Where jungle kisses the heavens, Sítio São Pedro, more than a family dream of autonomy We spent two weeks near Fortaleza to volunteer at the Sítio São Pedro, a project of autonomy on a beautiful 70-hectare land of hills and forests. As reviewed on WorkAway: We had a wonderful experience with Wilton and his family, near Fortaleza. So o filé! Wilton is a man of many talents, values and convictions. Accomplished artist with great songs and beautiful projects of land art; active environmental protector and social militant: in the countryside and in the city, he cares about his trees and the people; autonomy and transition to a greater sense of community are the paths he prepares for his family, friends, volunteers and perhaps all who want to smile at the thought of tomorrow. Our experience on the site was intense, very instructive and highly rewarding. we had the unique opportunity to be autonomous custodians of the site and it was great! we totally recommend it to those who want to have clean hands in the soil, clear eyes in the forest and blessed hearts under the stars. Health, peace, joy, love and happiness and thank you for this beautiful inspiration: you definitely influence our lives. We look forward to welcoming you soon into our own earthly paradise... This article shares more information about Wilton and his family, about the Sítio São Pedro and what we did there as volunteers. Finally, we also propose a detailed review of the project from a permaculture perspective and humbly suggest ideas and further developments. Enjoy your read. Feel free to comment, ask questions, suggest improvements: we are always very happy to hear from you 😉 Last, we mention many techniques and solutions, feel free to request more information about them, we might consider issuing a DIY tutorial. Meet Wilton and the Matos family Before physically meeting Wilton, we had questions about the ambition of this project “São Pedro” and its “family” environment. Was it a project for personal benefit? Was it religious? Was “permaculture” a washed-out word as we had noticed on some projects before? We met the nicest family. They welcomed us like their own and have been the kindest people to us. Ana Maria, the mother, made everything imaginable to make us comfortable and happy; her cooking skills greatly participated to it. Raimundo, the father, would always joke and laugh, tease us about veganism and volunteering, always with the biggest smile possible and always laughing whenever we would tease him about his love for bonfires. Both have been like parents to us and we truly thank them for such love and care. We also had a lovely time with Claudio Novo, the incredibly strong, dedicated, committed and humble worker of the farm. He is part of the family. We enjoyed so much working with him, listening to his favorite Forro music and collaborate with him to build this unique place. We understand that Wilton aims, through this farm, at getting out of the city; he wants to provide his family with real solutions of autonomy: water, food, shelter, energy. But this project is part of a broader engagement and a bigger network of positive initiatives that develop earthly alternatives to the global turmoil. As we met Wilton, he told us about the three main projects he currently works on:
Demonstrate permaculture techniques in an urban environment At some point, Wilton realized that his mission was about caring for the earth and planting trees. He told us that his name literally connects to trees; for instance, Matos (his family name) comes from “mata” in Portuguese and relates to ‘brushwood’, ‘scrub’ or even ‘thicket’. He thus studies permaculture and agroforestry. Moreover, he wanted to make a change, to do his share and resist against a global trend of destruction, he wanted to find a way to care for the earth and the people. He also understood that it all starts with the self and your immediate surrounding, your backyard, your neighbors, your family. Thus, several years ago, he started growing food in and around his house in the suburbs of Fortaleza: fruits, vegetables, herbs… He also stores water, raise seedlings and preserve seeds for the Sítio São Pedro. Wilton opened his house to propose trainings. He also works with several communities: transform organic waste into compost, produce food in the condominium, enhance water autonomy within the neighborhood, plant trees in the neighborhood, develop a sharing economy between neighbors, collect coffee “waste” and bamboo from the company… A greener culture is growing, and more people are inclined to also do their share. For example, on the first evening, we went around the block to visit an abandoned square within the neighborhood. The community decided to plant trees and make it green again. Different types of trees with various virtues now provide shade and allow a great and very informative tour with Wilton! The community plants trees for newborns and for those that pass away. Use agroforest as a tool to reconnect ex-convicts with life As briefly mentioned earlier, Wilton is in relation with several communities in and around Fortaleza. Among his network of positive builders, he has a friend in a religious community of Fortaleza. This community is in fact an association of several communities in which each community focuses on different issues and the related concerned people: physically impaired, mentally impaired, orphans, beaten women… This friend was in touch with a community that support ex-convicts with social reintegration. The initial idea of his friends was to benefit from Wilton’s musical and artistic skills to support this project. Indeed, Wilton is an accomplished singer and composer, guitar and accordion player. However, he did not want to remain in the music scene and around its toxic environment of inflated egos and culture of drugs… Moreover, he had already started walking along his lifepath of permaculture and agroforestry. This path leaded him to come across “land art”. In a nutshell, “land art” often uses materials of the Earth including for instance the soil and rocks and vegetation and water found on-site; look it up the internet, it can be astoundingly beautiful… Wilton immediately understood the great potential and proposed a project of land art to this community. The project was accepted with great enthusiasm from the nuns of the community. Wilton is somehow naughty: land art was just a good excuse to get a first foot in; his true objective was and remains agroforestry! He told me this beautiful story: an ex-convict came to talk to him and asked “do you have any prejudice?”. Wilton had no previous experience with ex-convicts and was not so sure about how to deal with potentially tensed situations, “Talk, I am listening...”. The man started talking about his life, a hard life in the streets since very young, too young. An urban life where violence is omnipresent and lead him to kill… “I enjoyed killing people”, he acknowledged... This guy is big, muscular, with tattoos everywhere and Wilton is not so sure at this point what the first question meant… “But you Professor [they call him Professor], you taught me what life really is. You showed me that you can take a seed, plant it, care for it and it will grow and it will create life! That is Life!”. Since then, this man is a real agroforest promoter: he plants wherever he can and whenever he can, he supports former convicts with reintegration and is very active in supporting Wilton’s effort in the community, he is married and has kid: a seed changed his life. Wilton has several such stories and listening to him is always fascinating and humbling at the same time; he is indeed a great professor. I also like the story about how he convinced the community to get more involved into the agroforest effort. It all started with a sad but true acknowledgement: even though everybody was welcome to participate, only the ex-convicts were there… was it because they were the only ones that had to do it (and tracked through their electronic bracelet)? Was it because others were prejudiced? Whatever, Wilton not only wanted to see a diversity of crops and trees in the agroforest, he also was manifesting a human agroforest. As the sisters communicated their great appreciation of his work, they invited him to speak in front of the entire community of communities during one of their assemblies. What could he say? How to convert this audience? What about talking about the Garden of Eden and refer to pope’s “Laudato Si”? agroforests are what God wants and what the pope is asking for. This talk was supposed to last five minutes; it extended to one hour or even more and triggered great enthusiasms among the community. The human agroforest could happen, and so Wilton gathered a group of professionals, scholars and students, teachers and professors, people from the community and outside the community. The ex-convicts helped those newcomers and told them about the wonders of life, an ex-convict naturally taught a professional agronomist how to plant a tree. Since everybody was in harmony within this effort with Mother Nature, no one even realized how strong the integration was; it required stepping aside to contemplate the scene to truly appreciate how they were all one in this beautiful reconnection with Life. Militantism Wilton’s family comes from the interior of the Ceara state in Brazil. As a kid he had the opportunity to enjoy the life outdoors, close to Nature. Due to “progress” and the related social convention pressure, he also lived in the city and saw how Fortaleza changed over the years. Fortaleza is burning: no trees, many weapons, public buses burning almost everyday (while we were there), violence became a culture that serves political interests, a culture that shreds apart the connection people could have had with their natural environment. Is it this dual experience that allowed him to be sensitive to social and environmental issues of our time? Wilton is an active militant that understands that social and environmental struggles walk together. One example of his involvement is the 80-day blockade of the “Parque Ecológico do Cocó” in Fortaleza. The ecological reserve was under threat from a government proposal to build a viaduct that would cut into the reserve, resulting in large loss of local flora and fauna. This infrastructure project meant cutting down trees and downsizing one of the few greenspaces in the city. This project did not proceed with preliminary public consultation and many architects, university professors, environmental groups and various non-governmental organizations stood up against this proposal. For 80 days, the protesters occupied the park, organized cultural and artistic events to raise awareness among the citizens and met with officials to propose other alternatives that benefit the citizens of Fortaleza without harming the environment, especially regarding transportation. Protesters were finally kicked out by brutal police force and gases and the city extended the road infrastructure as initially planned. We will not debate about democracy in this article. For you to better understand the environment in which Fortaleza is now developing itself, we are talking about a city of three million inhabitants (six million with the suburbs) that grows fast without proper urban planning which results in less and less trees, uneven access to public services and infrastructure. Transportation (we tried) is not efficient and those taking the bus only take it because they have no car; the city is made for car, not for people (might ring a bell on your side?)… As mentioned earlier, as we were on the Sítio São Pedro, several dozens of buses were burnt. Discover Sítio São Pedro As stated on the Facebook page of the Sítio São Pedro, “it is a permacultural and family experiment begun in 2016. It is located in the Serra de Aratanha in the state of Ceará and has an area of 70 hectares. It belongs to the Atlantic Forest biome that provides a daily experience of discoveries. We are in the first steps of the implantation of a permaculture system with some tools in progress: an agroforest of 3 000 m², a vegetable garden with 12 beds and a house of eco-built with adobe and a roof garden. In this space we hope to welcome people available to exchange knowledge, experiences and affection.” We provide a detailed presentation of the Sítio São Pedro below in this article. Brief history of the Sítio São Pedro Study to get away from the land The Matos family used to live in the countryside, the Sertão. They used to work in the fields and provide for themselves through hard work, community and collaboration with Nature. However, with “progress”, came despise against land work, peasantry and manual activities: “study or you will work in the fields” would say the teacher and authority representatives… Thus, the family decided to go to the city to allow their kids to study and get “proper jobs”, i.e. study to get away from the land. The father got a job in the city, the son studied and got a job in the city. Nevertheless, life in the city is stressful, violent, dangerous and too often lacks meaning… On the other side, in the countryside, “progress” also changed a lot of things: landscape is ripped off to allow bigger farms and mechanized solutions as well as capital accumulation through resources extraction, chemical fertilizers and pesticides kill the soil and the biodiversity, the conventional agricultural practice bear the soil that burns under the sun and goes from green to dust… the culture follows the same path and with money comes individualism and sense of community vanishes. This former land of prosperity of generous surplus sharing is now suffering from the same issues as elsewhere, as everywhere: desire for a big house, a big car, a big TV and egocentric accumulation of stuff. Study to come back to the land, acknowledge deep cultural shift Wilton works for the electrical energy supplier of Fortaleza. Aside from his job and the many implications in local projects (read above), he studied permaculture and agroforestry and has for more than 15 years been dreaming of an autonomy project. The first idea was to come back to the family land and turn it back into the green haven it once was. However, agroecology and permaculture now appear as silly ideas that do not make sense in a mechanized, petro-chemical -based approach to growing plants and killing undesirable life that some name “pest”. Even after explaining, his cousins did not want to follow the path of agroecology and kept on applying the same destructive practices on the family land… Wilton used a smart religious trick and mentioned the story of St Roch to make sure that his relatives would not harm the forest of the family land. Wilton and his parents followed Fukuoka’s principles and threw seed balls around. As a result, their patch of land is now green, full of trees, life comes back even though surrounded by desert… Rely on community, prefer close family, pray for keys The family patch of land being 400 km from Fortaleza and considering the disagreements, Wilton decided to look for a piece of land closer to Fortaleza to start his project of autonomy. At first, Wilton wanted to start this project with friends. However, it is not easy to adjust to everyone’s plans and timelines, priorities and constraints. After trying, he decided to look for something with his parents: Ana Maria and Raimundo. After all, it all starts with the self and keens. They visited many pieces of land, none of them were compliant with all requirements: forest, water, size, … Ana Maria went to a church and prayed. She requested the saint a land with water; she did not speak the name of the saint to her family. She and Raimundo finally visited a spot with everything expected, only one hour from Fortaleza: 70-hectare piece of land on the hills, with water source still flowing in the middle of the dry season after an exceptional five-year period of drought. This land was the land they were looking for! The administrative formalities revealed the name of the place “Sítio São Pedro”, as they signed the final paper two pictures of Jesus’s disciples were displayed in the room, of course, São Pedro was there. Ana Maria went and thanked this saint: he offered them the keys to paradise. What we did there As mentioned earlier in this article, we had the unique opportunity to live autonomously on the farm. Indeed, Wilton is still in a transition process and keeps on working in the city, he thus cannot remain all the time on the farm. After spending a day in Fortaleza with him, we went to the farm and spent several days with him to understand how the farm works, what needs to be done and what the complete farm design aims at implementing. It was so motivating for us to work towards an ambitious objective of self-reliance in this beautiful location! It was also very humbling to be trusted by Wilton and his family, we are very appreciative. As you might imagine, there are loads of different things to do. Wilton is very well organized and very clear. This which allowed us to have a rich, complete and rewarding volunteering experience.
Detailed review of the Sítio São Pedro from a permaculture perspective We refer to permaculture ethics and principles. We also look at the key permaculture domains, i.e. domains that require transformation to create a sustainable culture. Based on those references, we reflect upon our personal experience as volunteers for the “Sítio São Pedro”. First, we want to inspire from David Holmgren’s “Permaculture Principles and Paths Beyond Sustainability” and recall that permaculture can be seen as “Tools to Assist in Ethical Decisions: In attempting to lead an ethical life we need conceptual tools that will allow us to find what is appropriate, is practical for the situation and context, and yet will have some enduring value in chaotically changing times. Permaculture, and especially permaculture design principles, are conceptual tools which many people are finding useful in this journey (…) [of] ethical adaptation to ecological realities.”. With our analysis, we want to provide objective feedback and suggest some ideas. We also want to better understand our feelings about this project and eventually justify them. We use the permaculture flower to describe the solutions implemented at the Sítio São Pedro. Feel free to ask questions about the different solution, we will gladly answer and/or adapt the blogpost in accordance with your feedback 😊 The permaculture flower is available here: https://permacultureprinciples.com Land & Nature stewardship At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
Wilton also plans to implement the solutions that follow:
Building At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
Wilton also plans to implement the solutions that follow:
Tools & Technology At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
We humbly suggest:
Education & Culture At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
Wilton also plans to implement the solutions that follow:
Health & Spiritual Well-Being At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
We humbly suggest:
Finances & Economics At Sítio São Pedro, we identify the solutions that follow:
We humbly suggest:
Land Tenure & Community Governance At Sítio São Pedro , we identify the solutions that follow:
We humbly suggest:
Complementary and subjective remarks Slow and steady wins the race Meeting Wilton at this point seemed incredibly synchronistic for us. Indeed, the longer we travel, the better we understand what our life path might be. We also acknowledge that time is precious and that every project has its own tempo. When one wants to work with Nature, this tempo intimately mingles with the natural rhythms. We also reflect upon how our daily lives are deeply entrenched in a heavy system and we feel that the momentum of that system easily traps many of us in a way of living that is radically uprooted from Life realities; physically and culturally uprooted from the individual, community levels, society to global levels. Our desire to transition towards more mindful, compassionate and responsible paths will have to respect those rhythms… Not too fast to avoid hurting ourselves in the process, not to slow to not derive from our objectives. As we finalize this article, we remember our first high-altitude sickness experience in Ecuador, just after volunteering at the Sítio São Pedro. We felt confident in our physical bodies to top the challenges: Pichincha, Cotopaxi… Those two volcanoes are two great teachers. They taught us the importance of acclimation. Without this initial intention to observe and interact with the mountain, we were not capable to reach the top. One needs time to reach a summit and we cannot impose that time. We know what stars we are aiming at. We also know that every great journey starts with a step forward. We want this travel to already bring us many steps forward and that, as the route reveals itself always clearer as we go, we listen to our natural heartbeat to set our pace on our life path. Activism and the need for resistance This experience and more generally Wilton’s activism made him realize the need for unity and strategy. We are currently reading a very powerful book that allowed us extensive discussion about this topic with him. We recommend to everyone to better understand what is at stake and what caring about it could -or should- mean: “Deep Green Resistance” (free online read: https://deepgreenresistance.net/en/preface/deep-green-resistance/). Will you join me? Go futher…
2 Comments
papa
9/20/2018 10:04:02 am
les photos sont superbes
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Laura
9/26/2018 01:40:59 am
Merci beaucoup Papa :)
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