The Challenge
To draw up an amazing little garden. One that will bring surprise and delight to the world of these lovely children, while costing everyone as little as possible.
Thats Permaculture, and it can change the world.
If we do a compelling design, then it will become real. Materials will be donated, and the good people from 'Hands across the water' will actually create it with us.
Their third working bee is coming up, mid November.
Maybe you will take the plunge and join them.
Who its For?
The beautiful children of the Suthasinee Noiin Orphanage, who want so little but need so much.
Mrs Noiin has been loving and caring for HIV affected children for 20 years, doing her best to make their sometimes short lives beautiful.
"More than 1,000 children have died in my arms"
Recently she learned that she herself will not be around much longer.
The kids had been 'doing it tough'. But since the capable people at 'Hands across the Water' committed to looking after these children, daily life has become so, so much brighter.
How joyful these children are. Where does it come from??
To remind us that life is temporary, for all of us. To remind us to put as much love and joy into each day as we can. And to surprise ourselves with how capable and resourceful we can be, once we get started.
Tools and 'How To' ideas
Fantasize. Draw up a design that will kind-of fit the template below. Go over the edges. Use unlikely colors, put visiting creatures in, and artworks if you like.
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| This looks a likely spot for a loved, loveable garden |
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| Double click to enlarge, then trace in your own ideas |
Trace
Double-click this edge-garden template, to enlarge. Put some paper over your computer screen, turn out the lights, and trace it, gently.
Make three copies, so you can mess the first ones up, with joyful abandon. At first, don't erase mistakes. Make multiple layers of mess. Rich layers of mess, let them meld and produce offspring. Let your pencil lines go thick and wild.
Select what works best
Lift out the good ideas, maybe trace them again. Here are some helpful low-tech tricks for drawing up expressive garden plans.
Think about clever (or silly) ways to manage the yearly floods and dry spells, how to attract children's help, what to plant that they will love, and that will survive. Here are some ideas from a Japanese childrens garden I made last year, on getting the water, plants, love, and resources that will make a garden flourish. Share with the world, see what comes back
Post your heroic drawing efforts on your Facebook page, for your friends to giggle at. Maybe they will find whats missing, and put it in. Email your pics to to me - I have no idea how to make a tropical garden, thats why I'm asking everybody. Just take a photo of your drawing with your camera, and send.
I sent the first draft of this story to water expert Ross Mars, and look what came back - Rainfall data we need, to design a water system that works.
'Ready! Fire! Aim!" is the correct order, for getting totally new things done.
This Video shows last year's volunteers in action, doing their magic at Yasothon, in 2010.
Feeling Daunted?
Design never comes naturally, don't worry.
Unfamilar with tropical Plants?
Just make up fictional plants.
Whirligig flowers, leaves like petticoats, if you like.
Just write notes discribing what your fantasy plants DO, and what they need.
A plant-lover might read it, then suggest the name of something actual.
Like ice-cream bean, or dragon fruit.
Tropical plants all sound made-up to me anyway.
You can't mess up
Nobody, NOBODY knows how to do this.
Last year as part of their renovation blitz, the 'Hands across the Water' team had a go at planting an irrigated garden.
Tradies, businessmen, teenagers all volunteered their time, effort, resources, and flew all the way to Thailand.
The building renovation was amazing, but the garden didn't survive first go.
Did they fail? NO, because now we are hearing their story.
We have Permaculture, and they didn't.
Now they have us.
As every artist knows, you always need a few rough drafts when doing something totally new.
Your capacity for embarrassment is equal to your capacity to change the world. I really believe this.
Spend an hour, watch the impact
Its doing the things we don't naturally 'feel' like doing that change our life, set our orbit on a wider trajectory. If you get out the paper, the erasers, and a friend to help, you will be a new person.
Your garden, or your friends garden will be next, because you have set up a new 'tram tracks' of the mind. Your world will change. After just an hour of trying.
Connect
Contact me with your good ideas, suggestions, and offers of help, I would love to hear from you.0412 474 cecilia.macaulay(at)gmail.com
Contact the team at Hands across the Water, offer your smarts and strength, make some great friends.
About Hands Across the Water
Hands across the water is a Boutique charity, established by Detective Inspector Baines and his colleagues after the Thailand tsunami. A year after completing his work for those who had died, he found the children orphaned by the tsunami were still living in a tent, with an uncertain future.
'Results not Excuses'
Detective Baines is young, and quiet. He doesn't smile much, but gets things done. One year after he and his colleagues established 'Hands', the million dollars for the children's new home was raised. Not only do they have a colorful home. A palm oil and a rubber plantation were acquired. The children play and picnic there now, amongst trees that will be income source in their future.
Detective Baines and other directors pay for 'Hands' administration out of their own pockets.
Every cent donated to Hands across the water goes directly to caring for the children - food, medicine, and education.Detective Bains won the Australian of the Year award recently, and lectures to Corporate groups on effective leadership.
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| Hands across the water 8-day fundraising bike ride though Thailand |
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