Im jänner 2010 hat FöldKelte entschieden ein Sommercamp füe alle,die denken es braucht einen radikalen Wechsel in unserer Art zu leben um aus der tiefen ökologischen, sozialen und ökonomischen Krise zu finden, in der wir uns gerade befinden. ( mehr über Föld Kelte im letzten Bulletin) Das Ziel dieses Camps war es uns zu vernetzen, zu inspirieren und unsere Erfahrungen zu teilen. Wir wollten keine weitere Konferenz in der wir Vorträgen zuhören würden und nach her ginge alles wieder den selben alten Weg. Wir wollten ein Camp in dem die Menschen ihr praktisches Wissen in Workshops vertiefen könnten und wo wir uns mit der Frage “Wie machen wir nach dem Camp weiter?” auseinandersetzen würden. Unser Ziel war weiters die Energien die momentan in Ungarn vorhanden sind zu katalysieren um dem Spirit von FöldKelte und Reclaim the fields durch wirkliche Handlungen Ausdruck zu verleihen.
Das Camp fand in einem 300 Jahre alten Bauernhof, gestiftet von den Zisterziensern in der alten Stadt Zirc in den Bakony Bergen statt. Umgeben von barocken Gebäuden die schon bessere Tage erlebt haben und in Gesellschaft von Racka Schafen (lokale Rasse), Hängebauchschweinen, Rasta Puli Hunden und ehemaligen Legebatteriehennen schufen wir uns bald einen intimen Ort. Durch das finden eigener Namen für Plätze am Hof wurde die Atmosphäre freundlich. Der Geist des Platzes gab den Campern ein starkes Gemeinschaftsgefühl über die Tage des Camps.
Mehr Menschen als erwartet sind gekommen. Alles in allem waren ca 120 Leute am Camp. Die meisten davon kamen aus Budapest, einige auch von weiter her.Satya und Virginie – alte Reclaimer_innen – kamen aus Belgien um uns zu unterstützen. Wir hatten aber auch Gäste aus Dijon, Italien und den US.
Der Tag begann um halb sieben mit Yoga und Tai chi. Um aucht gabs Rohkost-Frühstück, zubereitet von Greg. Die Morgensessions dauerten bis um 1 und waren in 3 Arbeitsgruppen unterteilt. Jede dieser AGs basierte auf den Hauptthemen des Camps:Gemeinschaftsgärten, Hofkollektive und Ökodörfer.
Die Gruppen arbeiteten an praktischen Modellen mit Hilfe erfahrener “Hebammen”. Es stellte sich heraus, daß die Arbeit in kleineren Subgruppen effektiver und flüssiger verliefen.
Als Beispiel: die Ökodorfgruppe bildete 2 Untergruppen: eine mit eher technischem Ansatz und eine andere zu den philosophischen Hintergründen der Gemeinschaftsbildung. Nachdem wir um 1 die AGs beendet hatten gab`s reichlich Bioessen von Greg und seinem Team. Nach einer kurzen Pause fingen die praktischen Workshops an. Wir schnupperten mithilfe erfahrener Praktiker_innen in zahllose Aktivitäten die im täglichen Leben mit der Natur hilfreich sind wie Imkerei, Permakultur, Filzen, Käserei, Kräuter und selbstgemachte Solar-Paneele.
Jeden Abend kamen andere Vortragende. Zsolt Hetesi, Physiker und Forscher, sprach über die Rohstoffkrise und nachhaltige Bodennutzung, was ernste Denkarbeitvom Publikum erforderte.
More people turned up than we had
expected. All in all, organizers and
speakers, we were about 120 at the camp’s
peak. Most people came from Budapest
but some came from the countryside and
even from abroad. Satya and Virginie,
ancient-reclaimers strengthened the camp
from Belgium. We had more reclaimers
from Dijon, and guests from Italy and the
United States.
The day started at half past six. From
seven on we stretched with yoga and tai
chi. At eight, Greg, the camp’s official
French raw-chef came, saw and conquered
with his buckwheat squash. Morning
sessions lasted until 1 pm and consisted of
three large groups, each based on the main
topics of the camp – community gardens,
community farming and eco-villages. The
groups worked on practical models with
the help of experienced „midwives”: It
turned out that forming smaller subgroups
makes the work more fluent and effective.
For example, the eco-village section
formed a pragmatic subgroup made up of
almost exclusively of engineers while in
another subgroup people discussed the
philosophical depths of community-
building. After we finished with Greg and
his team’s nourishing biolunch and after a
short rest, the afternoon block with
practical workshops kicked off. With the
assistance of experienced workshop
leaders, participants got a taste of
countless activities that are very useful in
close-to-nature everyday life: bee-
keeping, permaculture, wool felting,
cheese-making, herb-studies and home-
solar-panel making.
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At the dinners various compositions of
salads, rye bread from the Kiskunság region
and cheese made at the camp’s workshop
filled the mess-tins, plates and glazed
vessels. After the light dinner, re-filled with
energy in the mild evening after the hot
day, the call of the camp’s shell horn
gathered everyone in the granary, whose
second floor served as dormitory for the
„tentless” campers.
Every evening we heard different speakers.
Zsolt Hetesi, physicist and researcher held a
lecture on the resource crisis and
sustainable land use, which demanded
serious
brainwork on
the part of
the audience.
In the lecture
he
highlighted
the causes,
logic
and
possible
solutions of
the
global
crisis with
the precision
of a surgeon.
Tamás Lantos, mayor of the village Markóc
located in the Ormánság region and leader
of a foundation for sustainable development
spoke about the everyday difficulties of a
tiny village on the periphery, and of
possible local solutions to the crisis.
Markóc’s experience suggests that village-
development based on local co-operation,
the re-introduction of traditional forms of
land use and adaptive fruit-farming based
on house gardens and local varieties, are all
good tools to help a minor town, in all
respects peripheral, to find itself again.
On the second evening „pioneers” from
ecovillages Visnyeszéplak, Nagyszékely
and Ilonamalom took the stage. They told
about their personal experiences and what
their weekdays look like after having cut
the ties with urban lifestyle. They were
bombarded with practical questions on
livelihood, the achievable level of self-
sufficiency and how much they follow the
news. It turned out that the latter was no
problem: As Péter Zaja remarked, he
knows that the Spaniards won the football
world cup. They all emphasized that even
if they are organized based on a different
system, they all live in communities held
together by solidarity and mutual help.
On
the
third
evening,
we
welcomed a
founding
father
of
the
Hungarian
green
movement,
painter and
translator
Gábor
Karátson.
We learned about his life, stirring his
kefir-fungi in his kitchen day after day
until the end of the 1980s, when he was
called to the activities around the Duna-
movement. He told a parable about a
woman, the roaring alarm system, the
unknown neighbour and social apathy and
quoted from I-Ching, a classic Chinese
text he translated into Hungarian. It left a
great impression in many of us when he
recalled his memories from the 1956
Hungarian revolution: he emphasized that
the most important but hardly ever quoted
motto of the revolution was „neither
communism nor capitalism”.
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After the plenary evening sessions,
campfire, live music, dancing and wine
from Szent György-mountain awaited the
campers. We welcomed Csaba Koncz 1956-
émigré, 1968-hippie, musician, maker of
musical instruments and proud caretaker of
a 170-year-old pear tree. On the last
evening folk musicians with violins and a
double bass took care of dancing. The free,
candle-and-torch atmosphere of the evening
fun evoked the feeling of a company of old
friends.
The last morning was dedicated completely
to the issue of how to go on. We had
brainstorming sessions in small groups
about tasks ahead. These were then
collected and concrete undertakings were
born. The group of Földkelte took on the
editing and publishing on our blog the
written records of the morning sessions, to
prepare a short video-clip on the camp, to
organize a September-meeting in Akli on
the occasion of opening a shop of local
products there, and also to organize a
FöldKelte weekend in autumn or winter in
Budapest (possibly in a place called
Tűzraktér). Other task-groups were brought
to life with the aim of translating into
Hungarian a book on community building,
entitled „Beyond you and me”; making
Hungarian subtitles to the movie „On
modern servitude”; starting a new
community garden in Budapest or its close
surroundings; helping to organize Reclaim
the Fields’ international meetings and
2011 international summer camp; and
finally of planning and organizing various
local actions.
The effect of the camp – probably echoing
the experience of many of us – was
possibly
summarized
the
most
expressively by Zoli Somogyvári, camp
waterman and translator: „The camp’s
effect was so strong that I returned to the
city as a complete stranger. People here in
the city were not strangers to me, in fact, I
rather felt empathy towards them (this I
explain to myself as a spillover of the
camp’s community-experience), but the
city’s decoration, the billboards, the light-
and noise-pollution was striking. This, of
course, didn’t last for long, soon
everything was back on the old track, but
the seed of change remained in me. I’m
waiting for it to come into leaf”.
Máté and Zoli
