America of the future will be all malls connected by interstates.All because your parents no longer can their own tomatoes.

—Garrison Keillor

这句话描述的就是CSA和全球化的大超市。我们选择哪一个？

在与大自然的力量合作的过程中，农民实实在在的创造了财富，但是对于大部分人类的历史，人类并没有给与食物更多的重视。我们吃了食物，但我们不知道他们从何而来，那些从太阳、土壤、水、空气中汲取生命力量的植物。可持续农业并不仅仅意味着实践的预知。相反，它挑战者生产者考虑长期实践、相互影响和农业的动态系统。同时，它还意味着让消费者通过了解更多的参与到农业和食物这个系统中。一个关键的目标就是要从生态的角度，从营养、能量以及动植物之间相互作用来思考，然后将利润、社区、消费者需求与之相平衡。

农业的确受天气影响很大，为什么有句老话叫：靠天吃饭？恐怕就是这个缘故吧。已经进入五月份了，这里的天气还不太暖和，而且多大风，这么大的风容易使人的意志消沉，因为你无法抵抗。我们的蔬菜宝贝们估计要在温室里多呆一段时间了。这周我们最大的任务就是赶在周五下雨之前把大量的洋葱种上，还有移植那些逐渐长大的西红柿到更大的“房子”中去。这些“房子”，我们都要先经过一边清洗，再消毒。

看，从我来到现在两周的时间，这些番茄秧都长了半尺高了。下一张图片就是将他们移植后的新家，他们在新家住上一段时间之后，就将投入大地的怀抱。

我和EMMA在学习怎么打磨锄具。

这是我们种的洋葱，最右边一排是上一周种的韭菜，从秧上看，他们似乎没有什么差别。快快长大吧，孩子们！

志愿者MIKE为这个农场创造了很多，他自己有一个汽车旅馆，他经常在这里呆上半年，然后就开车走了。这周，他开始打造他的新装置，一个用来收集雨水并用来浇花的装置。在我们的农场中，有很多类似的装置，我们平时种菜时用的水全部都是来自于雨水的收集，他们将房屋的屋顶做成斜三角形，这样，下雨的时候雨水会顺着屋顶留下来，然后，在屋顶的边缘放置一个水槽，雨水留下来会顺着水槽中的一个管道流到收集装置中。有时候，我真的感叹他们的聪明和灵巧，他们利用大自然，而又不破坏大自然。

工作之余，NICK带我们去了一个盐湖，从农场到这个盐湖的路上可以称的上WILD了，有些地方都像非洲的草原，但是我很享受这样的地方，它让人心胸豁然开朗。NICK说：石嫣，这对你来说是个难得的旅程，别人来了美国大家都会问你去了纽约、华盛顿、迪士尼没有？而你却类似探险的来到这里。呵呵，这不正是这个旅程的另类所在吗？

注意，湖水里的盐将胡边的草都浸成白色的了。

The second week’s work

America of the future will be all malls connected by interstates.  All because your parents no longer can their own tomatoes.

—Garrison Keillor

What this sentence is describing is CSA and globalized supermarkets.  Which one will we chose?

In the process of collaborating with the power of nature, farmers really do create wealth, but for the large portion of human history, people haven’t attached any more importance than that to their food.  We eat food, but we don’t know where they come from, those plants that draw life from sun, soil, water, and air.  Sustainable agriculture does not merely imply anticipating how things will be put into practice.  On the contrary, it challenges producers to consider practices in the long term, mutual impacts, and the dynamic agricultural system.  At the same time, it also implies allowing consumers, through greater understanding, to participate in agriculture and the food system.  A key objective is to think from the perspective of ecology, from health, energy, and the interactions between plants and animals, and then put profits, the community, and the needs of consumers in balance with it.

Weather really does have a huge effect on agriculture, otherwise why would we have the old saying, ‘to rely on the heavens for food’?  I think this is probably why.  It’s already May, but the weather here still isn’t very warm, and the wind is very strong.  Such strong wind easily makes one frustrated because you have no way to fight it.  Our vegetable babies will probably stay in the greenhouse a while longer.  This week, our biggest tasks were to get most of the onions planted before it rained on Friday, and to transplant the gradually maturing tomato plants to bigger “houses.”  We also had to wash and sterilize these houses.

Look – in the two weeks I’ve been here, these tomato plants have grown almost half a meter.  The picture below is of their new homes after transplanting.  After they live in their new homes for a while, they’ll be put into the earth’s embrace.

These are the onions we planted, and the row on the far right is the leeks we planted last week – from looking at the sprouts, there doesn’t seem to be a difference.  Grow fast, little ones!  

Mike, the volunteer, has created a lot of things for the farm. 

This week, he started to make his new device, a device to collect rainwater for watering the flowers.  On our farm, there are a lot of similar devices – usually when we’re planting, the water we use is all collected rainwater; they made the roof of the house a slanting triangle shape, so that when it rains the water flows down the roof, and then at the edge of the roof they put a sink, so the rainwater flows through the pipe in the sink into a collection device.  Sometimes, I really have to sigh at their cleverness and handiness – they use nature, but they don’t abuse it.

Aside from work, Nick took me to a salt lake.  The surroundings on the way from the farm to the lake could definitely be called wild, and there were a few places that looked like the African savannah, but I enjoy that kind of place – it makes your mind suddenly open up.  Nick said, “Shi Yan, this is pretty rare trip from your perspective.  When other people come to the US, everyone asks if they’ve been to New York, Washington, Disneyland.  And you came here to explore.  Ha ha, this must be the ‘alternative’ in your trip, right?”  

If you look closely, you can see that the salt in lake has bleached the grass along the edges white.