2009 has been a truly transforming year for me. I realized this when the boyfriend and I stepped off the University's free shuttles to downtown (meant to take students to Taking the Next Step, an alumni networking and career preparation event) and took several steps away from the event to spend the day together running errands instead. A year ago I was in those Marriott conferences rooms, begging alumni for some shred of hope that the financial crisis hadn't dealt any fatal blows to my future in journalism, and Washington Post columnist Bob Levy first told me about the Alicia Paterson Foundation, and the general notion that one could fund investigative projects via independent grants.
Like the Summer Action Grant, which I went on to apply for and receive later that year, and used to run, jump, throw myself into (and many other sports metaphors apply here) covering Chicago's Olympic Bid. Now I'm 20, and have my first byline in the New York Times. Damn things change; this much I am thrilled with. But how can I not be overwhelmed by the notion that I really am as capable as people say I am, that maybe I don't have any excuses not to be doing exactly what I want to do with my life, starting now. So I'm 12 days late in the New Years reflection department, but how's that for making up for lost time?
Without further ado, I give you What I Learned in 2009. Some of it's frivolously cosmetic, some of it has completely changed the way I view my place in this world:
1) Life always looks better after you’ve been on a jog and written a blog post, article or journal entry.
2) When I was in third grade I decided that I looked chubby with shoulder length hair, and demanded my parents allow me to grow it out. This summer, I hacked half of it off. The verdict? Short hair does not make you look fat. And I'm cutting it even shorter—will report back with more not-fat results next year.
3) When in doubt, go out. There is more to be accomplished outdoors, with friends, up late, on the North Side, than there ever could be at home in bed with an orange and the books (no, not all the books at once). Though the latter is a comforting prospect...
4) The only way to get real work done is to do so in isolation. But the time you spend not getting working done with friends is much more valuable.
5) Writing the way I do is never a bad idea, though some people will try to tell you it is.
6) The only time people are willing to tell you about themselves is at 11 pm after pancakes. Be prepared.
7) Physics majors are like football players for the least disenchanted of UChicago nerds. So don't hesitate to ask them to move your furniture/suitcases, etc.
8) Sometimes you may feel overwhelmed; your life may seem to hectic; your internal monologue may start to sound like one of those TV sleeping pill ads. You will fall asleep, give it time.
9) Not every ache and pain is the downfall of civilization in your brain. You have no Achilles toenail, tooth, etc.
10) You can count on Ben for much more than you’d ever believed.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Failed Olympics Bid Leaves Neighborhood in Flux
The secret's out! Through that special combination of luck/busting my ass, I wrote a story for the Chicago edition of the New York Times—specifically, for the Chicago News Cooperative.
Chicago News Cooperative
By RACHEL CROMIDAS
For much of Shannon Fischer’s 20 years, community change in her Bronzeville neighborhood has come in the form of a wrecking ball.
First, the Ida B. Wells housing projects fell, then the Robert Taylor homes, and now, within view of her apartment at 33rd Street and Cottage Grove, Michael Reese Hospital is coming down. Destruction can often lead to reconstruction, but hopes that Bronzeville might be revitalized as the site of an Olympic Village died in October when Chicago lost its bid for the 2016 Summer Games.
The neighborhood’s residential market took a severe hit, and developers have put off major investments. Few developers, it seems, can get serious about new projects in Bronzeville until the City of Chicago reveals plans for the landmark Michael Reese site, 37 acres at the heart of a potentially promising lakefront neighborhood.
Ms. Fischer remains optimistic. Even though the blocks in her neighborhood alternate between new condominiums and empty lots, foot traffic is sparse — and the only shopping center consists mostly of convenience stores and an auto repair shop — she believes greater Bronzeville will have its day.
“I think the neighborhood will continue to grow, considering there’s different people, different races and age groups moving in,” Ms. Fischer said.
Bronzeville was once a thriving “black metropolis” with hundreds of black-owned businesses and a booming night life. Its population swelled during the great migration of Southern blacks seeking jobs after World War I.
The poet Gwendolyn Brooks lived there, and in 1945, her first book of poetry — “A Street in Bronzeville” — brought her instant critical acclaim. Other notable residents included Richard Wright, the author of “Native Son,” and the jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong.
The area’s decline began in the 1950s as it gradually lost its middle class and businesses started to close. Though Bronzeville is unlikely to reclaim its golden era, developers like Keith Giles see the potential for new growth, only he does not expect to reach it any time soon.
Last year, Mr. Giles’s firm, Kargil Development, told the city that it was interested in developing the Olympic Village. The project would have helped Olympics promoters realize their vision of a new neighborhood that could bridge the gap between the resurgent Bronzeville community and the South Loop.
“It was an exciting development opportunity for an international event,” Mr. Giles said.
But with the Olympics impetus gone, banks not lending and no other financing in sight, Mr. Giles does not expect action soon on a Michael Reese site that might cost $1 billion to redevelop.
“The development business right now is on sabbatical,” he said.
While Mr. Giles’s company considers another project nearby, it doesn’t expect to see change soon.. “Unfortunately, most everything has stopped,” Mr. Giles said. “There’s new developments on one block, and you go across the street and there’s a burned-out building.”
Alderman Toni Preckwinkle, whose Fourth Ward includes the Reese campus, expects the city to release its plan for the site early this year. She said that a developer might be selected by the end of the year, but that the first buildings would most likely not be completed until 2012.
Ms. Preckwinkle also said developers would “prefer a clear site” around Michael Reese, casting further doubt on the efforts of preservationists who are fighting to save nearby buildings designed in consultation with the architect Walter Gropius, founder of the influential Bauhaus School.
Bernita Johnson-Gabriel, executive director of the Quad Communities Development Corporation, a neighborhood group that serves the Kenwood, Oakland and Douglas neighborhoods that make up greater Bronzeville, said hurdles to development included concerns about crime that are rooted in racial stereotypes.
“We are a neighborhood of color,” Ms. Johnson-Gabriel said. “There’s a perception of crime that obviously doesn’t quite exist here the way it is portrayed.”
Indeed, crime in the Douglas and neighboring Oakland neighborhoods fell steadily over the past decade, according to Chicago Police Department reports. Statistics show a 67 percent decline for Douglas — to 1,074 crimes in 2009 from 3,290 in 1999 — while Oakland’s number fell by more than half, to fewer than 300 from 611.
Some of the city’s larger development groups are pushing ahead despite a lack of clarity about the city’s plans. One, Draper and Kramer, is proceeding on a 70-acre development just south of Michael Reese that it began planning three years ago. In addition to 2,000 high-rise apartment units, the Lake Meadows project will feature renovation of existing rental units and condominiums, construction of single-family town homes and expansion of a small shopping center on the corner of 35th Street and Cottage Grove.
The firm will keep a close eye on the city’s plan for the Michael Reese site.
“We are very interested because it’s a large development and right next door to our property,” said Donald Vitek, vice president of acquisitions and development for Draper and Kramer.
While some residents and developers want officials to move quickly on the city’s plans for the Reese site, Mr. Vitek said a slower pace made sense. It will allow time to survey current community needs, he said, and possibly wait out a soured housing market.
The Douglas neighborhood’s new condos and town homes are selling for as little as $125 a square foot, a steep discount from similar South Loop properties. But Mr. Vitek predicted a steady increase in demand once the market improves.
An Olympics aftershock is hitting the market for existing homes in the neighborhood, too. Pam Dempsey, a real estate broker for Bronzeville Properties, said home sales came to a standstill during the Olympics bidding process, as property owners waited for the decision on a site. Only after the bid failed did they look to sell.
“They’re now entering into a down market,” Ms. Dempsey said. Prices for single-family homes in the area have declined to $100,000 to $200,000 now from $200,000 to $400,000 in mid-2007, she said. A high foreclosure rate has made the Bronzeville downturn worse than what has hit the South Loop or Hyde Park.
“We’ve experienced a lot of really, really deeply discounted foreclosures,” Ms. Dempsey said. “You’ll have a house that needs a ton of work going for maybe $35,000.”
When development does come, she said, Bronzeville will benefit most if the retail part appeals to the same kind of newly affluent residents as those who have moved into the South Loop and Hyde Park.
“Not the fast-food stuff we already have around here,” Ms. Dempsey said, “but nicer retail, like the stuff that came to the South Loop over the past 5 to 10 years. A wine shop or a cafe or bookstores — these things will keep people in the neighborhood.”
Joseph Schwietermann, director of the Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development at DePaul University, warned against easy comparisons between Bronzeville and the Hyde Park and South Loop neighborhoods. He attributes a combination of poor post-World War II urban planning and Bronzeville’s history of slow growth as factors that have made Bronzeville less successful.
“It’s easier to invest in housing with the hopes that retail will follow,” Mr. Schwietermann said. But, he added, “you can’t assume that if you build it, they will come.”
In October, contractors hired by the city began tearing down the first of seven buildings on the Michael Reese campus slated for demolition. The timeline for development is not urgent, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Community Development said, because the city will not begin making mortgage payments on the property until 2014.
The department envisions a large-scale residential and retail complex with a mixture of affordable and market-rate housing, in addition to dry cleaners, coffee shops and other staple businesses of neighborhood life. Its stated goal is “to build a community from scratch,” and stimulate redevelopment on the lakefront south of McCormick Place.
Byron Lindsey, manager of an auto repair shop, has seen little retail growth around the garage he has managed for nearly 20 years in what is now the Lake Meadows shopping center.
But his business is down only slightly despite the slow economy, Mr. Lindsey said as he juggled a phone in each hand and spoke to customers from behind the counter. He has perceived an influx of higher-income residents over the past five years, which he expects will contribute to a comeback once the economy recovers.
Redevelopment of the Michael Reese property could be the key.
“It could really determine whether the community gets a kick-start on its way back,” Mr. Lindsey said.
Rachel Cromidas is a Chicago freelance writer. Ben Goldberger contributed reporting.
Chicago News Cooperative
By RACHEL CROMIDAS
For much of Shannon Fischer’s 20 years, community change in her Bronzeville neighborhood has come in the form of a wrecking ball.
First, the Ida B. Wells housing projects fell, then the Robert Taylor homes, and now, within view of her apartment at 33rd Street and Cottage Grove, Michael Reese Hospital is coming down. Destruction can often lead to reconstruction, but hopes that Bronzeville might be revitalized as the site of an Olympic Village died in October when Chicago lost its bid for the 2016 Summer Games.
The neighborhood’s residential market took a severe hit, and developers have put off major investments. Few developers, it seems, can get serious about new projects in Bronzeville until the City of Chicago reveals plans for the landmark Michael Reese site, 37 acres at the heart of a potentially promising lakefront neighborhood.
Ms. Fischer remains optimistic. Even though the blocks in her neighborhood alternate between new condominiums and empty lots, foot traffic is sparse — and the only shopping center consists mostly of convenience stores and an auto repair shop — she believes greater Bronzeville will have its day.
“I think the neighborhood will continue to grow, considering there’s different people, different races and age groups moving in,” Ms. Fischer said.
Bronzeville was once a thriving “black metropolis” with hundreds of black-owned businesses and a booming night life. Its population swelled during the great migration of Southern blacks seeking jobs after World War I.
The poet Gwendolyn Brooks lived there, and in 1945, her first book of poetry — “A Street in Bronzeville” — brought her instant critical acclaim. Other notable residents included Richard Wright, the author of “Native Son,” and the jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong.
The area’s decline began in the 1950s as it gradually lost its middle class and businesses started to close. Though Bronzeville is unlikely to reclaim its golden era, developers like Keith Giles see the potential for new growth, only he does not expect to reach it any time soon.
Last year, Mr. Giles’s firm, Kargil Development, told the city that it was interested in developing the Olympic Village. The project would have helped Olympics promoters realize their vision of a new neighborhood that could bridge the gap between the resurgent Bronzeville community and the South Loop.
“It was an exciting development opportunity for an international event,” Mr. Giles said.
But with the Olympics impetus gone, banks not lending and no other financing in sight, Mr. Giles does not expect action soon on a Michael Reese site that might cost $1 billion to redevelop.
“The development business right now is on sabbatical,” he said.
While Mr. Giles’s company considers another project nearby, it doesn’t expect to see change soon.. “Unfortunately, most everything has stopped,” Mr. Giles said. “There’s new developments on one block, and you go across the street and there’s a burned-out building.”
Alderman Toni Preckwinkle, whose Fourth Ward includes the Reese campus, expects the city to release its plan for the site early this year. She said that a developer might be selected by the end of the year, but that the first buildings would most likely not be completed until 2012.
Ms. Preckwinkle also said developers would “prefer a clear site” around Michael Reese, casting further doubt on the efforts of preservationists who are fighting to save nearby buildings designed in consultation with the architect Walter Gropius, founder of the influential Bauhaus School.
Bernita Johnson-Gabriel, executive director of the Quad Communities Development Corporation, a neighborhood group that serves the Kenwood, Oakland and Douglas neighborhoods that make up greater Bronzeville, said hurdles to development included concerns about crime that are rooted in racial stereotypes.
“We are a neighborhood of color,” Ms. Johnson-Gabriel said. “There’s a perception of crime that obviously doesn’t quite exist here the way it is portrayed.”
Indeed, crime in the Douglas and neighboring Oakland neighborhoods fell steadily over the past decade, according to Chicago Police Department reports. Statistics show a 67 percent decline for Douglas — to 1,074 crimes in 2009 from 3,290 in 1999 — while Oakland’s number fell by more than half, to fewer than 300 from 611.
Some of the city’s larger development groups are pushing ahead despite a lack of clarity about the city’s plans. One, Draper and Kramer, is proceeding on a 70-acre development just south of Michael Reese that it began planning three years ago. In addition to 2,000 high-rise apartment units, the Lake Meadows project will feature renovation of existing rental units and condominiums, construction of single-family town homes and expansion of a small shopping center on the corner of 35th Street and Cottage Grove.
The firm will keep a close eye on the city’s plan for the Michael Reese site.
“We are very interested because it’s a large development and right next door to our property,” said Donald Vitek, vice president of acquisitions and development for Draper and Kramer.
While some residents and developers want officials to move quickly on the city’s plans for the Reese site, Mr. Vitek said a slower pace made sense. It will allow time to survey current community needs, he said, and possibly wait out a soured housing market.
The Douglas neighborhood’s new condos and town homes are selling for as little as $125 a square foot, a steep discount from similar South Loop properties. But Mr. Vitek predicted a steady increase in demand once the market improves.
An Olympics aftershock is hitting the market for existing homes in the neighborhood, too. Pam Dempsey, a real estate broker for Bronzeville Properties, said home sales came to a standstill during the Olympics bidding process, as property owners waited for the decision on a site. Only after the bid failed did they look to sell.
“They’re now entering into a down market,” Ms. Dempsey said. Prices for single-family homes in the area have declined to $100,000 to $200,000 now from $200,000 to $400,000 in mid-2007, she said. A high foreclosure rate has made the Bronzeville downturn worse than what has hit the South Loop or Hyde Park.
“We’ve experienced a lot of really, really deeply discounted foreclosures,” Ms. Dempsey said. “You’ll have a house that needs a ton of work going for maybe $35,000.”
When development does come, she said, Bronzeville will benefit most if the retail part appeals to the same kind of newly affluent residents as those who have moved into the South Loop and Hyde Park.
“Not the fast-food stuff we already have around here,” Ms. Dempsey said, “but nicer retail, like the stuff that came to the South Loop over the past 5 to 10 years. A wine shop or a cafe or bookstores — these things will keep people in the neighborhood.”
Joseph Schwietermann, director of the Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development at DePaul University, warned against easy comparisons between Bronzeville and the Hyde Park and South Loop neighborhoods. He attributes a combination of poor post-World War II urban planning and Bronzeville’s history of slow growth as factors that have made Bronzeville less successful.
“It’s easier to invest in housing with the hopes that retail will follow,” Mr. Schwietermann said. But, he added, “you can’t assume that if you build it, they will come.”
In October, contractors hired by the city began tearing down the first of seven buildings on the Michael Reese campus slated for demolition. The timeline for development is not urgent, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Community Development said, because the city will not begin making mortgage payments on the property until 2014.
The department envisions a large-scale residential and retail complex with a mixture of affordable and market-rate housing, in addition to dry cleaners, coffee shops and other staple businesses of neighborhood life. Its stated goal is “to build a community from scratch,” and stimulate redevelopment on the lakefront south of McCormick Place.
Byron Lindsey, manager of an auto repair shop, has seen little retail growth around the garage he has managed for nearly 20 years in what is now the Lake Meadows shopping center.
But his business is down only slightly despite the slow economy, Mr. Lindsey said as he juggled a phone in each hand and spoke to customers from behind the counter. He has perceived an influx of higher-income residents over the past five years, which he expects will contribute to a comeback once the economy recovers.
Redevelopment of the Michael Reese property could be the key.
“It could really determine whether the community gets a kick-start on its way back,” Mr. Lindsey said.
Rachel Cromidas is a Chicago freelance writer. Ben Goldberger contributed reporting.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
By Me
This blog has been silent all week, the first week of classes, but I've been working pretty hard. You could say I've been leading a double-life of sorts, one in which I'm a full-time student at the University of Chicago, and the other in which I'm a freelance journalist, sneaking off to the bathroom during class to answer phone calls from my editors.
Tomorrow, my 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. work-week is starting to pay-off, and I'm thrilled. Here's a hint:
Yup, all 14 letters of me, and 1,200 or so words more to come Sunday morning!
Tomorrow, my 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. work-week is starting to pay-off, and I'm thrilled. Here's a hint:
Yup, all 14 letters of me, and 1,200 or so words more to come Sunday morning!
Friday, January 1, 2010
Gardening for Peace
New story about two awesome UChicago alumns and their aid work in Africa—they helped farmers build a sustainable vegetable garden in a village with limited fresh food access:
Rebecca Thal began gardening in a small herb patch in the backyard of her childhood home. But she never imagined that her hobby would help improve the lives of villagers in South Africa’s Limpopo province.
Thal and Aliza Levine, both AB ’09, headed to South Africa in the summer of 2009 to create a sustainable community garden for the residents of the Hamakuya village as winners of the Davis Projects for Peace prize.
Davis Projects for Peace was started three years ago by philanthropist Kathryn Davis, who provides $10,000 each for 100 projects devised by U.S. college students. The University of Chicago is one of 90 colleges and universities to participate in the program, according to Jen Bess, a college adviser. Applications for the 2010 program are due January 8, 2010 at noon.
“The goal of our project is to increase food security in the region,” Levine said. “Part of the reason food security is so important is because of HIV rates. It’s important that people who are taking antiretrovirals or have symptoms get adequate nutrition.”
Levine and Thal partnered with David Bunn, a visiting professor at the University of Chicago, whom they met while studying abroad in Cape Town in winter 2008. Bunn is the co-founder of Tshulu Trust, a non-profit organization that studies ecological resources in communities surrounding Kruger National Park, like Hamakuya.
Though the trust had been working to set up small businesses and create jobs in ecotourism for the community, it did not have the resources to create a much-needed indigenous plant garden. “We just asked them how we could help,” Thal said.
Cape Town study abroad
Levine and Thal received their first introduction to Hamakuya when they stayed in a village compound during the Cape Town study abroad program, where they studied anthropology and African civilizations.
“I think a lot of anthropology [views the world] through a distancing mechanism. One of the reasons the Cape Town program was so great…was that just being in the new environment prevented that from happening,” Levine said.
For Thal, the quarter abroad not only exposed her to a different part of the world, it helped her define her studies back on campus as well.
“The Cape Town trip was the most intense and the most rewarding part of my time [at the University],” she said. “It changed my intellectual engagement with the world.”
The Davis Project caught Thal’s eye when she returned. “I was looking for any way I could get back to South Africa,” she said.
The committee from the College that selected the nominees for the Davis Projects for Peace prize was particularly impressed with Levine and Thal’s proposal.
“We wanted to see that students had been thoughtful about how their proposal connected to the idea of peace, and [Levine and Thal] did a nice job of tying that to the issue of food security,” Bess said. “It’s hard to have a life of peace when you are desperate for basic necessities like food.”
Unfinished business
After her first experience in South Africa, “I wanted to see more, not just of the political life but the day-to-day life in the rural parts,” Thal said.
The pair wanted to experience more of village life in Limpopo. But they also felt they had unfinished business with the community and the Tshulu Trust, which hadn’t been able to start up a food security program by the time they left.
“We saw firsthand how food was integrated into everyday life, and the lack of diversity of food sources,” Levine said.
To address these problems of public health and food access in South Africa, Thal and Levine spent 6 weeks in Hamakuya in July and August. For their primary project, they helped four farmers construct a vegetable garden with a sustainable irrigation system called circle farming.
Thal and Levine found the support of community members invaluable to the success of their project.
“We thought we would get over jet lag on day one and then start the project on day two,” Thal said. “But it took something like three weeks for us to build relationships and get a strong foothold in the community.”
The nearest village had only a dozen households, and Thal and Levine were among the few residents with a car. “We kind of became a taxi service, giving people rides when they asked,” Thal said.
Other locals gravitated to them out of curiosity, or a desire to help.
“One older man took on this informal advisory role for us. He would come by with his dogs and say hello; [he] told us what he’d seen and heard and taught us some of the language. Just hearing what [neighbors] wanted to get out of it helped us refine our approach. We didn’t put shovels in the ground until much later.”
Levine believes their work could have a lasting impact on the community. “There is very little rainfall, so their growing season is very short, and that makes it difficult to have long-term food security,” Levine said. “But the farmers were excited, and the best thing is this [method] is easy to replicate—the farmers have already made a commitment to show others in the community.”
Rebecca Thal began gardening in a small herb patch in the backyard of her childhood home. But she never imagined that her hobby would help improve the lives of villagers in South Africa’s Limpopo province.
Thal and Aliza Levine, both AB ’09, headed to South Africa in the summer of 2009 to create a sustainable community garden for the residents of the Hamakuya village as winners of the Davis Projects for Peace prize.
Davis Projects for Peace was started three years ago by philanthropist Kathryn Davis, who provides $10,000 each for 100 projects devised by U.S. college students. The University of Chicago is one of 90 colleges and universities to participate in the program, according to Jen Bess, a college adviser. Applications for the 2010 program are due January 8, 2010 at noon.
“The goal of our project is to increase food security in the region,” Levine said. “Part of the reason food security is so important is because of HIV rates. It’s important that people who are taking antiretrovirals or have symptoms get adequate nutrition.”
Levine and Thal partnered with David Bunn, a visiting professor at the University of Chicago, whom they met while studying abroad in Cape Town in winter 2008. Bunn is the co-founder of Tshulu Trust, a non-profit organization that studies ecological resources in communities surrounding Kruger National Park, like Hamakuya.
Though the trust had been working to set up small businesses and create jobs in ecotourism for the community, it did not have the resources to create a much-needed indigenous plant garden. “We just asked them how we could help,” Thal said.
Cape Town study abroad
Levine and Thal received their first introduction to Hamakuya when they stayed in a village compound during the Cape Town study abroad program, where they studied anthropology and African civilizations.
“I think a lot of anthropology [views the world] through a distancing mechanism. One of the reasons the Cape Town program was so great…was that just being in the new environment prevented that from happening,” Levine said.
For Thal, the quarter abroad not only exposed her to a different part of the world, it helped her define her studies back on campus as well.
“The Cape Town trip was the most intense and the most rewarding part of my time [at the University],” she said. “It changed my intellectual engagement with the world.”
The Davis Project caught Thal’s eye when she returned. “I was looking for any way I could get back to South Africa,” she said.
The committee from the College that selected the nominees for the Davis Projects for Peace prize was particularly impressed with Levine and Thal’s proposal.
“We wanted to see that students had been thoughtful about how their proposal connected to the idea of peace, and [Levine and Thal] did a nice job of tying that to the issue of food security,” Bess said. “It’s hard to have a life of peace when you are desperate for basic necessities like food.”
Unfinished business
After her first experience in South Africa, “I wanted to see more, not just of the political life but the day-to-day life in the rural parts,” Thal said.
The pair wanted to experience more of village life in Limpopo. But they also felt they had unfinished business with the community and the Tshulu Trust, which hadn’t been able to start up a food security program by the time they left.
“We saw firsthand how food was integrated into everyday life, and the lack of diversity of food sources,” Levine said.
To address these problems of public health and food access in South Africa, Thal and Levine spent 6 weeks in Hamakuya in July and August. For their primary project, they helped four farmers construct a vegetable garden with a sustainable irrigation system called circle farming.
Thal and Levine found the support of community members invaluable to the success of their project.
“We thought we would get over jet lag on day one and then start the project on day two,” Thal said. “But it took something like three weeks for us to build relationships and get a strong foothold in the community.”
The nearest village had only a dozen households, and Thal and Levine were among the few residents with a car. “We kind of became a taxi service, giving people rides when they asked,” Thal said.
Other locals gravitated to them out of curiosity, or a desire to help.
“One older man took on this informal advisory role for us. He would come by with his dogs and say hello; [he] told us what he’d seen and heard and taught us some of the language. Just hearing what [neighbors] wanted to get out of it helped us refine our approach. We didn’t put shovels in the ground until much later.”
Levine believes their work could have a lasting impact on the community. “There is very little rainfall, so their growing season is very short, and that makes it difficult to have long-term food security,” Levine said. “But the farmers were excited, and the best thing is this [method] is easy to replicate—the farmers have already made a commitment to show others in the community.”
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