one big mind-boggling mess

Greg and I went to see Slumdog Millionaire this week, in a packed cinema. Its success at the awards ceremonies has led to it being called a feel-good film, but if you go expecting to see the Bolleywood version of Mamma Mia you'll be left shell-shocked! It's really well written, really well acted, and the story-line is nothing short of brilliant. But it's also brutal and raw and doesn't hold back on its depiction of life in Mumbai - a life that is replicated in cities across India.

Last September I had the privilege (and that's not a platitude) of going to Chennai (Madras) for a week. I went with my friend Sharon Anson and a team from her organisation, Grassroots. They run a child sponsorship programme in the slums where the Dalit (or Untouchables, to use an un-PC term) people live and we went to spend some time looking at what the scheme is doing. Everyone comes back from India saying that it is the most incredible country. For me, it challenges me to think beyond my little circle: I begin to think that I'm sorting my world out, then I look up and see this sprawling mass and mess of humanity and I realise there is still so much to be done; so much that is wrong in our world.

I find India and its problems completely overwhelming. Where do I start? What on earth can I do? If I were superwoman I would put on my leotard and cape and sort it all out. But I'm not and I can't. But the fact that I can't do everything is no excuse for me to do nothing. £8 a month pays for a child in the slum to receive a decent education, to have a hot meal every day, to be taken care of medically and to be given new clothes every Christmas. Grassroots charge nothing for admin: all of that money goes directly to the child (which is why they are so much cheaper than the other child sponsorship organisations - work it out) and I have seen the real difference that that money makes.

I don't work for Grassroots: I'm not on any commission here! All I can do is urge us not to watch the 'movie of the moment' and then do nothing to help the real-life children that it is depicting.

What a stimulating 24 hours!

 

Well, what a stimulating 24 hours I've had over the weekend! The next step of my life's journey seems to have taken me into the Transition Movement - more specifically into the steering committee for Transition Chichester. For the un-initiated, a Transition Town is about recognising four things:

• That life with dramatically lower energy consumption is inevitable, and that it's better to plan for it than be taken by surprise.
• That our communities currently lack the resilience to handle the severe energy shocks that peak oil will bring.
• That acting as a community is the right level of response.
• That by unleashing the genius of the local community to design our energy descent, we can build ways of living that are more connected, more enriching and that recognise the biological limits of our planet.

 

As Transition Chichester, we have been putting on various events since the summer, raising awareness and beginning to gather together like-minded people who want to get involved. This weekend we had down Dr David Fleming, the creator of the concept of Tradeable Energy Quotas and a leading environmental thinker.  On the Friday evening he gave a public lecturer in the centre of Chichester and then, on the Saturday, a smaller number of us gathered together in a beautiful manor home to look at the Transition concept from an ecumenical Christian perspective.

 

Friday evening was stunning and Saturday completely different and refreshing, with so many things being discussed. The constant theme that kept coming up, though, was community: how can we begin to model the kind of community life that is going to be needed if we are to build resilience to withstand the shocks that are surely coming? From a Christian perspective, of course, this idea of community shouldn't just come because we need to respond to present challenges, but because we believe that this is how we have been designed: beings-in-relation, because we worship the God who is Community.

 

I don't have all the answers (did I even need to say that?!) but would love to be in a creative dialogue about this. What ideas do you have? How can we begin to model this? I look forward to hearing from you!

 

 

 

 

What could you not do without?

 

I've been watching the Victorian Farm series on BBC2. Maybe it's embarrassing to admit to it, but it's true: I find these sorts of programmes really interesting. In case you haven't seen it yet, the programme is following one historian (Ruth Goodman) and two archeologists (Alex Langlands and Peter Ginn) as they live the life of Victorian farmers for a year. They have taken over a smallholding on the Acton Scott estate and, following their own knowledge and the instructions laid out in a Victorian book on farming, are doing everything as would have been done 150 years ago.

 

It is a fascinating look at 'how things used to be'. They are reflecting the time at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, as machines are starting to make inroads into the farmers' lives, saving time and back-breaking work. Yet the life they are living still seems unimaginably hard from the perspective of life in our modern society. This week's programme is set in winter and co-incided with our heating breaking down. As I watched them it struck me that I could do without many of the things that I currently live with, but I think there are two things I really would not want to do without: the one is central heating (or some such equivalent system that heats the whole house - yes I know I'm a wimp!). The other is my washing machine.

 

What could you not do without?

 

From a post-oil perspective the programme is equally fascinating. None of us knows what our society will be like in a time when the availability of oil is drastically reduced. Will we go back to living as these guys are doing? Will there be green technology that enables to keep living as we do now? Do we want to keep living as we do now? What skills will we need to live well with less oil and how can we aquire them? Whatever the answers are going to be, we have to start asking the questions now and not burying our heads in the sand any longer.

K is for Kippers 

 

I remember when salmon was a serious treat: something that you only ate when you made a rare visit to a restaurant. Now, it is one of the cheapest fish you can buy and many households eat it every week. In the K is for Kippers chapter of my book I begin to look at why that is and explore some of the issues that lie behind the fish we find on our supermarket counters (I'd love to say at the fishmongers, but sadly we've lost both of ours in Chichester).

 

This short film from The Ecologist Film Unit focuses on Peru and its production of the fishmeal used to feed farmed fish. Make yourself a (fairtrade) cuppa and sit and watch.

 

 

 

 

Welcome to my blog J

 

This will be a place to visit for all sorts of things. I'll put up interesting news stories, useful information that I come across, personal musings and will also talk a bit about what I'm doing in my own life to try to live in ways that care both for this world and its inhabitants.

 

Do feel free to be in touch with me if there's anything you want to say. You can contact me very easily by clicking on comments at the top of this post.

 

Ruth