WEEK 1

Tuesday 03/30/10

I did not know what to expect from the course outline not alone talk about gardening. I believe the inclusion of gardening in this course provides an avenue for me to experience how it feels like to garden before I go out preaching to people the importance of gardening. Coming from a continent where most of the people live under $2 a day, I believe the $2 a day exercise will provide an excellent experience. I would not like be someone who goes out to talk about poverty to the poor and is dressed in a tuxedo.

I believe the instructor’s method to put us into groups to get to know each other provides a means of flexibility were it will be easy for us to approach each other when it comes to the course. I have attended some classes were students are total strangers till the end of the class. I am not advocating for friendship amongst students but an avenue were the class environment is such that it makes it easy to approach a class mate for clarifications.
I cannot wait to get things started, especially the gardening experience.


Thursday 04/01/10
Thursday’s workshop was an excellent experience for me. T o hear the entire speakers share their expertise on gardening was an eye opener.

To hear Dr. Holben talk about sustainability drew my attention back home where there is so much talk on “sustainability that sustainability this” and nothing has been sustained for decades now because of bad governance and policies. Food insecurity is on the increase because in African and especially in my country because of our inability to sustain our food system. There are always breaks from production to consumption in the food system. I believe as those in policy making indulge in their own political gimmicks, gardening provides an excellent avenue for the ordinary individual to minimize food insecurity.

Master gardener Cheryl’s presentation was enlightening and encouraging. The diagrams on the types of gardening she provided simply illustrated that anyone with a smallest space can garden if he/she puts her mind to it. Her diagram illustration of the positioning of a garden was just amazing. I never thought such considerations were needed for gardening. What comes to mind is just the plot of land, manure and seedlings.

Dr. Art Trese’s presentation drew my mind back to my secondary school days where I was thought agricultural science. Of course I had all the theoretical foundations with less practical. I believe the soil or the environment provides most of solution to food insecurity. To extend what I will acquire from this course back home will definitely pose as a challenge as people have no regards for soil conservation in their efforts to combat for insecurity. This has been the concern of the neo-Malthusian. People need to know the importance of soil in combating food insecurity and I believe Dr. Trese’s presentation said it all.

During the course of the presentation, I had a strong feeling that if I put myself to gardening I would be an excellent gardener and this was ascertained by Dr. Trese’s affirmation that soils ‘C’ and ‘D’ were the best soils. And guess what, I gave the highest scores to soils ‘C’ and ‘D’.

I cannot wait to have my first gardening experience.