Spring semester 2012 starts in 5 days. Chrissie, Sarah and Mike, this semester’s staff fellows have been here for two weeks (we’ve changed the title from “interns” to “fellows” to more accurately reflect the role they play here). The four students, Max, Lily, Kiera and Conner arrive on Sunday. Along with all of the other preparations that fill our days, the FtG blog is back online after a dormant period.

Soon the blog will be updated regularly. You’ll meet the new personalities, and follow our journeys and discoveries. We are so excited about this semester’s projects and team and can’t wait to share it with all with you.

Before we get into the new semester, there is a very important piece that we want to include, one that we couldn’t tell until a week or so ago.

Last fall, we had our first student-intern here at FtG, Skye Jang. Technically she was a gap year student, but since we didn’t run a full fall semester, and there were no other students, we created a “student internship” position and Skye filled it. Skye quickly became one of the “family” here – editing media, cleaning up server files, helping with the library, helping on the ropes course, recruiting new students, and learning how to interview and create educational media.

She also wrote five thoughtful, insightful and highly personal blog posts between October and December, the last one written literally the day before she returned home to Pennsylvania. They are best read as a progression of a series, which is how we wanted to share them. They illustrate a growth of self-awareness in a young person that is at once an intimate portrait and a universal story. And why did we wait till now to post these?

Skye used to joke that being at FtG was her “forced gap year.” Forced because she really wanted to be in college, and in fact had done everything in her power to get herself accepted into some of the top schools in the country. Everything in her power. But not everything was in her power to determine. You see, Skye and her mother immigrated to the US from S Korea when Skye was seven years old. Their green cards had not been issued at the time that Skye applied to college and she had no access to financial aid. Without that, she could not afford college. So she came here, to learn as much as she could, to re-apply to schools, and to do something resourceful while waiting for the green card.

We could have posted her blogs sooner. But her story, told in the posts, includes her disappointment with the US government, the delays, and how at 18 years old, those delays translate into real restrictions. Restrictions not just on financial aid, but on international travel, and on work status. One night, about to post the blog entries, in a moment of doubt I called Skye’s mom, a PhD candidate at Drew University, to make sure she was comfortable with us posting. She hesitated. Maybe we should wait till the green cards come through, she said.

The irony was not lost on any of us. Nor the fear of oppression, no matter if it was real or not. We couldn’t take the chance. Not in today’s climate.

As we prepare for the upcoming semester, we will study democracy closely, and question what one is, and whether we have a democracy in this country. Perhaps most importantly, we will discuss and debate what a real democracy might look like, and if that is the best governance we can create for ourselves.

We invited Skye to come back for this semester, so she can experience a real semester with her peers. She misses California, but she’s moving on now. With her green card issued, she can get a job, and she’s busy filling out all those financial aid applications. We miss her so much, but we are very happy for her, and so grateful that those of us here at Synergia and FtG played a part in her growing up time, and helped her to land more solidly into herself. We wish you the best of everything, Skye, and hope that someday you’ll return to California and see us.

We’ve asked Skye to guest-post on this blog from time to time so you can follow her story as she moves forward into university life. She is considering traveling to Korea this summer to visit relatives and we are hoping to get posts and photos of her trip.

Skye at Bioneers with Lily Yeh and Annabelle

Read on for Skye’s full story, Fall 2011.

And stayed tuned for more posts in the coming weeks!

Warm Regards,
Debra

For the past month, I’ve experienced the Nevada County life and much more. I’ve been exposed to so many things that, in a way, I thought were irrelevant before I came here. My way of life’s been dramatically altered. At Synergia, I live in a wood cabin made of recycled materials and have no cell phone service. I eat organic food and use composting toilets. I will also be the first to admit that I didn’t know much about recycling or composting. Moreover, I wasn’t aware that hog factory farms were immense problems in numerous communities right in my home state of Pennsylvania. Most recently, I learned about the Shoshone people and their dispute with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Barrick Gold Corporation over Mt. Denabo, a sacred site for the native people.

On October 6, 2011, I ventured to Reno with Tom, Debby, and Wyatt, a prospective student of Finding the Good, to report on a hearing, which was a small thread in the long-lasting controversy between the Shoshone people and the BLM and Barrick Gold Corporation. The court has already ordered in favor of BLM and Barrick Gold Corporation to begin the project. However, when the BLM and Barrick attempted to pump water out of the ground as part of the gold mining process, the Western Shoshone Defense Project filed yet another suit against them declaring the water was sacred and essential for their livelihood.

When I got back to home base, I watched the documentary “American Outrage” to further educate myself about the history of this dispute. Honestly, I found it hard to keep my eyes on the screen. The violence and force of the government in that documentary was mind-blowing, and at the same time completely heartbreaking. The film centers on the lives of Carrie and Mary Dann, two Shoshone sisters whose ranch sits on rich gold deposits. My heart broke when I saw Carrie and Mary’s life being torn apart for metals. I looked down at the gold ring and bracelet wrapped around my finger and wrist, and realized how insignificant they seemed compared to the Danns’ life. “When you buy your wife a gold ring, think about where it came from,” Carrie Dann says.  The BLM and Barrick Gold Corporation essentially demeaned the Shoshone people’s way of life and culture. Tom explained, “They’re trying to separate the human from the being.” Realizing this truth, I was saddened.

The government’s abuse of power made me all the more empathetic towards the Shoshone people. I have lived in the United States for almost eleven years. My mother and I came to this country believing in proclaimed opportunities for happiness, freedom, and success. For the past eleven years, my mom and I have struggled with the government over our legal status and still do today. We are not citizens. We are not even “registered aliens.” We are immigrants, restrained and leashed by the bureaucratic policies of the United States government. We are, in other words, foreigners, unrecognized and ignored. It wasn’t until this past school year that I realized the personal impacts of this reality. I applied to college, and naturally I applied for financial aid, as all my peers did. By the time college decisions came out, I grasped that I wasn’t in the same position as everybody else. I was notified that I was classified as an international student, and that I couldn’t receive federal financial aid. The government’s denial of me and my mom’s existence in the United States had trickled down to affecting my immediate future. Out of respect for myself, I took initiative to do something with this gap year, and here I am, three thousand miles away from home. In the past six months, I learned how naive I had been, how much I have left to learn, and ultimately, how important it is to take action out of awareness and courage.

Knowledge always has consequence, whether it is good or bad. Learning about the Shoshone, the environmental impacts of certain activities such as eating meat, and even the problems existing in Pennsylvania make me more aware of the world. It also opens the gate for cynicism and pessimism. However, we must never let the world make us hard. Instead, we can take pride in newfound knowledge and desire to learn more. Debby articulated, “It matters that [the Shoshone dispute] makes you sad.” Despite grasping the injustice that occurs everyday, the extraordinary life of the forest and the stars sparkling in the night sky are reminders that the world is a beautiful place. We, as dependents of the earth, have a responsibility to preserve it, just as the Shoshone people have done.

-Skye Jang

8:00:10 AM: Skye decides to sleep for fifteen more minutes because of the comfort of her bed

8:37 AM: Skye wakes and panics

8:41 AM: Skye decides to get out of bed

9:11 AM: Skye finishes getting dressed and brushing her teeth

9:13 AM: Skye enters Tom and Debby’s to find Tom eating breakfast at the table

9:15 AM: Granola and milk

9:24 AM: Skye goes to retrieve dish soap from storage room

9:29 AM: Skye calls her Mom in Pennsylvania

9:35 AM: “I love you. I’ll see you soon.”

You’re probably wondering why I took you through a short segment of my morning. It seems completely uninteresting and mundane. If you read in between the lines, you’ll learn more things about my life than at first glance. I have a comfortable bed to sleep in. I have clothes, and running water. I have food to eat. I have access to a telephone. I have a mom who loves me more than I can hope to understand. I know some of you are asking, “So do I. What’s the big deal? “ The big deal is that most of the world doesn’t have half the things I have. If you’re reading this on your computer right now, then I hope you come to appreciate it all, including the technology you’re using right now.

Last night was an ordinary movie night at Tom and Debby’s. We watched a movie called A Better Life. Carlos Galindo, the father of a teenage son named Luis, works incessantly to move out of East LA, hoping to get his son into a good school and away from gangs. He must avoid deportation and keep his son from falling into trouble. There are depictions of immense poverty and migrant workers begging for work on the street. They live crowded in one flat. Illegal immigrants do whatever they can to earn money for themselves and their families. Many face deportation after being caught by the authorities. Ultimately, all they wanted was an opportunity to live better, as was with Carlos Galindo. Near the end of the movie, Luis visits his father in a detention center. Carlos pours his heart out, apologizing for failing his son, admitting that he loves him enough to give up his entire life. Carlos is sorry that he couldn’t give Luis any better. I cried.

Is it a little close to home for me? Probably. I really respect single parents. They have to be two different people, a mother and a father. More than that, I really respect single parents who are immigrants. My Mom’s effort to give me a great childhood as a single parent becomes clearer and clearer as the years go by. My Mom strived to keep both of us out of poverty for our future even before we came to the United States. I was too young to understand, but now I am learning of the struggles she overcame for me so my life would be changed for the better. For that reason, I grew up privileged.

I always believed that I had less than I deserved and other people suffered so much less. I didn’t have the fancy new cellphone or the $300 bag. In reality, I have so much more.  I have basic necessities, and conveniences that are in fact unnecessary for survival. However, I have my life. A few days ago, Debby said, “All those superficial, material things could never compare to who you are and what you’ve experienced as an immigrant from South Korea. Your perspective of life is something that can’t be replaced by plastic things.” She articulated something so apparent to her, but not me. Hearing this gave me the best sleep I have had in a while. I woke up this morning feeling chipper, but most of all awake. I don’t mean physically feeling conscious, but really feeling awake.

How about we all take a moment to imagine what it would feel like not to have running water or to have a hungry stomach before going to bed?

-Skye Jang

Quite contrary to how momentous the occasion was, I felt quite apathetic about the whole situation. I haven’t taken the time to really reflect on how wonderful it is to have a Social Security Number. Wait a second…am I actually supposed to be happy that the government finally gave me a SSN? Maybe you can help me find the answer to that question in the next few minutes you take to read this.

When I first got here in September, Debby asked me to read an article titled “Help! I’ve Been Colonized and I Can’t Get Up…” by Jane Anne Morris. She addresses this phenomena occurring in the world concerning the public’s tendency to not take action against corporate exploitation of the environment, rather choosing to complain and blame other people. Jane Anne Morris describes the population in three parts. She explains that one of the three thirds “are preparing testimony so you can be persuasive at a generic regulatory agency hearing while you’re begging them to enforce a tiny portion of our laws.” I call that “groveling,” as Morris puts it, begging, sycophancy, being a toady, maybe kowtowing, even for the smallest of results. After seeing the fruit of all your efforts, you rejoice for the killing of 600 trees, not 2000. The government has us under so much oppression that small, minute outcomes produce celebratory parties with champagne. That is being “colonized.” So yes. I have a right to be apathetic that my SSN came in the mail last night. I have a right to question whether I should really be happy.  When it comes right down to it, are we living in a true democratic nation, when we have to beg for things that should be granted, such as an “identity”?

How about the other side of the story? An enormous number of immigrants are working day to day, and paying their taxes, praying that an opportunity to receive even a Social Security Number and eventually their Alien Registration Card crosses their paths. Do I really have a right to say that I am apathetic now? Let me take some time to explain to you what it would be like if I had never come to the United States. I would be living in a crammed, overpriced apartment complex with my Mom. I would be taking about an hour commute to school courtesy of the Korean subway system. I would be going to school and returning home, in the dark. My Mom would be working almost 24-hour workdays. I wouldn’t know how to speak English. I would have never known that there were bigger opportunities outside of my country. Ultimately, I would have never questioned the status quo. I’ve laid out both sides of the debate. Should I be glad about this next step towards citizenship? Should I question the government’s limitations on its source of power, the people of the nation? What do you think?

Now I realize that I talk about immigration and the government a lot. Maybe it’s because this has been such a large part of my life. Maybe it’s because it really matters that people know. Maybe it’s just because I’m eighteen and I’m pissed. No matter what the reason, it’s safe to say I’m still perplexed. However, in this post-911 era, I am well on my way to receiving an Alien Registration Card. That’s a minor miracle.  Oh, the irony…

-Skye Jang

How many times have you gone on Facebook today? How many emails have you sent today? How many Twitter followers do you have? How often do you check your cellphone for text messages, emails, or missed calls? We live in an era where “facebooking” is part of our daily jargon. We live in a place where cellphones are causes of car accidents. We are wired all the time. We live in a technological world.

Just this morning, I sent a half a dozen emails within 10 minutes. In the next five, I went on Facebook, and clicked the red notification flags at the top left hand corner of my screen that told me someone had written on my wall and sent me an inbox message. Facebook just happens to top my “most visited” sites list. Even without cellular service or a television, I find ways to connect myself to “the outside world” with a mere stroke of a key. Warning: I’m going to be cliché.

What has the world come to? I guess the real question is: why are we so addicted to technology? (I know it’s not just me)

The whole concept of the Internet, cellphones, and televisions was for people to be connected even when thousands of miles away, and for people to access available information quickly and with ease. We use this technology to do everything from downloading movies to reading the news. Traditional letters have transformed into emails, and phone calls have turned into text messages with emoticons attached to them to denote emotions. Youth, in particular, inundate themselves with pop culture, social networking, and indecipherable music. This includes me as well. This being said, I am not criticizing our utilization of technology. Rather, I’m trying to understand why we use this technology the way we do and how this consumption is influencing us.

When it comes to the impacts of technology, there is the good and the bad. Let’s begin with the good. We are able to connect with people we haven’t spoken to in years. We can access news quickly and efficiently. We have information at our fingertips. We can send messages to people without waiting for extended periods of time. Regardless of whether we acknowledge it or not, technology facilitates our daily tasks.

What about the bad? Exposure to media has caused a universal “negative body image syndrome,” amongst teens and young adults. We have given up traditional, more “real” ways of communication for ease and speed. We care more about who is tagged in which photo rather than what is going on in the world. People are invited to important events through the Internet. Our virtual lives are far more interesting to us than reality.

So…what does this all mean? I don’t mean that we should sacrifice our access to the Internet or trash all our cellphones. I understand the limits of living without the technology we have. I’m eighteen. But…what if we used this gift we have for better purposes? We can use the connection we have to the whole world to make our voices heard. We can relay information that we believe is important. Make a Facebook status, group, or event. Tweet. Send an email. Text. Make a blog post. I don’t mean talk about Kim Kardashian’s divorce or Lindsay Lohan’s next court date. I mean talk about something that’s really important to YOU. Yes you. Maybe that does actually mean talking about Kim Kardashian or Lindsay Lohan. Don’t let technology control you. Rather, master it and make it your own. What’s your story?

________________________________________

November 28, 2011

Last night in bed, I was thinking about who I was just a year ago. I was a senior in high school, bored and undecided. About what you ask? About everything. In twelve months, I’ve completely changed as a person. I always thought that change was bad. Change led to people growing apart. Change is different. The reality is that change is a normal part of life. Change shapes who we are through all our experiences, the challenges we take on, the obstacles we overcome, and the people we encounter.

My point is that I’ve even changed in the past three months. I could tell you all the new things I learned or habits I’ve adopted. But I won’t. There are too many things to mention.
Instead, I want to tell whoever’s reading this to have courage; courage to delve into the unexpected and unknown. I traveled thousands of miles by plane to the other side of the country. I had no idea what Nevada City was like, and I had to commit without knowing. Most teens and young adults aren’t willing to leave their life behind for something like my internship. Well, did you know that there are almost 200 countries in the world and seven billion people on the planet right now? Who knows how many animals and trees are in the world…it’s probably safe to say that you haven’t even seen a quarter of the world. I haven’t. If you have, that’s absolutely amazing.
There are so many things to see, to learn, and to experience to stay in one place for too long. We can never hope to understand different perspectives of the world without seeing them firsthand. By “seeing,” I mean more than just physically being able to look at things. The sense of satisfaction and adventure you get from leaving home and exploring new places is unreal.
This notion of having courage applies to anything, way beyond just traveling. Have courage no matter what you do. If you’re thinking about taking on a new challenge, just do it. No need to come up with more excuses not to. You will change. You will see the world in a newer way. It’ll feel remarkable.

2 days until departure. Until next time California.

-Skye Jang

The First and Final Question: The Legacy

Some are lost. Everybody wants to be found.

The drive to Parque Patagonica takes seven solid hours, through the most obscenely vast, open landscape in the world. Volcano ice-tipped tops, with crimson covers at the foot, slowly ebbing into the turquoise riverbeds. Steep high hills, cut like glass shards towering into the clouds. So I see: why Patagonia? “Because it is the benchmark for what is wild in the world”, is what Yvon Chouinard says. Perhaps one of the only places left to view what people thousands of years ago saw, a land untouched, and unsoiled by human development.

In April, the colors turn, from ash green to deep crimson and neon yellow. We leave the Evergreen at Pumalin and cross the border into ______. The drive encompasses a lake that lies directly on the Argentinean border, and meets the Baker River a few miles from our destination. We arrive two hours late, dinner on the table. Doug has us staying in the Butler’s house, with some rearranging from Carolina, our trip organizer and Chris Tompkins’s (Doug’s wife) personal assistant.

Here is the thing about the Butler’s house: it’s a **** ing mansion. Doug’s obsession with aesthetics drives people crazy. “It’s almost over the top”, one of the American volunteers says to me. “We spend days rearranging rocks the size of a toddler’s fist.” I get it. In his interview Doug explains to us the value of beauty, and how its power is vastly underestimated. Again, I get it. It has the power to sway minds, evoke feelings and create a sense of place. And that’s what the Butler’s house does. Though the gushing hillside adjacent to the mountain the house is tucked away in, helps. The landscape is completely different here from Pumalin Park. All of a sudden it is dry, the mountainside is orange and barren, large llama-like animals called guanacos roam freely. The completion of the park is almost half of what it is in Pumalin, partly due to the fact that a miniature Ahwahnee stands halfway furnished and windowpane-less in the small valley. Shacks from the former farm are still inhabited by the workers here to finish the building and restoration.

In the morning Dave gets news that one of Chloe’s friends has committed suicide. It’s unclear how much his death affects my good friend, she seeks solace the only way we can a world away ~ in her friends back home, via Facebook. I grieve a little, too, for my generation and the unnamed burden we all seem to bear. For the many deaths in families, friends and acquaintances we endure; I am frightened by this reoccurring trend that is surging though the nation. More and more lost young souls give up the will to live on; I see it come closer all around me, I can almost feel it, perhaps that is what it will take to name it.

I climb to the top of a small peak rising from the valley’s depths, with nothing in hand, and a clear mind. The sun sets at the end of its shallow arc.

When there is nothing more in sight but jagged horizons I look out toward the darkening sky. Here I see things that bring me back to center, hope revives. And if there is one answer to death, I am certain it is this: Nature’s unyielding gift of wilderness. The last of the warming sun, the crystal air, the impeccable silence. I count my blessings; wander back down in a Z line, accept my opportunity, my responsibility to live on. For I am found.

Annabelle's last photo sent from the field

Sunrise. (My fingers are still shaking. I feel hot from all the blood pumping through me adrenaline-fast.  Nature comes close. A little fox sneaks up and growls at me. I freeze. We stare. It’s love at first sight. Instinct gets me scared; first thing: unlatch my camera from the tripod.)

You can sense my hesitation. I like you, long-nose and pointy-ears, I like your brown fur and little white teeth. There are myths about you dear, and the mischief that you drive in the village. The cats are scared, the people are scared and the bone remains still lyine in the mellow grass. Today you want to come and play with me.

It’s a hunger, for danger. The quiet approach and the growl. The stare. And I salute. This is your land, this is your terrain. I know little but that of which you have granted me a glance. I know what I see from behind my window, in the pictures, through the legends. I live only a fraction of the wild that you call home. And for that I grant you the upper hand, consider me an ally. I shan’t trespass anymore.

– Annabelle

Annabelle encounters Wild Life

This is our third day here in Parque Pumalin and it is absolutely stunning. The paper thin grey clouds hang over the bare-backed mountains. The fluorescent green grass lights up the acres and acres of this amazing park. Although I do not speak the native tongue, the people who live here are some of the most welcoming and gorgeous people in the world. There is a man named Dan staying here at the park who was born and raised in Costa Rica, he has been deemed “The Translator”. Everyday he has shown us around the property and taught us things that once were just fantasized dreams. His ability to interpret and communicate with the locals make him more of a “god sent child” to us.

Being here in Chile still seems like a dream. I never thought that I would have to take four planes in the course of 24 hours to arrive to my final destination. The first we took from San Francisco to Dallas but that plane was delayed for a few hours because of a ventilation problem. We all had to exit the plane and re-board once again; only this time they did it by name. The second plane was from Dallas to Santiago and that was a nine-hour flight. The third was from Santiago to Puerto Montt, which was roughly two hours.
 The final plane held only six people. When we finally arrived at the private hanger, and I saw the plane we were going to fly in, I thought it was a joke. I said to everyone that there was no way I was going to get into that plane. Contrary to my wishes, it was reality. The pilot Rodrigo (who also took us shopping, as we looked like lost ducks in a giant pond) started to wash the plane. The only way I could tell that we had taken off was by looking at the ground, because the takeoff was like dragging your finger through whipped cream. Smooth.  As we flew over the mesmerizing Chilean mountains it felt so good to get away from everything. The plane has to have an equal amount of weight distribution. That being said I was in the very back squished against the luggage, my cheek against the window forcing me to look down at the breathtaking scenery. I felt like I was flying through the spacious clouds and over the high mountaintops.

I have always taken the fact that I have food for granted – when we need food we buy it. Being here in 800,000 acres of Parque Pumalin there is no way of going and buying food when there is a shortage of it. When we were in town we bought food for only a few days because we were told that there would be food provided for us to dig in after our long journey. Unfortunately there was a misunderstanding; there was no food here in Parque Pumalin waiting on our arrival. There are, however, a few gardens here, so for the last two nights we have had huge green salads with all of the different components of the plentiful gardens. There were bushes and bushes, rows and rows of blueberries which I ate almost two pounds of because that was all we had to eat for a good two days. I have also always taken for granted the fact that I have electricity. Here in Parque Pumalin, the electricity only comes on from 7:30 pm to 11:30 pm which the only time to charge our camera batteries and such. Not having electricity has made me realize and be more conscious of all of the problems eating away at our world. These are some of the many life lessons I have learned here, but NEVER take anything for granted. Now I see how lucky I am to live where I do with so many plentiful resources right at my fingertips. I could never have dreamed of something like what I am living at this very moment, and it still doesn’t feel real.

-Chloë

Low tide over Parque Pumalin

My parents, Dave and Yvonne, in the six-seater, flying over Pumalin

Me at sunset