In our last posting, we left you hanging with an enticement of the coming student farm. Now in its neonatal state, the farm is beginning to take shape, and with the warm weather and team efforts, also green-up.
With this, we welcome you to walk through time and space to visit the most recent addition to Kabul University's Faculty of Agriculture:
It's February. A time of freeze & thaw, snow & sunshine. The ground has quickly gone from dust to mud to ice to mud to dust. We look out over the lay of the land with visions in our minds, hope in our hearts, and energy in our bodies.
Within a matter of weeks, the students are roaring to go, eager to take on the first challenge: clearing the land of building ruins. After two days of effort, all involved declared, "This is really too much. We're living in the 21st century, can't we clear land with modern technology???" The next day, we brought in a tractor to finish in 2 hours what would have taken us several days.
Omar Khan, our faithful friend and tractor drive, has been working diligently to plow this 1/3 hectare plot, land that has been in weedy fallow since the late 1970's. Omar Khan remembers well the last crops grown on this land and is happy to see it put back into production.
Production. That means the generation of products --- for consumption, for sale --- something with value that should probably be protected. Thus, the next step, deterring would-be thieves or mischievous youngsters. A 2.5m chain link fence was erected in time for the beginning of the school year, 21 March. Time has shown that we could have gone higher, or installed an unfriendly line of barbed wire across the top, as it's not quite the obstacle we had anticipated. Maybe Joern should carry a set of keys with him next time he heads to the farm on an off-day.
During the installation of the fence, the groundwork was being "strung out", plots being established, students being acquainted with their patches of land into which they could sow their effort and reap their rewards.
A couple of student groups initiated projects involving a hoophouse to study the effects of season extension compared with open field production. To accomplish this, we had the help of an organization working at the Ministry of Agriculture. They provided the carpenter to put our design into effect.
And quite a stunning effect it has had on many of the passersby. As we recently saw the plastic coverings of the neighboring hoophouses be tattered and torn to shreds, we're left to wonder how long this building will last, since the climate here is intense in every way: biting cold, blazing sun, cracking drought, driving wind & dust, deluging rain, piercing hail, blinding lightning. It's no wonder people age so quickly here. If poverty isn't enough of a struggle, God has seen fit for the people of this land to be confronted with a harsh environment.
Overall, there are over 20 groups of students doing work on the farm, from designing and landscaping the entry way.
To establishing and maintaining colonies of honeybees. They've had quite a time of it, too, having caused artificial swarms twice, and then witnessing the third (and natural) swarm, which left one of their colonies on the brink of death. Nevertheless, the other 3 hives are doing well, and we are looking forward to the first crop of honey in the coming weeks!
In the coming months, we will tell the story of the crops these student groups are producing. In the meanwhile, we will endeavor tell you of the other adventures we've had this spring.
