is a site newly rented this year and is used by students from Da'an Community College.
Chen Chi-chun hopes his students can all complete a full year, because the course design allows students to understand which plants are suitable for growing in each of the four seasons, and also lets them understand the concept of "plant in season and plant in the right place." In addition, Chen Chi-chun also takes students to other excellent organic farms or rural villages for exchange and visits.
The Shiding teaching farm only began land preparation and cultivation in October 2009. Before that, Xinyi Community College students farmed at Songshan Citizens' Farm. Chen Chi-chun says: "Previously, to save trouble, the landowner sprayed herbicides several times a year, but I and the students started with weeding and gradually implemented organic farming. Unexpectedly, in just a few months, many fireflies came. This counts as a beautiful unexpected harvest."
Chen Chi-chun's main teaching philosophy is to emphasize taking good care of the "soil," which is the most fundamental part of organic growing. He says: "Only healthy soil gives healthy plants. Good soil will naturally cycle endlessly and keep regenerating. At the same time, the concept I insist on is 'soil and body are one.' Human health and soil are inseparable. That is why my home is in Shiding, and the teaching farm is also set up right there. Besides being able to look after it nearby, I can also farm and eat what I grow, which has many benefits. At the same time, I also insist that we must learn from nature and follow nature, which is the true way of farming."
When most people see a cabbage worm, they rush to remove it, but Chen Chi-chun teaches students: "Insects eat bad vegetables, so if pests or diseases appear, that means there is a problem with your growing method that needs improving, rather than spraying pesticide. At the same time, all fertilizers must be fully fermented and rotted before they can be applied to the soil. Anything doubtful, polluting or unfermented must not be applied in the field."
"I believe organic should be a way of life and should not be used for consumption," Chen Chi-chun repeatedly stresses to students, hoping that besides learning to farm, students can understand the true spirit of organic and not be deceived by merchants. Chen Chi-chun also says: "The ultimate purpose of my teaching is also the hope that this attitude toward organic farming can be passed on, so that more and more people know about it. The best outcome would be, I hope, that if in the future students themselves find an abandoned farm or piece of land, through their understanding of soil and organic farming they can restore it into a piece of land that can be cultivated, so that the earth can keep regenerating."
Rita (pseudonym), a student at Xinyi Community College, only joined the "LOHAS Organic Farming" course this year and currently has more than two months of practical farming experience, but for the first month there was no harvest and she was even teased by her family. She thinks that is because city people value results more and feel it should be "plant today, harvest tomorrow," but she believes there is no need to rush and one should wait patiently. She also says: "Actually, I often sow seeds and then two weeks later forget that I sowed in the same place. I take a more carefree, let-it-grow-naturally attitude!"
Recently, Rita has harvested quite a lot. She says with a smile that after her family ate it, they all felt it was especially sweet and especially delicious, and she felt quite a sense of achievement. Rita says: "At the beginning, when I first started growing, I thought three ping for one person was so big! However I planted it, I could never finish planting it all, but now I have already rented ten ping, and I am still not satisfied. I even want to find a bigger plot somewhere else to grow."
Da'an Community College student Xiao Bang-zhe already has a plot on the mountain that he can cultivate and wants to learn better planting techniques, and he happened to see that Da'an Community College was offering a course this year. At present he brings his daughter every Saturday to the Xindian teaching farm to learn vegetable growing. He says: "After actually taking the class, I really learned a lot. Especially now the cucumbers I grow on the mountain are big and good, but what I think this course has taught me is that as long as you care for plants carefully, they will give you the greatest return."
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