Blog #1: First Week at Kroka

Ladies, gentlemen and children of all shapes and sizes, we are the Kroka Ecuador Semester 2015. 

I, your humble scribe, am here to let you know that your kids are all still in one piece, parents.

Your siblings are partying harder than you with chickens and kasha, brothers and sisters.

Your friends are blessed and burdened by living in Hobbit land.

Though legs may ache and infections pus, fear not,

for we sing before meals, touch fingers in circles,

wake before sunrise, ukulele rehearsals.

Though mornings are chilly we work up a sweat

Or yoga in boathouses we never regret.

It’s the candlelight in the center of our circle, surrounded by darkness and stars.

Though only first week semester agrees

It feels like we’ve been here since 2013.

Pedaling to ponds and bakeries, we revel and rejoice and we sing,

            “tierra mi cuerpo,

             aire mi aliento,

             agua mi sangre,

             y fuego mi espiritu,”

Instead of store-bought overpriced sadness,

we thread the machine and sew our own backpacks.

Prussik, figure 8, trucker hitch, bowline,

knots we must tie or we can’t fly an airline.

Mountains call louder than roosters at dawn,

yet peaceful as walks to Beaver Pond.

We all have big jobs fulfill these coming months:

Dan – the Navigator

Declan – the Bureaucrat

Jamie – the Shaman

Emily – the Kitchen Queen and Food Processor

Mayah – the Home Mama and Camp Manager

Ella – the Food Manager

Isiah – the Historian

Merin – the Energy and Fire Manager

Lily – the Farm and Garden Manager

Mercedes – the Craft Manager

Zander – the Gear Manager

Jacob – your Humble Scribe

Grace – the Hygiene Queen

Lydia – the Maestro Mayor and Bike Manager

Basil and ginger fill our nostrils in the kitchen while the morning dew dampens our bare toes.

We take English and Permaculture in the big yurt

and Jupiter nights of wisdom to burst.

            “I am lost in creation, I am found in confusion.”  

~Isiah

Perhaps the reason it feels like we’ve been here so long

is in one day the growth and awareness we've received in our minds;

has been intricately woven through our heads

by our teachers, animals, garden and breath.

We’ve bounded with organisms, poems and horses,

wood splitting, fire licking dance of the forest.

Diving off rock faces, chaga in bowls,

cayenne in everything keeping us full.

Koru the baby may break glass,

But his smile sings in the hearts in our class.

Que hora es?

Have I rambled or dangled? Was I not perfectly clear?

Do you have the slightest idea what we are doing here?

I hope you do for it is my job to make it so, you see.

We miss you, we love you, dearly indeed…

Send us chocolate please.

Sincerely,

your Humble Scribe, Jacob

                                                             

~

A Poem for the Sun

From far up in the blue,

My love’s light does rain down

and wherever I step,

the sun’s shine falls around.

Each and every new day

I awake without light

Fresh from my dreams

of a long ago night.

And as I arise

and I go for a run,

I watch for a glimmer

Of fresh morning sun.

And although the warm light

Remains (for now) far away

I smile, and greet him,

and welcome the day.

“May you kiss the sun and turn from it,

certain that it will love your back.”

~ by Mayah

Badger Balm Bill’s Quotations

“As a carpenter, my fingers would dry and crack in the winter. I would cover them in olive oil and beeswax under plastic bags at night in bed. One night Katie turns to me and says, ‘That’s pathetic, you can do better than that.’ ‘’

“An atomic bomb has a start and a finish. The invisible powers we can’t measure, locate or weigh like love, compassion and beauty are infinite.”

“When I was young, I was freakin fascinated by herbs.”

PHOTOS

(simply click photo to see the full size image)

Zander and Lynne working with Brita at morning chores

Schedule for the week

Ella working joyfully on the expedition backpacks

Jacob focused on the perfect stitch

View of the Kroka teepee from a thirsty lawn

Evening reading in the Big Yurt

Lydia and Grace writing reflections in the field with laundry drying on the rack

 

Marcela teaching

Students working with Bill Whyte, founder of the W.S. Badger Co.

Grace, Zander, and Jamie stacking wood together

Marcela showing Lydia and Declan something magical

Emily enjoying meaningful work