In 2006, I got hired by a photographer named David LaChapelle (Lachapellestudio.com) to create a sustainable retreat on his 30 acre Rainforest property that he had just purchased in East Maui. He listed off a few key parts of his vision, and left this property in my hands for a year before he returned. This was the first time in my life that I was able to work with an unlimited budget- which for any kind of artist is a dream-come-true. With a lot of hard-work, intention, and blood-sweat-and tears.. we created one of the greatest living art-pieces that I had ever been a part of. The property is 95% self-sufficient (we needed to buy only grains and oils and the occasional meat). We run everything on solar or wind power, our cars run on discarded Veggie-oil from the hotel in town, we have goats, chickens and ducks, acres of vegetable gardens, salad mandalas, and dessert gardens (which is one of my favorites with cacao, vanilla bean, ice-cream bean, butterscotch fruit (chicos),mango, passionfruit, papaya, cherimoya...).
A beautiful part of this project was working with World Farmers Exchange who works specifically with farmers in third-world countries who are eager to learn new ways of growing food organically. The thought is that we train them in permaculture and sustainable agriculture- in methods that are cross-cultural- and they bring back the lessons and knowledge to share with their community. It was beautiful to see, when David began doing photoshoots and videos and we would break for lunch, a heartwarming reality revealed itself: that we are all the same. We would cook our food from the land, and have giant meals together, and Lady Gaga would be sitting next to Patience from Ghana, who would be sitting next to our farm-worker Cezar from the Philippines, sitting next to India Arie...all eating, all humbled and reminded of our humanness. It is a memory that will be with me forever. After LaChapelle land became a success, other farmers and families in the area began asking if we could help them as well. The recession hit Hana hard, and many people were out of work and not sure where to turn.
We decided to try an experiment: we had transformed Davids land with an unlimited budget (and figured anyone could do that), and we wanted to see what we could do with NO FUNDING, just with willing hearts, minds and hands working together. So, we found a central place in Hana- and began town-hall-style meetings. Instead of focusing on what we don't have and the scarcity- WHAT DO WE HAVE? And we began to make a list. One surprising thing that many people had overlooked was the abundance that the rainforest provided. They didn't look at the land as being lucrative anymore. They saw the fruit falling from the trees as a burden - it made a mess, had a shelf-life of only 3 days, and brought in mere pennies. So, we had to find a new way of utilizing this veiled-abundance. So we brought in a couple of culinary masters - we looked at recipes, and found many ways of preserving the fruit by making value-added products (jams, hot-sauces, syrups, chutneys, candies, banana breads, ice-cream, sorbets, fruit snacks, soaps, salves, bath oils...).
And Hana Farms was born. Paul Taylor and Martin Vasey were willing to use their land as the location for the endeavor. We started with just one employee- Ananda Nadeau (whom I will always see as the Mama of Hana Farms,), and a Costco Tent on the side of the road which eventually became a beautiful sustainable-thatched roof-open-air marketplace.
Paul and Marty were open to providing housing and tent-sites and a basic food stipend for workers, And so we began a whole new sort of volunteer internship program: college-aged kids come out for up to 3 months (we provide gourmet meals (mostly grown from the land), lodging and free permaculture classes weekly), they make amazing products out of the abundance that the Rainforest provides run the storefront, and learn about Agricultural Entrepreneurship. This model grew into an amazingly successful business that now helps to support over 30 families, artists, and farmers! (You can visit the road-side stand just after mile marker 31 on the Hana Hwy at the Welcome to Hana Sign... and we sell our products in 6 different stores on island, and online at www.hanafarmsonline.com It is amazing to see the results of what can happen when the right willing hands and hearts and minds are brought together to focus on a vision.
Basically, throughout this process what I saw as a commonality was that all of these projects from the Greenhouse project in Swaziland, to LaChapelle Land, to Hana farms were all made possible by bringing together the right people who shared a common vision. I have seen hundreds of volunteers whose lives were forever enriched by the experience of giving. Lives were deeply changed
Ultimately, I believe that we sometimes just need to be reminded that we are ALL the same. We are all children of God, we all have blood that flows through our veins, we all hurt, we all want to be Loved, and to feel validated, we all are looking for a sense of purpose in this life whether we realize it or not. And someday, we will all die, and return to that which we came from...and when we do, I don't think it matters how much money we made, or how many things we acquired, or even how many movies we were in. We are all given different amounts in this life, that is true....but what I believe matters most is how much of that we gave. How much of the love, or the voice, or the passion or the fame that we were given did we share? did we use to make a difference? What did we really contribute to the world- and will it be there after we are gone?
This is how Voluntourism was borne govoluntourism.com. We realized that there are millions of needs in the world...and yet, there are equally millions of people who are awakening to a new reality, and who have a hunger to serve, and a hunger to be part of something bigger than themselves...to be used...to be a vessel...and to give. Voluntourism finds these exceptional individuals and places them with the right needs...because YES...there is a need out there just waiting for YOU!
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