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Green Eggs and Us
(reposted from Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin's blog, dated October 18, 2011: http://blog.bjen.org/) We can learn a lot from Dr. Seuss, or a local CSA, or a child's coloring book. That is: there's a lot more variety in the world than we think. Not all carrots are orange; not all potatoes are white; not all watermelons are red; not all bananas are yellow. According to Plants for a Future, there are 20,000 edible plants in ...
The Gardens of Antwerp
(reposted from Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin's blog, October 16, 2011: http://blog.bjen.org/) This is the city of Antwerp, circa 1572. It was one of the most cosmopolitan, creative, commercial cities of the 16th century, and home of some of the era's most impressive engravers and printers. I found this particular map in a charming book called Imagined Corners: exploring the world's first atlas. It offers a treatment of the political, ...
Wangari Maathai and a billion trees
(Reposted from Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin's Blog from October 3, 2011: http://blog.bjen.org/) In the run-up to the New Year, a bit of news may have escaped noticed: "Wangari Muta Maathai died on September 25 (1940–2011). She was a Nobel Peace Laureate; environmentalist; scientist; parliamentarian; founder of the Green Belt Movement; advocate for social justice, human rights, and democracy; elder; and peacemaker. She lived and ...
On What Does the Earth Rest?
In honor of Rosh HaShanah, a post from Rabbi Nina Cardin (http://blog.bjen.org/) dated September 27th, 2011: When the rabbis-of-old mused about the nature of the universe, their telescope was the Tanakh (the Bible), their philosophical society the pathways of Yavneh and Babylon. Without advanced technology, with no peering devices beyond their own eyes, they used the latest - which is to say the earliest - source of knowledge they had, ...
Aftermath of Irene and Lee and Nature’s Answers
As we head into this New Year, let us reflect on the impact our activites have on our local surroundings, in our own neighborhoods and communities. We were recently made keenly aware of the devestation and havoc that could be wreaked on our local watershed, the Chesapeake, from two recent major storms. As Rabbi Nina Cardin explains in her blog from September 16 and 21, 2011 (http://blog.bjen.org/): While we are basking in lovely fall ...
A Thing of Beauty
(Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin explores nature's attempt at maintaining permeable surfaces, right in her own yard, in her blog from September 15, 2011: http://blog.bjen.org/) An enterprising man in a white pick-up truck came to the house yesterday, lured no doubt by the state of our driveway. He was not the first. Trolling for work in these difficult times, such eager workmen drive around neighborhoods like mine checking out the state of people...
Grassroots Jewish Women’s Community
By Teri Jedeikin Kayam Farm Multicultural Educator True to its name sake, The Matriarch’s Orchard watches over Kayam Farm from its place upon the hill. Its landscape, gently sloping towards vineyards and strawberry patches, is rich with fruit trees, berry bushes and spiritual symbolism. It is a space created by women for women - a radical innovation that invites Jewish women to engage with each other and with all women of diverse ages and ...
Alienature (the alienation of people from nature)
(reposted from Nina's Blog: http://blog.bjen.org/ Thursday, September 1, 2011) It all began when we caged electricity. This miraculous taming of God’s fierce fire; the channeling, damming and undamming of the stuff that drives the pulse of the universe and every creature’s heart. Our slow, sad alienation from nature all began when we put those ions on the end of a leash. The power we have harvested ...
Reusing the land: then and now
(from Rabbi Nina Cardin's blog, posted August 21, 2011 http://blog.bjen.org/) By a bend in the Genesee River, fast along the eastern shore, right about where the massive Hutchison Building of the University of Rochester stands today, an Algonquin tribe once thrived. They built homes from the forest's abundant tree bark and farmed the rich soil. They occupied about 9 acres there. They created the foot paths (and followed the animal ...
Incorporating change in a radically different Jewish world
The Going Green Campaign of the Baltimore Jewish Community has been engaged with answering the charge of how to grow numbers, engage more people, and invigorate the masses. This blog, written by DFI's Executive Director Cindy Goldstein,( The Darrell Friedman Institute for Professional Development at the Weinberg Center ) addresses their approach to implementation of mission and vision in an ever-changing landscape: For decades, ...
Impact of the Jewish Farm movement – how have you been affected?
Survey from Rachel Berndtson, a doctoral student in the Department of Geography at the University of Maryland. Her dissertation research is on the impact and diffusion of Kayam Farm throughout and beyond Baltimore ... to generate knowledge on this *specific* movement, occurring in *this* area, at *this* time... Please take a few minutes to help in this important research! https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/3QDTGNV
The Beauty of Compost
(reposted from Rabbi Nina Cardin's blog: http://blog.bjen.org/ ) A brief respite from the summer's heat: I had been looking for the perfect counter-top compost container and had not been able to find one. So, in desperation, I simply reached for a clear plastic cannister that would otherwise be holding flour or rice or granola or some such. We keep it by the sink and dump our food shards in there. Surprisingly, fresh compost is not always ...
Sustaining Community – the Jewish Baltimore Way
(By Ben Greenwald: Ben Greenwald is the founding chair of THE ASSOCIATED’s Green Task Force. To learn more about THE ASSOCIATED’s efforts, visit www.associated.org/sustainability.) When our parents, grandparents and the founding leaders of our community first established communal priorities and identified pressing issues to address, it is unlikely that they envisioned a day in which gasoline would cost more than $4.00 a gallon and that in some ...
How to Achieve Sustainability Through Local Community Action
Hello! My name is Rachel Berndtson and I am a doctoral student in the Department of Geography at the University of Maryland, completing my dissertation research is on the diffusion of the Jewish farming movement in Baltimore. As a geographer, it is my aim to better understand the interactions between humans and their physical and social environments at the local level. As we progress into the 21st century, the notion of achieving sustainability ...
