Ecological Wisdom | Social Justice | Critical Thinking | Positive Action BANGALORE VOLUME 6, ISSUE - 3, JULY - SEPTEMBER, 2015 Rs. 80/- Mindful Travel Why is Flying out of the Sustainability Discussion? Soren Anderrson To Save the Future, Live in the PresenT Wendell Berry The Pope Deserves a Standing Ovation Dr. Mercola July - September 2015 Eternal Bhoomi 1 My Grandfather rode a camel My father drove a car I fly in a jet plane My son will ride a camel... - A Saudi Arabian sayingg 2 Eternal Bhoomi July - September 2015 3 mKci 6 Photot: https://flic.kr/p/ How Much to Travel, How to Travel?1 The Earth is bountiful and incredibly beautiful - So back to our question, how much to travel and beckoning to us to climb those mountains, watch how to travel? wildlife at dawn, relax on that beach - after travelling Our writers in this issue, share different half way across the planet. And there are people of perspectives. Peter Owens muses on travelling as a exotic cultures, lovely old castles and other man-made pilgrim rather than as a tourist. Do we take or do we wonders to admire. Add to that our human need to give as we travel? And when we take, how do we take be enchanted by what is new and affordable, we have - as consumers or seekers? a great footloose civilisation. On an average over 8 million people fly every day, and if you travel by train, Francesca Baker invites us to do as the locals do, the station is so crowded that the whole world seems rather than carry our city with us. ‘Armchair travel’ by to be travelling. But hey, so are you! James Strohecker shows us perhaps the best way for us to travel without travelling, and maybe, settle some When we googled “Mindful Travel”, what came up of our restlessness. In similar vein, Garima Bhatia talks on top was mostly how to be careful when travelling of ‘Birding from your Balcony’. abroad, respect other cultures, taste new foods and often, Buddhist teachings of observing, practising Subsidised aviation fuel is what has made air travel deep breathing, accepting and being mindful of so cheap; the nexus between big airline corporates everything we come across etc. Rarely a word about and politics of oil is merrily fuelling air traffic - to over how much to travel or how to travel sustainably. 10,000 flights a day, while carbon emissions keep rising. Soren Andersson writes about why flying is out Yes, sustainable living is not easy. Thinking about of the sustainability discussion. sustainability and walking our talk is not just difficult, it is confusing. On the one hand travel and tourism And food is being shipped or flown across the world, is expected to provide livelihoods to many, so it sometimes back and forth with some ‘value additions’, may even be considered a bit of ‘do gooding’ to the because transportation costs are kept artificially low, underpriveleged. And our families and communities are and economics does not recognise or acknowledge scattered across the world, and shouldn’t we be close ecology. Devinder Sharma and our young intern, to them, visit them? Conflicting information and ideas Roshan Benefo unravel some of the hidden stories are so common - like an article on carbon emissions on of how food travel thousands of kilometers before it one page of the newspaper and another article in the reaches our plate. next page extolling a must-visit destination in Europe. There is much more to understand about our So much so that we stop trying to make sense of the addiction to travelling - in the world outside as well as messages we are bombarded with. within ourselves. We wish you happy reading. Seetha Ananthasivan ([email protected]) July - September 2015 Eternal Bhoomi 3 EternalBhoomi Issue No. 23 July - September 2015 Eternal Bhoomi is committed to bringing you holistic perspectives on Nature and Vantage Point sustainability from renowned writers and thinkers as well as practical ideas and To Save the Future, Live examples of earth conscious living from people around the world. 20 in the Present Wendell Berry Mindful Travel How do we hold mindful travel and a shrinking world simultaneously in times 24 The Pope deserves a of numerous possibilities to travel far and wide? Articles in this issue focus on Standing Ovation balancing our love for travel with love for Mother Earth... Dr. Mercola Movie Review 26 The trail of a disappearing Culture Shoma A. Chatterji Poster 28 Fishy Movements Facts and Figures Critical Thinking 30 Have you overstepped the Sustainable Consumption Line? Ashish Kothari Agriculture Mindful Travel Book Review 34 Coming of Age: The Organic Community of 6 Pilgrim or Tourist 18 Nature without Borders India Peter Owen Jones By Murali Sivaramakrishnan Bharat Mansata 10 Why is Flying out of the Sustainability Discussion? Soren Anderrson 12 Armchair Travel James Strohecker 14 Food Miles Devinder Sharma 16 When on a Holiday do as the Locals do Francesca Baker 4 Eternal Bhoomi July - September 2015 Gardening Bhoomi’s Panel of Advisors: 46 Vegetables in the Backyard Shri Satish Kumar Shree Padre Eco-philosopher, co-founder of Schumacher College and Editor, Resurgence & Ecologist Magazine Food www.resurgence.org 48 Go Bananas Dr. Vandana Shiva I.M. Pushpa Scientist, Eco-activist and Founder of Navdanya www.navdanya.org Snippets Dr. Madhu Suri Prakash 50 Mystery of Greenland›s Author and Professor of Education, Vanishing Lakes Pennsylvania State University www.yesmagazine.org Glacial Lakes Disappearing Act G.Gautama Perspective Director, Chennai Education Centre, 36 The Part and the Whole Why Just Maggi? There Krishnamurthi Foundation of India Jane Sahi are bigger Rakshas out www.pathashaala.tcec-kfi.org there... Shri Narayana Reddy Organic farmer and promoter of Holistic Science sustainable agriculture Darwin Revisioned 38 52 Announcements Ashish Kothari Brian Goodwin Founder of Kalpavriksh, activist 54 Bhoomi Programmes and author of books on bio- diversity and globalisation Expressions www.kalpavriksh.org 55 Bhoomi College 40 Balcony Birding Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Garima Bhatia Founder of SVYM (Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement) /BhoomiNetwork www.svym.org 42 The Big Fat Indian Wedding Shri Devinder Sharma Soumya Suresh /bhoomicollege Author and Food Analyst; Chairman, Forum for Food Security www.devinder-sharma.blogspot.in /channel/bhoomicollege Interview Dr. Harish Hande 44 Path with a Purpose Magsaysay Award Winner, Founder Rema Kumar /bhoomicollege of SELCO, a pioneer in rural solar electrification www.selco-india.com Helena Norberg Hodge Founder and Director of the International Society for Ecology and Culture (ISEC) www.localfutures.org Eternal Bhoomi is a magazine published by Bhoomi Network, a unit of K.N.A. Foundation for Education, a Public Charitable Trust registered in 1995. Cover page Image: https://en.wikipedia. org/?title=Portal:Energy/Selected_ picture#/media/ July - September 2015 Eternal Bhoomi 5 VANTAGE POINT Pilgrim or Tourist? Photo Courtesy: Hartwig HKD Every act of travel is a journey into an intimate landscape, but that response of intimacy is earthed in the pilgrim, not in the tourist, writes Peter Owen Jones. This time last year I was walking the nearest beach, where I lay down on important to remember is that whilst towards Hartland to meet Satish and as adults we may think we know our sleeping in churches and barns. The off before falling asleep for three hours. surroundings, children know that year before last I was sent on a tour of Ithe still shingle don’t know and watchedwhy I did my it but plane it gave fly they don’t. I still remember the thrill the planet by the BBC for a programme me a window to think about the notion of setting out one morning from my called Around the World in 80 Faiths, of why we need to get away to relax, home to go beyond the furthest place and the year before that I spent some and the more I considered it, the more time alone in the desert in Egypt and perverse and insubstantial it became. had ever been before, to go into what lived for a month with sadhus in India. werein the for fields me thebehind unknown my house woods that and I There is something deep within So this year I thought it was high most of us that is continually drawn has taken most from our children (and by this distance, and the history of Ifields. notice What it in perhaps my own the children) computer is agethe to Santorini, Greece. I thought I would humanity bears this out in the slow calling to explore. Yes, the internet does sorttime outI took a room a holiday. when I Ibooked arrived. a I flight took exodus from Africa. What our ancestors the train to Gatwick Airport from my knew was that over that hill there had it is a world without skies! nearest station, found the check-in never been a human being before, give us the world at our fingertips, but desk and waited my turn in line. But the and for hunter-gatherers that meant What drove the purpose of travel nearer I moved to the front, the more untouched foraging and hunting where after human beings had found so uneasy I became and just before it was much of the planet was trade, and my turn I slipped under the barrier and the food. Maybe it was this that drove that remains true today; it is the walked back through the airport to the usthey on were into theguaranteed far reaches to beof thethe tundra,first to act of making money that forms the station and took the next train home. and over miles of ocean in boats no framework for world travel, whether bigger than tables.