7/26和訳

最近の写真を送ります。ちょうど１週間前、ここゴールドコースとでグリーンズ（緑の党）の旗をつくっているときのショットです。私の母が90枚もの旗をつくってくれ、私たちでその旗にプリントをしているところ。今年のいつになるかわからない選挙のための準備です。

オカネをかけＺＯＯＮＹ、選挙活動をする様子をナマケモノ倶楽部の仲間たちが興味をもってくれたらうれしいのだけど。

私が最近、女性の集まりの会議でスピーチした原稿を、オーストラリアのブログにアップしました。
www.anjalight.com
講演のタイトルは、「母親と運動を両立する」です。関心がありそうな方がいたら、どんどんリンクを貼ったり、訳してください。

handmade Green Flag !

I'm sending a nice photo of our making the Greens flags a couple of weeks ago on the Gold Coast. My mother sewed 90 flags and together we screenprinted them in preparation for the election camapign (not yet known when it will be - this year for sure). Also, in case you or other Sloth friends are interested - I have put a recent speech to the feminist conference on my web page: www.anjalight.com called:
'integrating motherhood and activism' - you are very welcome to send
this around if you think it would be interesting for people.

5/13

Today I looked out my window and saw that the mango tree has flowers.
This should be good news (yum! mangoes!), but it is actually frightening – they are flowering 5 months too early…Our natural systems are out of balance…We now have such overwhelming scientific evidence proving climate change yet witnessing the reality of the incredible changes taking place in our lifetime is still a deep shock.

And everything else seems to go on like it always has – governments and people seem so slow to change. In this sad country Australia we still spend billions of dollars on weapons and almost nothing on renewable energy. Recently there has been a lot of media here about ‘clean coal’ technology – new science that has not yet been proven but is a desperate attempt to justify the big profit fossil fuel coal industry. The government plan to encourage nuclear reactors is also building and we now will begin to open up new uranium mines.

I have been selected as the number 2 senate candidate for the Queensland Greens in the upcoming federal election. This means a great opportunity to raise awareness and encourage people to take action.

Last weekend Pacha, Yani and I stayed at Palm Island. It was like returning to Ecuador; a tropical paradise troubled with poverty, but brimming with potential. The Australian government spends millions of dollars each year on welfare payments and ‘projects’ for Palm Island but things don’t seem to improve. The population of 3000 people still share only 320 houses, most people live on a diet of fish and chips and coca-cola, there is a shocking alcohol and drug problem and children are often neglected.

I saw an article in a newspaper saying that a new house would cost $400 000 to build on Palm Island. I can’t understand why this can be so expensive. Why can’t volunteers be allowed to help construct lower cost ecological houses using some materials that could even be found on the island (eg. there are plantations of pine ready to harvest).

Like Ecuador many of these projects are ‘imposed’ by well-paid consultants from the outside, are very expensive, have little or no follow up and are almost doomed to failure. A simple, small, slow approach may be much more successful.

One of the ideas of the local council and other community representatives is the potential for income (and jobs) on Palm Island from tourism. This reminded me of Yakushima where our Sloth Club member, Tessei Shiba, has such a profound insight to a new type of tourism that is truly ‘engaged’, sustainable and honours the indigenous reverence and knowledge of the land and it’s spirits. Can Palm Island, in the beautiful Great Barrier Reef, bypass the mistakes of ‘tourism as usual’?
All I could do this time was bring some non-hybrid seeds from Seedsavers and share stories, songs and ideas with our hosts Robert and Svea Pitman. Next time maybe I can bring a group of ‘Slow’ friends from Japan, or a volunteer to set up permaculture gardens or build a straw bale house.

Pacha, Yani and I are very excited about my mother coming to visit soon. I am borrowing a sewing machine so we can get started on making hundreds of ‘Be the Change’ flags for bicycles and big Greens flags for election day. It always feels good to be doing something practical and ‘hands-on’to get a positive message out there!

Remember, you are welcome to come and help us here in Australia anytime. The garden here and at the school needs a lot of help – and there will be many exciting and inspiring campaigns ahead (like the Peace Convergence in June).

Love to all, For Life, anja,pacha and yani

5/9

Dear Friends,

This truly is a Slow Mother diary! so very slow. I am sure it happens to you too, so much happens that there seems to be no time to share the stories as they speed by! I know that many people who read this blog have had the chance recently to hear the inspiration and knowledge of that great teacher in action, Satish Kumar. By a lovely coincidence, my friend Sally McKinnon from the Ethos Foundation is organising his tour in May for Australia.

So here (finally!) are some news updates.
I was not selected as the lead Green senate candidate for my state, but I will probably be the 2nd or 3rd candidate on the team and was selected to be on the campaign planning team for the upcoming national election (sometime between August and January 2008). So my life is still very busy on political issues (if you are interested in reading more check: www.anjalight.com). I would very much appreciate any help for this campaign and would like to put out the call again for volunteers to come and help us (more information below)!

In quiet Ayr the weather is cooling down and it is time to plant vegetables again, here in my garden and at the school too. Over the past few weeks I have been spending more and more time on the computer, writing media releases and responding to local issues, brainstorming campaign ideas and expanding local networks. It is hard to see results in this kind of campaigning. It's always much easier to see change when you do things in your own life growing vegetables, riding around on your bicycle or watching your electricity bill go down as you use less energy. One deals with many more words and one deals with actions!

Pacha, Yani and I are all very well, healthy and active. Pacha has just learnt how to ride her bicycle without training wheels and we now all ride to school. Yani is doing beautiful art work and always impresses me with his attention to detail (he loves colour matching his clothes). We have also recently returned from a visit to my family on the Gold Coast - enjoying quality family time and playing in the ocean.

Our next travel plans are to Palm Island (next week) - only 2 hours by boat from nearby Townsville. This is an island that was used as a dumping ground for Queensland's indigenous peoples. Families from many different tribes were forcibly moved to the island mostly so that their lands could be taken by white settlers similar to the strategies used in Hokkaido. It was also used like a penal colony aboriginal 'trouble maker'were sent here throughout the 1900s. It is 素amousas one of the most violent places outside a war zone (according to the Guinness book of records), and also a place where Aboriginal people are struggling for their rights.

In 2004, an Aboriginal man was killed by police and there has been a growing movement calling for justice on this issue. Around 3000 people live on Palm Island, but there are only 320 houses. Services like education and health are controlled by the state government and so do not reflect the real needs and wishes of the people. Palm Island is a lush, tropical island, but almost all the food needed here is brought in from outside.

Pacha, Yani and I going to visit the island to connect with people and celebrate the beauty of the place (in the middle of the Great Barrier Reef). I will bring my guitar and a big package of seeds from Seedsavers. We will meet with local people involved in some projects or local initiatives and see if there is any way we can help. Perhaps sharing the story of Slow tourism that empowers the community to create their own vision of a sustainable and hopeful future will be useful. I will let you know how our visit goes.

In June, we will travel to another beautiful place, Shoalwater Bay, near Rockhampton, to protest a massive military exercise. For two weeks beginning 19th June, nearly 14, 000 US military personnel along with 12,400 Australian troops will take part in live aerial, ship to shore and land based artillery bombardments in the Shoalwater Bay Training Area which is partly within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and is habitat to many endangered species including the endangered dugong and green turtle. The Peace Convergence will be a peaceful gathering in the Shoalwater region on 18th 24 June 2007. You are invited to join us and hundreds of people from around Australia for peaceful protests against these war games. Please contact me if you are interested.

The countdown is coming for our return to Ecuador - still planned for early 2008. Before we go we must let go of everything we have collected to make our some in Australia and to find a good family to look after our house and garden. Harder than anything else is getting go of my family for however long we will be away. My Mother is now in her mid seventies and it is a hard thought to be so far away from her. Of course, we also have family in Ecuador and all of the 銑uque痴ide are very excited to see Pacha and Yani again.

I also want to make sure that I am prepared to be useful in Ecuador by doing things like re-activating the volunteers program, organising the next the alternative expo, developing alternative education options, helping organise more Slow tours and providing a safe, stable and stimulating base for Pacha and Yani at El Milagro.

So, the life of a Slow Mother and her family goes on!

Love to you all,
For Life, anja

2/11和訳

二ヶ月間のGNHキャンペーン日本縦断を終えて、今エールでのスローライフに戻ってきました。
（詳しくはSlowing down Japanのレポートをご覧ください。）日本では、たくさんの新たな地球大好きと言う人たちに出会え、また昔の友人に再会出来てとてもよかったです。

また、古くてもすてきな我が家とうちの庭に戻ってきてほっとしています。
ずっと雨が降っていたようで（まだ降っているのですが）緑が覆い茂っています。
鶏たちが、うれしそうに葉っぱをつついているのもすてきです。
今は一年でも暑い方の時期なので、給湯器を止めることにしました。
（給湯器は家庭で使われるエネルギーの30％も占めているのです。）
子供のお風呂用にお湯をポットで二回程度沸かすので十分ですし
冷たいシャワーもなかなか新鮮でちっとも大変なことではないのです。
その上生活をもっと軽くすることへの小さな一歩にもなります。

パチャの学校の一学期も始まり、ヤニも同じ学校の中にある幼稚園に行き始めました。
ヤニは自分のいつもの場所に戻ってきてうれしそうです。
いつもの毎日、大好きなおもちゃや鶏が駆け回る大きなお庭、そういったものが大好きなのです。
パチャもお友達に久し振りに会えてとてもうれしいのですが、「ふつうの生活」にもうすでにちょっと退屈しているようです。

オーストラリアに戻ってからまずゴールドコーストに住んでいる家族に会いに行きました。
誰もが巨大淡水化プラントの反対運動に関わっていました。
その淡水化プラントと言うのは、環境影響評価についての地域の協議会をほとんど通さずに開始されたものです。
行政によると、水不足の危機であり多少の懸念があったとしても建設を推し進める必要があるとのことです。

多くの人がこの淡水プラント（海の水を淡水に変える）という政策に乗り気ですが、その行程には多大なエネルギーを必要とし、莫大な予算がかかるのです。
私の妹のインゲはその抗議行動の先頭に立ち、もっと違った方法、例えば暴風雨水を取り入れる、雨水タンクを設置する、あるいは節水をするなどを推進しています。

私は巨大フランス系企業のVeoliaと世界の水の供給源を支配しようとする試みとの関連があるのでは？と思います。まるで第二のオイルラッシュのようです。そしてついには、国民が贅沢なお水のために多大なお金を払うことになるのではと懸念しています。

エアーに戻ってからは、緑の党選出議員として立候補する働きかけをし、また温暖化防止キャンペーンに関わる行動を開始しました。（更新したweb log www.annjalight.com をご覧ください。）
地元の二団体が、すでに来月にも大きな会議を開く計画を練っています。

私もこの地域の市長に会って、市民が温暖化の問題に対応していくようどのように仕向けるか、様々なアイデアについて話し合いました。

議会としても、気候変動危機に対して市民が前向きに対応するよう働きかけることに重点をおいている提案をする準備を計画しているようです。

熱帯林情報センターのジョンシードとルースローゼンヘックは、オーストラリア各地で“気候変動、”と言う映画を上映し、その映画は熱烈に受け入れられてきました。

多くの温暖化に取り組んでいる団対が、状況が変わるよう個人レベルでそして政治的レベルで行動をとってきました。日本でも今回のアル・ゴアの映画「不都合な真実」に対してどんな反応が起こっているのか気になるところです。

【翻訳：中島由美子】

2/11

We have now returned to our ‘Slow Life’ in Ayr after spending 2 months travelling through Japan with the GNH tour (please see report ‘Slowing Down Japan’ for more details. It was wonderful to meet many new ‘Earth Lovers’ and reconnect with many old friends in Japan.
And it was also good to come to our garden and lovely old home. It had been raining (and was still raining) so everything was green and lush – nice for the chickens who pick happily away at the greenery. It is the hottest part of the year so I have decided not to turn on the hot water system (this uses about 30% of a household’s energy needs) – just boiling a couple of pots of water for the children’s bath. It is refreshing and not difficult at all to have cool showers - and a small step to living more lightly.
Pacha has started her first year of school and Yani has started kindergarten at the same school. He is very happy to be in his own space again, loves the routine of predictable days and his favourite toys, the big backyard with our chickens running around. Pacha loves seeing her friends again – but I think she is already a little bored with a ‘normal’ life!
When we returned to Australia we first visited my family on the Gold Coast. Everyone is involved in the campaign to stop a massive de-salination plant that was started with almost no community consultation of environmental impact assessment. The government says that because there is a ‘water crisis’ they just have to go ahead and build, despite many concerns. Many people love the idea of de-salination - turning sea-water into pure water – but the process uses a huge amount of energy and is extremely expensive. My sister, Inge, is leading the protest and promoting better alternatives like harvesting stormwater, rain water tanks and wasting less water. I see the connection between the massive French based corporation, Veolia, and the control of global water resources – its like a new oil rush – and can only lead to everyday people ending up paying enormous amounts for the luxury of clean water.
Back in Ayr I have started getting more involved in the climate change campaign along with working on my nomination as a senate candidate for the Greens (check out a new web log: www.anjalight.com). Two local groups have already started to plan a large meeting on climate change next month. I met with the local Mayor here to talk about ideas to engage everyday people in responding to climate change. It looks like the council will support a plan to prepare a presentation proposal focussing on empowering people to respond creatively to the climate crisis. John Seed and Ruth Rosenheck from the Rainforest Information Centre have been doing a ‘Climate Change – Despair and Empowerment’ Roadshow in other parts of Australia that has been received very enthusiastically. Many Climate Action Groups have been formed to continue active personal and political actions to make a change. I wonder what the response in Japan has been to the new movie by Al Gore – An Inconvenient Truth?
The most inspiring words I have read recently comes from Joanna Macy – I have to include it here and hope that it gives you the same sense of empowerment to continue as it has for me.

In INQUIRING MIND

Submitted June 27, 2005


THE END OF OIL, CLIMATE CHANGE, AND THE GREAT TURNING

Joanna Macy

In Buddhism, there are two mudras, or hand gestures, that I cherish. Statues and paintings of Buddhas and bodhisattvas often show them. One is the Fear Not or abhaya mudra--right hand raised at chest level, palm outward. It says, "I will not be afraid of the fear. I will not close down, I stay fully present." It's strikingly similar to the gesture of greeting associated with American Indians. "How!" they said, as I saw in the movies, and later I learned the meaning of that raised empty hand: "See, I carry no weapon, don't be afraid."

The second hand gesture I give you tonight is the Earth-touching one, the bhumisparsa mudra. Its other name is Calling the Earth to Witness, and it connects with the story of when Gautama, soon to become the Buddha, sat down under the bodhi tree. I picture him saying, in effect, "I am not going to get up until I have broken through to the secret of the suffering we cause ourselves and others. Until I wake up to that, I am not going to move." Well, this infuriated Mara, the embodiment of sin and death. Mara sent demons to frighten Gautama and dancing girls to distract him; but the Buddha-to-be didn't waver. Finally, Mara challenged him outright. "By what right and authority do you think you can solve the mystery of suffering? Just who do you think you are?"

And Gautama offered no personal credentials. No curriculum vitae. He didn't say, "I'm the son of a king. I graduated summa cum laude from the Yoga Institute or went to Harvard Business School." He said nothing at all about himself. He just touched the Earth. It was by the authority of Earth that he sought liberation from suffering.

So we can make that gesture too. We can touch the Earth. That act, even if only mental, reminds us of who we are and what we are about, as we confront the collapse of our oil-based economy and our oil-damaged climate. We are here for the sake of life. By the authority of our belonging to Earth from the beginning of space and time, we are here.


These Buddhist mudras are mirrored in the protocol which the Haudenosaunee or Iroquois Six Nations Confederacy used when opening their treaty meetings. You can make the following gestures mentally or physically.

We offer salutations and respect to all present at this meeting and to all who will be affected by it.

We brush off the chairs on which we sit--

to make a clear space for a meeting of minds.

We brush off from our clothing any debris picked up on the way--

to clear our minds of extraneous matters.

We wipe the blood from our hands--

to acknowledge and apologize for any hurt we have inflicted.

We wipe the tears from our eyes--

to acknowledge and forgive any hurt we have received.

We take the lump out of our throats--

to let go of any sadness or disappointment.

We take the tightness out of our chests--

to let go of any fear or resentment.

We acknowledge and pray for guidance

to the Great Creator Spirit of All Life.

Ho. So be it.

The Six Nations Confederacy, we are told, weighed every decision by its effects on the seventh generation. To adopt such a practice ourselves, we would need to let the future ones figure in our minds. To help me do that, I've been trying to imagine what storytellers of the seventh generation may recount about us. Maybe they'll say something like this:

"Once there was a mighty people. They possessed the greatest concentration of economic and military power the world had ever seen. And that vast power of theirs derived from ancient sunlight stored deep in the body of the living Earth. They felt entitled to that black gold--entitled to use it all, leaving none for us who came after. They felt entitled to it even when it lay under other peoples' lands. They felt it was theirs, because they had come to depend upon it in every aspect of their lives-- in food, clothing, shelter, in travel and transportation and communicating with each other. They had lost the ability to imagine any other way of life.

"A few voices warned that the black gold would run out and that its end was soon approaching. But those voices were hard to hear. More warnings came: that the burning of the black gold was disrupting the seasons and weather patterns, bringing vast climatic changes in the very metabolism of Earth. But that seemed too huge and too remote to take seriously, until...

"Until, faster than anyone had foreseen, it all began to happen. The black gold grew harder to find, costlier to pump. They called that point, when the decline began, Peak Oil. And at the same time, it was plain to see how melting arctic ice was altering the ocean currents which had steadied the climate for thousands of years. Droughts and flooding increased, giving a hint of the suffering in store from hunger and rioting and mass migrations."

This much, we know, the future storytellers can say. What will they go on to recount? What ensuing drama will they recall?

That is partly up to us, of course, because we are living it. We cannot make the realities of end of oil and climate change go away, but we can choose how we're going to respond.

It seems to me that there are two kinds of response to massive collective trauma. One is to contract--to close down in denial and fear, to tighten the heart and the fist. The other is to open up--open eyes, heart, hands, freeing the capacity to adapt and create. We know we're capable of that, because it is happening now all around our world.

A revolution is underway. You may not see it, if you don't know where to look, for in the words of Gil Scott Heron, "this revolution will not be televised." But once we become aware of this tidal change, the end of oil appears not as some hopeless, ghastly fate, but as an adventure requiring all our wisdom and passion for life.

This adventure is what many of us call the "Great Turning." It is the epochal shift from the industrial growth society to a life-sustaining society. This is the context in which to view the end of oil and climate change. Those two major disrupters of normalcy weave through all our other environmental battles, and they are at play, as well, in our militarism and social inequality and abuses of political power. More clearly than other crises and calamities, they sound the death knell of our industrial growth society.

So those future storytellers, looking back at our time, may go on to speak of the Great Turning. I can imagine them saying, "Our ancestors back then, bless them, they had no way of knowing if the Great Turning could succeed. No way of telling if a life-sustaining culture could emerge from the death throes of the industrial growth society. It probably looked hopeless at times. Their efforts must have often seemed isolated, paltry, and darkened by confusion. Yet they went ahead, they kept on doing what they could--and, because they persisted, the Great Turning happened."


For us alive today in the midst of it all, we can learn to see the Great Turning by bringing into focus its three dimensions. They co-arise and reinforce each other. The first dimension is holding actions in defense of life; they function to slow down the destruction caused by the industrial growth society, and buy time for more fundamental changes. The second includes all the life-affirming structures emerging now, fresh social and economic experiments ranging from land trusts, ecovillages, and local currencies to alternative forms of education and healing, many of them inspired by old, indigenous ways. And the third dimension consists of a profound shift in our perception of reality. As the ecological and systems worldview takes hold, our planet appears to us, not as supply house and sewer, but as a living web of relationships. And as ancient spiritual teachings resurface, we awaken to our essential identity with this web of life and accept our sacred responsibility to honor and serve it.

This multidimensional revolution holds such promise that I can't help thinking of it as comparable to the First Turning of the Wheel, when the Buddha Dharma broke forth upon the world. Once again the reality of our radical interconnectedness with each other, and all beings through space and time, becomes clear. And now our very survival depends on our waking up to that reality.

This Great Turning alters none of the facts about end of oil and climate change. It cannot save us from the immense and painful challenges they bring upon us; but it does enable us to engage them wholeheartedly, with wisdom and courage. For, like those two mudras--Fear Not and Touch the Earth--it grounds us in our mutual belonging.

In that mutual belonging is our solidarity--with past and future generations, and with each other. There is no end to that resource. It will never run out.

Slowind Down Japan

Slowing Down Japan

From the Tokyo Jungle to tiny villages tucked away in the mountains, something is stirring in Japan. This summer 7 million people joined in the ‘Candlenight’ campaign to turn off their electricity for 2 hours – a campaign that began only 3 years ago. Spontaneous groups are starting up all over the country inspired by a Quichua folk tale about a hummingbird trying to put out a forest fire with single drops of water. The Hachidori Book, by Keibo Oiwa, which includes the personal actions of many Japanese and international activists, is a best seller. Slow Life and ‘LOHAS’ (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) concepts have become the current market trends.

These ideas and campaigns were all introduced or promoted in Japan by Keibo Oiwa, best selling author and co-founder of the Sloth Club. They may help answer the need to find a place between denial and despair when facing the ecological catastrophe we have created.

The Sloth Club began as a simple emotive response to the plight of a rainforest species (albeit a warm and fuzzy creature) and has evolved into a broad-based, integrated movement that links the themes of peace, environment, health and lifestyle. The main mission of this group is to encourage people to be ‘Sloth’ - to slow down, live simply and enjoy life without destroying the planet – to change our culture. It promotes and markets fair trade, organic products to raise funds for the protection of Sloth habitat and support for local communities helping to protect the forest. It has supported a wide range of initiatives from LETS trading systems, bioregionalism, permaculture and seedsavers networks, new ecological companies, local communities, Slow tourism, the Slow Business School and Company and Café Slow – a nerve centre in Tokyo for this fresh and positive movement.

I have been coming to Japan once or twice a year for the past 18 years. In 1999 I co-founded the Sloth Club with Keibo Oiwa and Ryuchi Nakamura. As an activist I have travelled the length and breadth of this country, campaigning on forest, indigenous peoples and nuclear issues. It has been immensely fulfilling to witness the growth of the Sloth Club and the Slow movement in Japan – despite the scale of the challenge ahead.

In November, The Sloth Club, with support from the Japan Foundation, invited me to Japan again to join the GNH (Gross National Happiness) tour joining representatives from Bhutan and Canada. GNH was first promoted by the King of Bhutan to challenge the idea of measuring a countries wealth purely by its economic output – or GNP (Gross National Product). It may be that Japan (and the world) is ready to understand and support the idea of GNH as a response to the ecological catastrophe we have created through our relentless pursuit of GNP.

For the past 2 months I have been lecturing, performing and networking throughout Japan in a wide range of venues on the theme of GNH and positive action. My two young children, Pacha and Yani, have travelled with me, sharing the stage from time to time, helping carry baggage, charming and shocking local hosts – and constantly reminding us of the future generations that we must take action on behalf of.

For the past week, over New Year, we have been able to slow down ourselves, sharing the home of Yumiko Otani and her family in the snow-laden mountains of Yamagata. Yumiko has led the campaign to reintroduce traditional grains to Japan, the ‘tsubu tsubu’ millet movement. Eating these grains is not only extremely healthy, but promotes a more gentle lifestyle for the Earth. Yumiko has developed recipes (available in the 20 books she has produced to date) that completely replace the need for any animal products in the diet and supports many environmental campaigns – especially those focussed on protecting seed diversity. Twenty eight people shared her house over New Year, crowding into the kitchen to help create incredible vegan feasts. Her husband, Kazuo, guides the group in the eco-design of the house (the warmest house I have been since coming to Japan), complete with biogas digester to produce gas for cooking from our own biological wastes.

The past week has been a sharp contrast to the sometimes hectic schedule in the Tokyo and Yokohama area as well as the west and south of Japan.

Our first events in early November were in Yokohama and Tokyo at Meiji University and the Lifestyle forum in Shinjuku with Jigme and Pema from Burma and Michael Nicoll of the Haida nation. Burma represents a last, fragile vestige of a simple, sustainable lifestyle, balanced with a light-hearted, fun-loving yet humble approach to life. It seems a lifetime away from the over-stressed, exhausted people I squeeze in with on the Tokyo trains…

Highlights of the tour include reconnecting with people and places I hadn’t met for many years before, like Fukunaga-san in Nagano, whose sons were teenagers when we first met in 1990 when they were campaigning to save the rainforests of Costa Rica. Now Echiro and Jiro are edging 30 and have started the only company in Japan that produces snowboards from domestic timber. Their attitude to life is free and fun-loving, yet responsible in acknowledging their human impact and doing what they can to respond.

In Nagoya, the local Hummingbird group networked with at least 10 other groups to organise an event with the Nagoya expo choir. We sang the newly released song about the Hummingbird story ‘Kurikindi’ that I wrote last year. It seems to be the theme song of the Hummingbird movement in Japan.

Returning to Tokyo, I was invited to perform and speak at the Greens Party Symposium, joining the rising Japanese Green political stars with the mammoth task ahead to raise a groundswell to win seats in the upcoming local and federal elections. Their main interest was in helping motivate people to run as Green candidates and to inspire members with success stories from Australia. In Japan not many people know of my Green political action and are surprised to hear that I have run for the Greens 5 times so far and intend to keep running whenever the opportunity arises. They were very interested in my motivation for running not with an expectation of necessarily winning the seat but to provide a choice and campaign on issues that other politicians may not otherwise address. At the symposium I met Ryuhei Kawada, a haemophiliac suffering from AIDs due to a botched blood transfusion (for which he has received little or no compensation), who will be the lead Green senate candidate for the federal election. His nomination is being supported by my friends Keibo Oiwa and Jun Hoshikawa (head of Greenpeace Japan) along with other key Japanese campaigners.

In Uozu, Oguni and Aso mountain our events were deep within the local community, with children and grandparents joining the audience. In Kanazawa a funky, hippy, culture edge concert in a trailer community called “Nature-lab”. In Kumamoto talks with the environment network and the fair trade movement, celebrating the first anniversary of the Hachidori (Hummingbird) Cafe attended by the Mayor. In Fukuoka I joined an event marking the anniversaries of the Minamata and Chernobyl disasters. In Aka-mura I travelled and stayed with members of the ‘Slow Business School’, started by Ryuchi Nakamura, who are trying to revive the local community by finding niche products and markets with the ethics of fair trade, organic, local, sustainable and with a spirit of voluntary simplicity.

In Yakushima, a world heritage island in the south of Japan that is home to the world’s oldest cedar trees, I facilitated a deep ecology workshop with Tamio Nakano and Lima Kimura. We came to the end of the two-day workshop committed not only to reduce, reuse, recycle, but to reconnect, remember and rejoice our capacity and potential to respond to the ecological crisis. Tessei Shiba, a local councillor, Sloth Club member and leader of the successful campaign to protect these ancient forests from logging, shared his story and vision for the future of Yakushima to encourage local ‘control’ of the tourism industry that now threatens the ancient forests and to promote a resurgence of the ‘jomon’ (ancient) culture that held these forests in such deep reverence.

Back in Tokyo, thanks to our ‘world expo’ connections (I was one of 3 Australian ‘Earth Lovers’ invited to perform at the world expo in Nagoya in 2005) we were able to make an appearance at the huge ‘eco-products’ exhibition in the massive Tokyo Exhibition centre. What a strange feeling – standing in this huge, incredibly noisy and bustling building, opposite the Toyota stall singing and talking about feeling connected with the Earth…I mean, even Coca-Cola had a stall there (with calico bags being given away) – which means we must really have hit the main stream –and a major gasoline seller in Japan… oh so confusing! The NGO section was typically small but very heartening, with universities and high schools tacking up their low-tech posters on the walls of the cubicles beside groups like Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace. The Sloth Club also had a stall. Interestingly some people came to the next event in the centre of Tokyo after the speil we had there. Some people are looking for something more real than Corporate Greenwash…

It was a completely opposite atmosphere at the Slow Mother Gathering in Fujno the following weekend. This was two days of music, workshops and a wide range of natural parenting/eco products themed to support an emergence of natural, ecological parenting and childbirth options as well as environmental action. The audience was filled with children of all ages, men and women bedecked with slings full of babies. It was the first time I could relax completely as Pacha and Yani (and the many other children there) were taken care of by the collective good-heartedness of the 300 or so participants. We will continue to explore the Slow Mother theme and hopefully have more events like this in the future in Japan.

It is ironic that the Japanese government is worrying so much about the low birth rate – when there seems to be no effort in creating a child friendly country. It is hard to find a decent park for children anywhere in Tokyo and travelling by train with kids is a nightmare. So much money was and is still spent on un-needed construction works throughout the country, yet almost nothing has been spent on creating a quality of life for future generations.

In Tokyo I also met my old friend and now Director of Greenpeace Japan, Jun Hoshikawa, at the Greenpeace office in Shinjuku to talk mostly about Climate Change campaign, Green politics and the whaling issue. He has a huge challenge ahead to re-frame the Greenpeace position on whaling, moving it away from an issue of stubborn nationalistic pride, while maintaining the strong anti-whaling position of Greenpeace. He also has to explain to the rest of the world the more complex picture of the history of Japanese industrial whaling (originally promoted by the US after the WWII) and to help create a more effective and sophisticated approach than just Japan bashing. In talking in depth with many Japanese people over this issue over many years, I believe that the majority of people, especially young people, have no real attachment or interest in whaling or eating whale meat - actually most young Japanese people love whales and dolphins. But nobody likes being told what to do or what they can’t do. For the Australian government to make such a ‘show’ of their opposition to whaling (which is a very easy position to take with no Australian economic interest in whaling) – while having an arguably criminally negligent position on global warming (Australian Greenhouse emissions are the highest per capita in the world) is extremely cynical to me.

On solstice I joined the other founders of the Sloth Club, Keibo Oiwa and Ryuichi Nakamura, for the final event at the now famous Café Slow. Over 100 people squeezed into the place for a candlenight event incorporating theatre, music, talk and star gazing. Telescopes were set up outside to try to see the milkyway beyond the haze of Tokyo (bit of a challenge…).

As an organization the Sloth Club is now moving to a new stage. With close to a thousand members and a number of companies that have begun as offshoots of the group, it is now looking for a larger office space in Tokyo. Thanks to the wonderfully efficient and effective secretary, Naoko Baba, it has received funding and support from a wide range of groups that have helped a near constant flow of speakers and activists visit Japan. While dedicated to promoting a lifestyle/culture change, it doesn’t hesitate to take an active role in campaigns, including the two major ones unfolding in Japan right now; protesting the Rokkasho nuclear fast breeder reactor (and promoting safe and sustainable solutions to climate change) and lobbying to protect the Japanese constitution from losing article 9, the law prohibiting Japan from engaging in war against any other nation.

To most people outside Japan, the Japanese culture is quite enigmatic, fast paced, high tech, nature dominating yet with customs and traditions honouring nature and spirituality. I find people pretty much as alienated from each other and nature as anywhere else in the world, but perhaps with just a little more reason to want to change and a few more reference points in their own culture that only 100 years ago maintained a sustainable, relatively peaceful society. Despite its current wealth and success, Japan is ranked way down at 80 in the world’s list of happiest countries – some 30 000 people commit suicide in Japan each year. Young people are seriously questioning the life choices of their parents and are looking for something more meaningful. Older people left behind in the tucked away mountain villages all over Japan have had their pride in their traditional self sufficient farming culture battered by modern consumerism and techno-gadgets blaring at them from their TV sets and their community decision making process stolen by central political authority. Very slowly young people are moving back to the mountains and are asking to learn more about their grandparent’s wisdom.

And 7 million people are switching off their lights and lighting a candle at solstice in what is becoming a new ritual of peace, reflection and ecological awakening. Looking out from the Shinkansen, there were solar panels on about 5% of the houses we bulleted past – well maybe it was only 2% - but definitely more than I have ever seen in Australia. Are we ready to look at Japan beyond the single issue of whaling and feel some inspiration and solidarity about what is happening here? I hope so – we desperately need to find common ground and shared commitment to rescue the future.

10/8

We are back in our peaceful Ayr home after visiting my family on the Gold Coast. It was a welcome recovery time after the busy election! Our final result was the
best it has ever been in this region - just over 4% of the vote. This seems very small and some people may feel disheartened by these kinds of results - to me it
was very well worth the effort to introduce new ideas and solutions. I think it is so important to offer people a viable alternative and as the environmental issues start affecting people in their daily lives they may start looking for alternative political options. The local newspaper printed every one of the 8 press releases I sent them almost without editing - so this was worthwhile in itself I think (if you would like to read these please let me know!).

Over the next month we will be preparing for our upcoming visit to Japan and I'll be finishing off my teacher's aide course while preparing the house and garden for a period of hibernation. Hopefully someone will take up the opportunity to live here while I am away (see message attached) - but if not our lovely neighbours Don and Colleen are happy to look after the chickens. It's a little sad that the mango project will have to be put on hold - maybe the right person will come to carry this through next year.

Since the election we have had two waves of environmental inspiration - the visit of David Suzuki and the release of the film by Al Gore: "An Inconvenient Truth". I couldn't make it to David's speech, but I am already seeing the impacts in this
local area with people feeling a renewed commitment and being more empowered about holding the local council responsible for bad development decisions. I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth "about global warming despite wondering if I needed to because I am quite aware of the issue. It is not a fun movie - but it is something we must all see and is a very straightforward and clear explanation about the causes and consequences of our activities on the planet. I felt responses on many different levels but especially on the issue of how to respond.

Where is the space between denial and despair? How can we feel empowered enough to think that the little things we do have any impact at all? We search for absolute perfection in what we see as environmental leaders (including Al Gore) but must accept that we are not perfect and just have to do the best we can and support each other in our journey to live simply and joyfully.

There is a rumour around that Al Gore likes Ferrari cars - does that diminish the truth of the message he is presenting? At the end of the movie there are many pieces of advice about what we can do, including voting for politicians that will make a change - and if there are not those politicians available to run yourself for political office. It was good to hear this after running for the Greens once again!

My sister, Inge, often points out my inconsistencies, especially the way I fly across the Earth to sing environmental songs in Japan.how can I really justify this? It is not easy, planting thousands of trees is not enough, can I really believe this music touches people deeply enough to have a profound shift, or empowers people to do something?

So, I too battle a sense of despair especially that what I am doing is enough and is actually causing more damage to Mother Earth. At the same time I feel a sense of urgency in fully owning my role on the planet as someone who has been involved in these issues my whole life, taking a stronger leadership role. It is a hard choice, the choice I have been facing since a young teenager, made even more complex with my beautiful children facing these choices with me - escape to live a purely ecological life (El Milagro) or directly face the monster of our own making destroying our planet and ourselves. I imagine it will be a combination of both, as it always has been.

At least for next I have committed to trying to expand my school permaculture garden project next year and offer this project to the other schools in this region. This will hopefully result in planting many seeds - vegetables, flowers, trees and very importantly, inspiration and empowerment for young people.

And for the near future I look so much forward to meeting my friends in Japan soon. Pacha and I are practising the Kurikindi song together and all of us are very excited! Running the workshops this time will be interesting and important - I hope they are a source of deep empowerment for all.

10/8翻訳

ゴールドコーに住んでいる実家から、静かなここエールの我が家のへと戻ってきました。ゴールドコーストでは、選挙のあわただしさから解放されのんびり出来てよかったです。選挙結果はというと、獲得票はこの地区では今までで最高の４％を少し上回るというところでした。

この数字は一見低く、がっかりしてしまう人もいるかもしれませんが、わたしにとっては、新しい政策などを住民の人たちに披露するという点で努力し甲斐がありました。私は思うのですが、今までとは違う実質的選択肢を提供するというのは重要なことなのです。
　
というのは、環境問題が人々の生活に影響を及ぼし始めているのですから皆が、今までとは違う政策を求め始めているのではないかと思われます。地方紙が、私の送ったプレスリリース８部をそれぞれ掲載してくれました。そのこと自体が、そもそもとても価値のあることだと思います。
（もしお読みになりたいのであればお知らせください。）

来週一杯は、冬に備えて家のことや庭の準備をするかたわら、目の前に控えた日本訪問の準備をし、先生支援コースを終えてしまわなければなりません。誰か私のいない間に留守番をしてくれるといいのですが。もし誰か見つからなくても、ご近所のドンとコリーンが快く鶏の面倒は見てくれますが。マンゴのプロジェクトが保留状態になってしまうのが少し残念ですが、多分、適当な人が来年にかけて引き継いでくれるでしょう。

選挙以来、環境問題を喚起する大きな動きがありました。デイビット鈴木さんの訪問と元米国副大統領アールゴアの映画「不都合な真実」の公開です。デイビッドさんの講演は実現しませんでしたが、このあたりの人々へのその影響は見て取れます。住民が新たに責任感を持ち、地方議会が好ましくない開発事業の決議に対して責任をとるよう今まで以上に要求しているのです。

地球温暖化がテーマ－である映画「不都合な真実」ですが、このテーマに私自身よく精通しているのに、見に行く必要があるかしらと思いながら、見させてもらいました。あまり楽しい映画ではありませんが、とても見る価値のあるものです。とても率直に、そしてはっきりと温暖化の原因と私たちの地球での行いがどのような結果をもたらすのかが描かれています。いろんなレベルでの反応を感じました。特にこの問題にどのように応じていくかという点での反応を感じました。

拒絶と絶望の間に来るものはどこのあるのでしょうか？どうやって自分にできる些細なことが、とにかく何かを変えていくのだと考えられるように勇気付けていけることができるのでしょうか？私たちは、環境問題のリーダーとして非の打ち所が無いものを（アル・ゴアを含めて）求めますが、私たちは皆完璧ではないという事実を認め、自分が出来る限りのことをやり、シンプルで楽しい生活への探索の過程で支えあって行くべきなのです。

アル・ゴアがフェラーリ車の愛好者だといううわさが流れています。でもそのことが、彼が伝えようとしているメッセ－ジを損ねるでしょうか？映画の最後では、私たちに何ができるのかというアドバイスがあります。その中には、この状況を変えていってくれる政治家に投票するというものから、もし適当な政治家がいない場合は、自分で立候補するというものまであります。今回、緑の党から立候補した私としてはうれしいアドバイスです。

私の妹のインゲは、いつも私がやっていることの矛盾を指摘します。特に私が環境の歌を歌いに日本へ行くのに飛行機を使うことに対してです。私はどうやってこのことを正当化できるでしょう？これは容易なことではありません。何千という木を植えたとしても十分ではありません。私の歌が本当に人々に感動を与え心の奥深くに届いて、その結果その人たちに何らかの行動を促しているのだからと信じてもいいのかしら？

そう。私も絶望感と戦っているのです。私のやっていることは果たして役に立っているのかとか、それどころか母なる地球にダメージを与えているのではないかという気持ちと戦っているのです。それと同時に一生をこの問題に取り組んできた者としての地球での自分の役割をきちっと果たさなければと言う焦燥感も感じています。

これは困難な選択肢です。私が十代から直面してきた選択肢であり、私の大切な子供達もこれらの選択に私とともに直面しなければならず、それが物事をより複雑にしているのです。

全くのエコロジカルな生活（エルミラグロ）へと逃れるか、私たちの地球と人類を破滅へと導く怪物と対峙するか。私は今までそうであったように、両方をうまく組み合わせられると思います。

とりあえず次の段階として、学校のパーマカルチャーガーデンのプロジェクトをもっと広げ、このプロジェクトをこの地域のほかの学校にも提案していこうという試みに関わってきました。願わくば、このことが多くの野菜や花、木のタネを植えていき、更にとても大切なことですが、そうすることによって若い人たちにインスピレーションや活力のタネを植えていくことになればと思います。

そして日本の皆さんに今回お会いするのをとても心待ちにしています。パチャと私は今一緒にクリキンディの歌を練習しているところです。皆とてもワクワクしているのですよ！

今回ワークショップを行うことは面白い試みであり、大切なことでもあります。私はこれらのワークショップが皆さんにとって深いところでの活力の源となっていけばと願っています。
【翻訳：中島由美子】