Chongming

This past weekend I finally made my first much anticipated trip to Chongming Island (崇明岛)! A few people have asked us why we’ve decided to locate in Shanghai as oppose to a second tier or third tier city in China. After all, a less urbanized city might have cleaner air, water, and soil, and consequently be more fitting for food production. Mainly, we’re interested in Chongming Island because of its relative undeveloped state and its proximity to Shanghai, one of China’s largest and most affluent cities. In the past, Chongming has been designated, with national and local government support, as a site of eco-development. While officials plans for a large scale eco-city (a city named Dongtan) fell through because of a real estate corruption scandal involving the Shanghai mayor, Chongming still retains the promise (superficial or real) of becoming a symbol of a greening China.

The food on the farm was definitely a big perk. After having spent 2 weeks on HK eating mostly meaty dim sum dishes and constantly eating out, I was happy to have some vegetarian home cooking! And even better, all of the food eaten on the farm was from either his farm, or the neighboring farms that also considered themselves “natural”/”beyond organic”, meaning that they held themselves to a standard that was even higher than the organic certification standards. In both the US and China, food that is labeled as “organic” is free from synthetic chemicals, but organic chemicals are still be applied. Some people have argued that “organic” is not necessarily better because “organic” chemicals are often low in potency. Thus to achieve the same effect, more chemicals have to be applied. Unless he was certain of the quality of the ingredients, he did not use it on his farm. Even the vinegar was made by one of his friends. The food was fresh, local, and completely safe to eat, which I think is quite hard to achieve in China.

His kitchen was pretty typical of a rural Chinese household, and we cooked our food in one of those fire stoves where one person is fully responsible for feeding the fire while other people did the wok work. I happily participated in cooking the first night’s dinner and then on the second night, I spearheaded a 卷饼 effort! I was quite proud of myself because it was the first time I made 卷饼 from beginning to end. Woot!

Another highlight was watching the show 舌尖上的中国(“A Bite of China”) on a projector in his living room. It felt so much like a home movie theater! The show itself was filmed in an epic Planet Earth-esque style, except the content consisted solely of mouth-watering food, food culture, their epic origins and their complex extraction methods.

Another highlight was planting sprouts in the rice patty! On the one hand, I thought it was a comical experience because rice patties are a part of so many Asian jokes. At the same time, it was also quite an experience! Because we didn’t have shoes, we worked barefooted, and the feeling of mud oozing through our toes with every step and going up to our ankles was quite sensational. I probably won’t do it again though because as I learned afterwards, one can catch many diseases that way…oops. Anyhoo, even though planting rice sprouts is hard work, I really enjoyed it for the short duration that I got to participate. People talk about reconnecting with the Earth, or reconnecting with one’s ancestral roots, and I felt like it was very profound experience to be able to participate in an activity that has defined so much of China’s history. Rice has been a staple in Chinese food just as agriculture has been China’s staple industry. While planting, I was thinking about the thousands, if not millions of people, who have come before me and participated in the same creation ritual.

The people I met on the farm were also an assortment of interesting characters, from Laojia (老贾), the urbanite philosopher turned farmer (for him, his farm is more about realizing his philosophical and Buddhist beliefs) to the other farm interns who all seem to be trying to fulfill a slightly different dream of their own by coming to Laojia’s farm. While each person’s background story is unique, everyone (probably including Mike and me) seem to be very 非主流.

I think I really enjoy being on the farm because it not only fulfills my desire to understand sustainable development, but it also enriches me intellectually and philosophically. The act of modern day agriculture has been reduced to a systematic process, where the input of N, P, and K with the right amount of synthetic pesticides is expected to produce long-lasting sturdy crops. However, to be a more ecological farmer, one has to challenge the treatment of nature as an input and output machine, and really absorb the beauty that is diversity and give thanks to all the components of the whole that somehow make an ecosystem work. In participating in agriculture, one really has to consider human's role on Earth.

Pictures to come later!