Rural Community
Community as the agent of transformation of consciousness is the heart of the matter for me this week.
Finca la Flor is a consciousness transforming organic farm on a mountainside in central Costa Rica. You can learn a lot about the farm at the website: http://www.la-flor.org/
The deepest and most soulful and most challenging and most delightful experiences are through my interactions with the folks who live and work here.
AT THE TABLE:
The community here keeps changing. There have been anywhere from 7 to 12 volunteers living here during the last week. They come from British Columbia, Quebec, New Brunswick, CA, IN, NY, TX, France and Austria. Brigette or Bri, the director, is from Germany. There are about 12 workers on the farm -- cooks, Spanish teachers, administrators, and agricultural workers -- from tiny La Flor (the local village) or other nearby communities. Therefore, even meal time is a lesson in international diplomacy and courtesy. (By the way, we have super terrific local organic food for every meal!) Often at the table French has been the predominant language this week with English as a close second. Early in the week our Costa Rican hosts/cooks were not sitting at the table with us.
Over the relatively short time of a week the community transformed. We learned how to thank our cooks and co-workers in the kitchen and insistently invite them to sit with us, though the table was crowded. We used a large white board to list the names of the foods we were eating and other vocabulary needed for conversation as we shifted our table talk to a more common language: Spanish. And we practiced talking and listening, being the one telling a story and the ones receiving.
SINGING AND STORY TELLING:
Tuesday evening Eugenia and Armando along with Bri taught us “La Guardia Morada” which is a Costa Rican folk song about the national flower. We also heard the story of this place and its challenges in creating relationship both with the land and with the local community.
DANCING:
Significant in this transformation was dancing! At the initiative of Eugenia, Lena and Francisco, we all gathered to learn sala, merenque and cambio. Our Costa Rican hosts were both gracious and insistent as they pulled us out onto the “dance floor” (common building). Dancing, to me, is a concrete expression of learning one another’s language and culture -- body language and gender culture, among other things. The whole body work of dance as well as cleaning out the goat and horse and chicken and duck pens is transforming in a way that hours of “meetings” could never be!
“HOME”
In a more substantive way, watching the film “Home” together on Friday evening stirred deep waters of conversation. It is a stunning portrayal of the formation of all the interrelationships with make life possible on earth as well as all the ways we have seriously endangered that life force. This sparked table talk about eating or not eating meat. So, Bri, in her best consciousness transforming manner, said, “Well, I think we will eat a goat next week. Will you, Nina, eat it?”
So, more visceral consciousness transformation to come.
I am so grateful for the soulful hospitality of this place. Though I miss home and church more and more daily, I am indeed privileged to be gathering a global community of friends here.
peace to all, Nina
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