Organicvision – a world tour dedicated to sustainable lifestyle (by Johanna from Organicvision)
Curious about alternatives to mainstream urban lifestyle?
Wondering how our society can change to become ecologically viable?
This is precisely what we want to find out on our journey around the world visiting 30 exciting projects covering permaculture, eco-construction, herbology, self-sufficiency, homesteading, transition towns, eco villages etc.
We, that is Joanna and Franck- a German/Polish-French couple in their thirties, living in Brussels.
Some years ago, if somebody had asked us about the future, never we would have predicted that we would quit our jobs one day and do a project dedicated to sustainability…
We decided to rethink our future. After having visited several organic farms in Belgium and Spain in 2009, we were captivated by the generosity and enthusiasm of the people we met there. Compared to the authentic values these people were living, our office jobs, our hectic everyday life seemed fake and meaningless.
Many discussions and sleepless nights later, our decision was clear: We wanted to change our life.
Even more: We wanted other people to discover that it is worth to live closer to nature. But how do you do that? Our solution: Travel various countries and meet positive role models, work with them and share their inspiring ideas with others via interviews, video clips and pictures on a blog!
To this end, in October 2009 we also set up an association – Organicvision – as we wanted to show our sincere long-term investment in promoting sustainable lifestyle and setting up a network of activists in this field as our project develops.
Then we started to seriously prepare our world tour, which will start very soon with a survival training in Belgium followed by a permaculture design course in Southern France.
After a long trip we finally arrived in Metz with our installation. The setup went faster than planned and also a big projector was put in place to project our e-tree animation on the wall of a big school. Everything seemed to go fine except for the Internet connection.
The e-tree project however depends on an internet connection since the animation is accessible via a website and connected with a twitter account.
After several hours of trying different connections, chasing the technical team and getting help from many different people, the official starting time of our project had passed and the stress level was rising. Since France Telecom was not willing to come and fix the problem someone had the idea of ringing doorbells at the nearby houses to see if anyone had a wifi connection we could use. After the second try it worked. A very kind neighbour came down to help us out with his connections – he even agreed to have a 100m cable being thrown from his balcony so we could get a direct connection at our both.
One hour later we finally had a good Internet connection and people could enjoy the animation. What a night! Luckily things went much smoother the day after in Brussels and since we were lucky with our location the tree was almost constantly occupied. During the 2 events over 700 messages where written on the e-tree ranging from simple expressions and messages to friends to thoughtful comments on world peace and philosophy. Try it yourself!
Here an interview that was done on our way between Metz & Brussels:
And here a video showing the e-tree in action in Metz:
A place somewhere in a warm country far away from traffic and stress. A place with nice people sharing the work, doing things together they really enjoy and thinking out of the box. Am I the only one here, or is this also something you sometimes dream about?
Here the good news: These places do exist. It might not be all that perfect as we dream it up in our minds.
Community life is not always easy and it’s more a life choice than paradise. But I’ve visited many places with interesting set ups. A group of people that lives up to permaculture principles and applies environmental solutions like Earthships & solar kettles that still seem very cutting edge to us. The El Bosque village is one of them.
The Bosque Village is a combination of a campground, a rustic retreat center, a permaculture farm, and a forming ecovillage. We love to share our space with visitors interested in sustainable tourism, ecovillage living, outdoor recreation, personal development and creative activities.
The great thing is that el Bosque is open for volunteers so you can experience for a period of time how it feels to live in such a place. Have a look at the El Bosque group for more information.
Have you ever dreamt about an ecological neighbourhood where you can easily park your bike? A place where you can let your children play outside without bigger worries and where neighbours share more than just the usual small talk?
In a place like Brussels this may seem utopian – or do we just need to wait until someone makes the first step to make this happen?
Last week a group of people that has this vision met for a first brainstorm. What are you hoping for, what are your fears and how do we overcome these? A ’soft’ session for a first get to know each other and see where one can take this project from there.
In Germany green housing projects are well established (I actually grew up on one) whilst this is still new in Belgium and so far brussels has never seen a project realized by individuals as the initiators. This may change very soon it seems when looking at the group of motivated people that I met last week.
The next meeting will be in 2 weeks time. For more info visit our group:
Twestival is a series of events that will take place on the 12th of February all around the world.
The aim is to raise at least about 4000USD per event so that one well can be built and give people in the developing world access to clean drinking water (this event supports the cause charity:water).
The event is to 100% run by volunteers. Publicity is mainly made via networking tools like Twitter and Facebook. For some more information, watch the video below:
Domespace is a round house that rotates with the sun. The house can be adapted on the individual needs of its inhabitants and the construction aims to create a long lasting home that creates a low impact on the environment buy enabling a maximum of life quality. › Continue reading
Have you ever dreamt about a garden on top of your house? Why not install a green roof that does not only provide green space but also the perfect isolation?
Here an example from Building Green TV: Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, Texas, United States
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