Our wintertime in Singapore

Although we are now back in Tropical Singapore, I still count this as my 'winter time'. What I mean, is that I am treating it like it's a time for reflection and going 'inside'.

I truly discovered the meaning of this when we were working on the farm in Wales, outdoors non-stop from March till September this year. Long long days spent outdoor working on the land. Physically, I don't think I've ever been in this great shape.

But I certainly felt very 'lost' during those long summer months. Lost because this was the first time in my life where I was outside SO MUCH. Both physically, mentally and spiritually. It was as if I was out of touch with 'me'. It wasn't an instant realisation. But instead, just a gradual strange feeling of just constantly being in the present. Being in experience mode, instead of reflective mode.

As Fran, our farm host describes it - No time to ponder and think about life... just constant do do do! work work work. The summer months on any northern European farm means a short window of time to get everything done! Grow all the veg, plump up all the animals. Hurry while the sunlight is still high in the sky. "Make hay while the sun shines" as they would say.

Honestly, I was exhausted all the time. I crashed into bed by 9pm every night, and woke up 10 mins before breakfast at 8, my whole body sometimes still aching from the work the day before. Where was all my energy? How was it that Fran and Kevin were going going going like machines? Where did all their energy come from?

I then learnt from Fran, how she lives with the seasons. Like how our energy levels are different during different parts of the day - Morning = high, Noon = Peak, Afternoon = Slow down, Evening = Chill. For her, and most farmers, the wave of energy dips and peaks throughout the whole year. She tells me, summer is a time when you just don't have a moment to think too far ahead, or too far behind! You're busy from one day to the next, making sure the onions are in the ground so they will be harvested in time! The tomatoes get their feed so we can eat them ripe before the first frost. Getting the sheep sheared before it gets too hot and they start getting fly-strike. Everything is literally back to back.

So our mind, spirit, body is directed towards these immediate necessities that need to be done. So that when the leaves fall, and the vegetables stops to grow, one will have stored enough food to last you another tough winter.

Then winter comes. And everything slows down. The sunlight, once given in abundance, suddenly so sparse, and the nights are so loooong. It's cold and you want to stay by the warm fire as much as possible. Snuggle up with your loved ones and conserve all energy for next year. Winter down time. Time to go inwards, consolidate the whole year, reflect and plan.

It's funny now, looking back, I can see why it was so difficult for me to update my blog while in the farm. I couldn't bare being in that cold, dark room for long when I know it's just so beautiful outside. So I usually just quickly check my emails, send necessary updates to family and then get out! And somehow, I just wasn't able to have any proper reflective thoughts. It was like my mind was always blank. (very good for yogic/buddhist practices)

So after quite a big summer, we knew, we'd better try and get our proper winter's rest no matter where we are and what we are doing. And so far, for the last three weeks in Singapore, I've pretty much been quite good at it. Am catching up on my sleep. I am slowing down my physical exertions, eating more (hehhehheh), and definitely given myself a lot more time and space to reflect. I was at first feeling guilty about being so piggish and unproductive. But instead of guilt, why not just surrender into the present, and just flow with whatever comes my way? In fact, my sudden spurt of reflectiveness is the productive engine at work now. Lap it up!

So while the rest of the country turn up the volume with the partying, shopping and festivities, For the sake of balancing out the whole year, I am going to pretend that I am still at Old Chapel Farm and have my own quiet winter. :)

Working with our hands

I'm reading an awesome little book right now, borrowed from the library called "A Different Kind of Luxury. Japanese Lessons in Simple Living and Inner Abundance" by Andy Couturier. When I saw the title, I was immediately drawn to it. This is exactly what I think about all the time, exactly what we try to tell people why we do what we do, and exactly what we are striving for. Simple Living and Inner Abundance. I always admired ancient Japanese culture of respect and wisdom that we in Singapore, is completely lacking. We seem to be horrendously unwise. With all due respect to our parents and grandparents who love us and brought us up the best way they know how... a lot of it is really misguided. Don't want to get into a list of things right now. But definitely one of the things... is how we did not at all encourage our children to work with their hands, and instead, focused on just academia. Anyway... I will just quote this from the book which sums up what I want to express. The context here is the writer of the book, asking Osamu Nakamura, self-sufficient man who lives alone in the woods who does wood block carving and booking binding for enjoyment - if it nerves him that a small mistake he makes can mean he will have to start everything over again.

"A crafts-person's job if half meditation, half creation. It takes creativity to design whatever you are working on, but it takes meditation to do it right. Making things with one's own hands cultivates a certain generosity and openness of the heart. It nourishes that state of mind in the crafts-person themselves, which is intimately connected with an entire way of life." Hearing this I am reminded, with sadness, of the epidemic levels of depression in my own country, and wonder whether it might have something to do with the aversion we have to working with our hands. For people in industrialised socierties, perhaps the problem is not that manual labour is intrinsically unpleasant, but that we get frustrated because our attitude is one of resentment toward something demeaning. Viewed differently, however, such work presents us with an opportunity to know ourselves and the physical and natural world better by exploring this essential aspect of being human: our relationship with our hands. How funny it is that one of the fundamental definitions of being "modern" is the ability to avoid physical labour, when it might be that very thing that could provide us with such depth of connection to ourselves and to the world.""

Very well said.

And very sad indeed as well.

I just feel so incredibly blessed that I now know better. And I leave you some of the wonderful things we got to do by hand at Old Chapel Farm....

Picking dandelion in a field of... well, dandelions to make wine

Turning the bed over to plant fresh crops

Where do you think milk comes from?

Resting after planting this bed of young tomatoes

Green bean chutney I made

My gate almost finished

Posing for a photo after our 2 day basket weaving course

I just want to be able to sit on grass

Singapore?
Bali?
Australia?
New Zealand?
and now... Canada?

The options are many. Decisions are hard.

But at the end of the day, I told Bjorn today..... I just want to be somewhere, where I can sit on the grass.

And that's something ... one just can't really do in hot, sticky, buggy, wet, pokey-grassed, Singapore.