MANY THINGS!

Things are moving along well. I have chosen the team who will be working directly with me on the project, each person brings needed skills and personality traits that create a dynamic and well suited team for the following years work. You will see a few of them in this entry, but once i have the first formal meetings with them I will upload profiles for further inquiry. This is just a general entry to show some of the things that i have been doing over the past two weeks time...

This Bed above is the first garden 'bed' i have installed. It is a no dig bed with a layer of composite wood (very thick cardboard like ply wood) on the bottom and loads of compost then about 25cm of green grass cuttings, im having to let it cool down over a week or so as the temperature from the decaying green is not suitable for planting yet and i have no suitable soil to patch plant into it.... the bugs are going crazy in there though and things are just turning to mush like race cars into brick walls.... or something along those lines...

This is the second bed i have done, this one i decided to do a double deep dig for, turning the turf over and folding the under soil on top of that. Having a cold during this process was very taxing so i think its the only one i will do like this. I want to see the difference in productivity between the no dig and 'dug' styles of beds. The soil here is full of clay, a soil strata in a jar of water is a uniform fade from top to bottom grit with barely noticeable layers. Everyone here says that the soil is very good so im taking their word for now and watching as my mulch kills the surrounding grass which is incredibly tenacious here.

These little guys have a colony under the entire lawn, any piece of wood I leave outside will have a tunnel of dirt leading the colony to their primary resource, they are going to make short work of my wooden bed, but i don't mind because they are mushroom farmers and spread spores throughout the garden, they also attract brids by the flock, hence the mud tunnels they build to move overland, hiding themselves from the tweeters from above! Truly amazing creatures... im just waiting to see what one of the soldiers will do when they get my foot some day - they are about 5 times the size of the workers...

Speaking of mushrooms check out the mycelium growing vividly through my pile of grass cuttings i appropriated from my neighbors laborers. I gave the grass cutter 1000 Schillings, thats 45 cents canadian, for about 80 pounds of grass clippings that he was otherwise having to haul up to the top of the property, he was stoked to just toss it over the wall to me. Im learning about mycelium and mushroom cultivation and forestry through a book called "mycelium running" -how mushrooms can help save the world... and im going to approach the government body responsible for lake Victorias health who have recently been publishing articles about how the waste water leaving the ghettos and industries from the city are effectively destroying the inlet which receives them. By using mycelieated bails of hay or wood chips we can filter polluted water such as that... i'm still learning so more on that as i develop my capacity to explain it... but look at that stuff... it EATS EVERYTHING!!!

Over the wall and down the street phoenix and our great friend Ras Papa pose for the shot.

Ras Papa and I met over 2.5 years ago on my previous trip to the region when i was still developing the Bavubuka Foundation. We have a very deep connection and share the same philosophical insights and moral values, and funny enough carry around many of the same crystals wherever we go! It was crystals that we first connected on in fact. He is an extremely knowledgeable person with experience in nearly every country in east Africa. He has a string of past projects behind him and an extensive network in the region, speaking over 5 languages Ras Papa is one of my greatest resources of information while living here. We are working together on media projects as well as the development of the OME project. There is no doubt that Papa will continue to be an honored friend for many years to come, we hope to one day open up a holistic healing center/resort where people from around the world can come and live to get healed from ailments through natural medicines and therapies, or just enjoy the comforts of an east african paradise while producing art.

The rainy season is leaving us, having me expediate the purchasing of 10$ 100L barrels to capture whatever rain may come in the following months. Here i'm finishing working to plant a bucketload of comfy around the compost area, i think i'm just about to realize i should shower under that flow... it was glorious!

Here I am listening to a group of Davids community members about 15 minuets drive out of the city center. This room is the sunday school room of his church and here we are conducting permaculture meetings every saturday morning at 10am. The reception of permaculture is very inspiring, people are highly interested... especially since I told them that they should not be hungry another day after they get home gardens going!!!

Our Patio in use. Ras, Phoenix and Sebastian chill in the afternoon during an editing session for the first music video Papa and i have produced since i've been back. This patio is going to be fitted with patio furniture, trellis vines and planters, and a functional outdoor kitchen and bar just behind Sebastian's feet there... it will be a great place to eat, study, and meet with project partners and clients.

This is a design i have just completed today which is the first draft of a community basketball court. With two acres just given to him by the local chairman David is so eager to get the court built that he is selling his van before he go's back to the US to fund the project. Having gotten the confirmation that we can use his church and land for the site of the first PDC Course (Dates to be determined) I was keen to jump on board with the porject and design the nearly 2.5 acres surrounding the court into functional washroom and water facilities as well as food forrests and coconut palms for shade and food... this site will be a garden for the local children in the community, and a recreational site for young sports players, as well as a lawn and meeting space for church functions such as weddings and outdoor occasions and celebrations.... Aaaaand PDC STUDENTS CAMPING!!!

I found comfrey in a ditch behind our house. A week later the developers had carved out the ditch with a tractor and i was able to salvage about 6 robust plants from the wrekage.. the day after i planted these suckers back into the earth they were sprouting back through the mulch... (those with leafy material above the surface, im still waiting to see the root cuttings poke their heads up).. very excited to have a lush patch of this beautiful plant hiding my shrine of death, aka compost pit!

Yea... uh... here is a typical back street... following my friend brian to his house in Makindye i could not help take pictures of the street conditions here.

This is Brian.... one of my favorite people in the world. He has been working with me since my second trip, so over 3.5 years. His dedication to study, work ethics, and friendly nature make him a serious companion to work with. He is a skilled boxer and comes from a very colorful past, his life experience and general attitude towards life are amazing to me. I cant say enough about him... but i will try at a latter date when i do the TEAM BIOGRAPHY entry.

Thats all for now! Love Life Everyone!

Aaron.

HOME SWEET HOME

So im in Uganda again. The flights were smooth and I have been spending my time setting up the new house we are renting in a city district known as Intinda. You can see the back yard in this photo above. Our rental space is the bottom floor there with the large patio

Sebastian, shown above, has connected with new friends who have high prospects in the region. We spent a day with one of his friends who is a developer, sitting on the roof of his apartment building overlooking one of the larger ghettos in the city... The name eludes me at this time... Seb was mugged however and the ghetto is one of the more dangerous locations in the city, so at night YOU DONT GO TO THE BANK MACHINE ALONE!!!!! Or anywhere outside alone... The night just simply provides too much cover for thugs...

Back to the house: We have two bedrooms, a large living room, two bathrooms, a massive patio and a fully modern kitchen upstairs... I have turned a back area of the outside into a woodworking shop where I have already built a coffee table, two shelves, and a bench... With more to come! The wooden poles you see in the photo there are only $1.50 EACH! So im looking forward to more rustic furniture production (and planting 10 times as many trees as I use of course)... I will do another blog just on the furniture once we have made all the fixings for our patio hang out!

The property is in a location known as MINISTERS VILLAGE where many government officials call home... Where the military and police patrol all the streets and back alleys from midnight to dusk... Where the chances of being robbed are so low the home owners here have not even put up razor wire on the back wall of the property. Never the less we still lock our main door whenever we leave, we have so much gear and stuff that one of the people who work for the house could decide to sneak away some things when we are gone. Regardless of the normal security considerations, the fact that we have a modern kitchen, meals being cooked for us twice a day, and working bathroom and water AND electricity almost 99% of the time makes the $500 rental fee all too worth it. This place is a slice of paradise! I will try to capture some of the sun rises we get from the patio facing due east...

Keeping the blogs short and sweet, more to come....

Oh NO! An ASH CLOUD!!!

Has anyone else thought that maybe volcanos are another great solution to our energy desires? They seem to be massive thermal shafts which could boil many tons of water per day on steam cycling turbine systems. You could power generators the size of city blocks with such immense thermal energy. Just Robo-dig a shaft that runs close to the molten zones and pipe it with our strongest alloys to cycle-boil a few million tons of water through "made to order" generator stations which can be detached and airlifted in a matter of hours. Then just move to the active thermal stores which have relative stability for access and bring a main cable (1-5oo kms) with you to connect to regional power distribution stations.

The flight I was on last night needed to turn around 2.5 hours in. I was watching 2012, what a crazy movie, and the captain came on with the message from Hethrow that there was an volcanic ash cloud moving closer to england and europe. They had to divert all flights inbound to their airport and others so we got to do a U Turn in the clouds back to vancouver.

Things like this are great, im sitting there thinking about what it would be like to have to run from the earth as it cracks beneath our feet and hurls mountains and oceans at us, not unlike my views as of late, and then we have to avoid an ash cloud in the plane that im on. Personally i think we could have very very easily gone through and landed in England... seeing videos of the cloud taken by PLANES!!! nearly, what looks like, 10 km from the volcano site, i was a bit disappointed... however, who knows, that cloud COULD spread and COULD choke engines... that i have no doubt... hmm lets see, what would burned stone smoke do to a metal engine sucking thousands of Litres of air through itself per second???

So, i have six days now till the 21st when i can get back on the Jet and be on my way... again... No more goodbyes, im just living in vancouver at a friends place, on the couch, still sleeplessly dreaming about getting to Kampala again.

BAGS FOR SALE!!!

Signing off

Aaron.

Ps. For those of you who are looking for a safe place to be when 2012 happens, we can arrange your accommodations at discount rates... underground strong rooms @ 10k each! And if the earth does not get burned and flooded, well, you will have a nice hobit home in east africa! I will fill it with orphans when your gone!... hahhahahaa seriously though.

TIME TO FLY

Departure is set for 14th of april, flying british airways, first class of course...not, but looking forward to the view anyways! I am of course completely over board with thoughts and visions of the project work and how its all going to be this fourth time back.

Im mentally preparing myself to have the courage and strength that will be needed for this role i have before me. I thought it would be a nice effective blog to show a few great shots selected from the vaults of previous trips... what you are about to see, is for you, and you alone! Click on the images to see the full size shots, then tell your friends! This blog is about to become full of great stuff straight from Uganda... follow this adventure and i will love you times a million.

Some images in life are so important, that their comprehension is a mater of life or death. The fabric of your thoughts ARE the connections you have with all the world about you. Anyone with a home garden is right now the crowning achiever, the utmost noble prize winning statute of wisdom and logic.

(avoid angry Jedi masters)

"Do or do not, there is no try!!!"

Well maybe it would be ok to listen to the angry Jedi master. Yoda showed up to my bedroom the other night while i was sharpening some second hand kitchen knives from a local thrift store. They are Gifts for talented cooks i come across that want to teach by example...

Anyways he came for a talk and noticed i had not been sharpening the knife with the right "same angle" strokes... he gave me his old famous line up there after i said it was good enough... he then apologized seeing as though I didn't say anything about trying...

Then he asked me to type out a message that goes like this...

"Seeing is not believing, believing is believing, seeing comes once one believes they can see!"

After that he rambled on about tv sets becoming useless, people crying when they finally see the devastation of oil culture which we have all be Forced into through the generational debasement of truly people based governments. He said near the end something about sometimes wanting to come back to the physical plane but was afraid what he would do if he got a hold of his light saber again...

Then he gave me a meteorite with fossilized mushroom spores from a distant region of the outer galaxy star systems and said: "Crush this stone you will when all seems lost. It will only remind you that life will continue, so that never may you need to crush it, for all can never be lost in a universe of pure consciousness."

He walked back a few feet and faded into thin air again...