Ciclovida Tour

We’ve had a great tour through the farmlands of Massachusetts this week! The tour has brought us to all sorts of family farms, community gardens, revolutionary agricultural projects, and more! We started off int the hometown of the two film-makers, Matt and Loren Feinstein: Colrain, Massachusetts. We arrived in the evening and kicked off with an event at the Green Emporium/Mike and Tony’s Pizzeria, the only pizza shop in this small population-2000 town.

Colrain event at Mike and Tony's

We had a beautiful event with an incredible turnout of many great folks from Colrain; it was one of our biggest events yet, despite the fact that it is the smallest town we’ve stopped in! Jarabe and Inacio were joined in opening up the event by alocal folk band

The Feinstein family and friends

The Feinstein family turned out in full force, with 3 generations of the family present to see the film (many for the umpteenth time) and to meet Ivania and Inacio. All-in-all the event felt very warm and the Ciclovida team felt very welcomed in this cozy little farm town.

 

The next day we headed out on bike east to Turners Falls, our next stop on the tour. We had a gorgeous ride weaving through the hills of western Mass, descending into the beautiful Pioneer Valley. We arrived at the Brick House, the community resource center that hosted the event. The Brick House is a great community space that has served many purposes through the years, as its mission is, “to provide accessible services, respond to immediate needs and foster community organizing efforts to address longer-term solutions for change and community development.”

Event at the Brick House in Turners Falls

That night we did a workshop on the Landless Movements in Brazil and had a great screening with a packed audience! After the show we headed out to Gill to stay with the wonderful folks at Undergrowth Farm. They welcomed us to the cozy home and shared some homemade kombucha, maple syrup, home-cooked food, stories, and even seeds with us!

The Undergrowth Farm

In the morning we got a tour of their gardens where they already have som crops blooming! It was a short but very sweet visit, and Ivania shared with them that she was happy to visit their farm because their lifestyle seemed very familiar to her, similar to how she lives in Brazil.

They sent us off as we biked on eastward toward Orange, MA to check out the Seeds of Solidarity Farm. We had our most challenging ride yet as we biked uphill for over 2 1/2 hours to get out of the Valley! With tired legs we were welcomed to the Seeds of Solidarity Farm by Deb and Ricky, the two creators and workers of this organic, revolutionary, solar-powered, off-the-grid farm. At SoS they use innovative, yet very basic method of “no till” farming. They don’t till the soil but let instead let it recuperate and help it to do so by laying down cardbord to attract worms and fungus to nourish the soil. At the farm they do workshops and classes about this farming technique and also sell their produce at local farmstands. They have beautiful hoophouses bursting with greens and soon a whole array of other produce including tomatoes, corn, beans, and more! After spending the afternoon sharing stories, food, and seeds with them, we traveled off for Fitchburg. This time in van, and luckily for us as we soon discovered that Fitchburg is the second hilliest city in the country!

That night we had a small, intimate movie screening at The Rabbit Hole bookstore. We connected with some wonderful people from Fitchburg, including people working with the Cleghorn Neighborhood Center, Mass Local Food, and Growing Places, an awesome program helping people, particularly low-income people, all across Massachusetts start up community gardens. They are hoping to open up 50 new gardens this year! We had a great discussion after the movie in which people shared feelings of frustration that fighting against corporations sometimes makes you feel like you’re up against a huge wall, but also sharing that hearing about Ivania and Inacio’s form of resistance by biking 6000 miles really gave them hope. One woman from the audience also said something very poignant; she said: “I am beginning to realize that one of the most revolutionary things I am doing in my life right now is growing my own food.” Indeed we are seeing, day by day, that revolution and rebellion is indeed growing and being grown.

The past

couple days we’ve have been excitedly getting down in the dirt at the Soul Fire Farm! It has been exciting visiting with friends out here in Grafton, New York on an incredible sustainable farm. We spent the day yesterday exploring the land, learning about the chickens, and planting some potato plants. It has been a great learning experience working with Leah and Jonah, who own the land here and built the beautiful eco-home they live in. They built their home from scratch using all natural materials found from the land, timber wood frame, straw bale and natural plaster construction, and even a solar hot water heater.

Its been a very celebratory gathering here as friends and companheiros from the area came bringing partners, family, and kids for a delicious potluck to kick it all off. We had a great night sharing music and performances among all the talented folks here. We were especially lucky to have a performance from the kids here who sang their own version of “This Land is Your Land,” singing “This land was made for planting seeds”.

Special musical performance by Taina Asili and Gaetano Vaccaro

Also Taina Asili performed for us and was accompanied by her husband and bandmate, Gaetano, on guitar, as well as Leah, who did a silk trapeze act for us all overhead! It was incredible.

Yesterday we had a great visit at the Peace Pagoda where we connected with Buddhists from Japan who are doing peace work here in the United States. The visit was very meditative and had a sacred feel as we all partook in playing fan drums together, along with a couple Japanese women who have come to live at the Peace Pagoda after the tsunami and Buddhist nun who built this peace pagoda, Jun Yasuda.

Inacio shared a couple songs during the ceremony and through translation we all connected, communicated, and enjoyed the songs in Portuguese, English, and Japanese.

Peace Pagoda

I was comforted and intrigued when Jun Yasuda reminded us that “we must play our drum for others, not for ourselves,” resonating with me not only for that moment, but also as explanation for why we all act, make music, share, write poetry, grow food, sing, and really, why we were all there together.

The Ciclovida crew at the Soul Fire Farm

 

 

The whole group in front of a beautiful mural in a Holyoke community garden

This week we got to come back to our roots (nuestras raices) in Worcester and have a packed screening of Ciclovida at Clark, as well as meet some incredible folks at Nuestras Raices in Holyoke!

We got back to Worcester late on Tuesday night, and on Wednesday had the chance to stop by Worcester Earn-a-Bike, where the whole bike system was built, to do some tune-ups on the bike system while we are in our hometown.

Community Fire at Clark

That night, we had an intimate community fire with Clark librarian Rachael Shea, who for the last 3 years has hosted monthly Sacred Fires for all in the Clark community. It was a great chance to connect, talk, and share food around one of the most primal, instinctual ways of gathering. As a regular fire-goer, I know the smell of the fire almost makes you forget that you’re in the city and brings you back to your connection to land and earth. We laughed, shared stores, and had great converstaion.

Jarabe performing at Clark

That night, the Worcester screening brought out a huge crowd (of almost 100 people!) from Clark as well as the broader Worcester community. We had a couple special guests: Sergio Castillo, local Worcester activist, film-maker, and musician, and Loren Feinstein, co-producer of Ciclovida. Many friends, neighbors, and fellow organizers turned out for a wonderful high-energy event.

Discussion after the movie at Clark

The night concluded with discussion including Ivania and Inacio sharing that they had certain perceptions of the United States before coming here that are shown by the market and the media, but that they are happy to find many people in the United States resisting capitalism.

 

On Thursday we rode out to Holyoke and had an incredible time with all the great folks at Nuestras Raices. We were welcomed and given a tour by Diego and Ramiro, two incredible organizers with Nuestras Raices who showed us their aquaponic system in their greenhouse and also explained their work over the last 5 years to get fresh, healthy food fo local schools by connecting them with local Puerto Rican farmers.

Sharing seeds in Holyoke

They have worked to get culturally relevant food for young people (in a city that is 36% Puerto Rican) by getting produce that is typical of Puerto Rican cooking, raised by Puerto Rican farmers, and served as Puerto Rican food in Holyoke schools (for example changing Friday Pizza Day to serving a Puerto Rican dish every Friday).

We got the chance to meet several local farmers who showed us around 3 incredible community gardens that are supported by Nuestras Raices. Each one had its own feel but all proved to be important community spaces that are clearly a source of nourishment and vitality in Holyoke.

That night we had a wonderful event at Nuestras Raices where the whole Readnex Poetry Squad joined us for the first time and rocked us all!

Readnex Poetry Squad

During the discussion, an audience member raised a really interesting question about what the greatest challenge was during Ivania and Inacio’s journey. Ivania shared that the hardest point in the trip was when they passed through one stretch of Brazil where they didn’t encounter one farmer for 5 days! They passed by vast stretches of industrial agriculture, sprawling green monocrops, feeling isolated as they saw only a single person driving a big machine to harvest crops and spray pesticides. She said as they went through this really tough portion she just asked “Why are we doing this? We rode off on our bikes to connect with farmers, and we are not meeting any farmers here!”

Forest garden in Holyoke

The next day we closed out our visit in Holyoke with a tour of the incredible “edible forest” of Matt’s Holyoke friends who we stayed with. We got to explore the incredible bounty of their permaculture garden, sampling sweet violet flowers, potent garlic chives, spicy mustard greens, fresh cilantro, and sea kale.

Our bounty in the forest garden

We had the most beautiful breakfast all picked right from the garden, with eggs from their 3 chickens in the backyard as well. Then, as if we hadn’t had enough amazing agriculture, we got a tour of the Nuestras Raices finca where they farm over 7 acres of land, provide a place for farmers to learn new skills, raise livestock and animals, and provide education programs to get kids gardening and farming.

Nuestras Raices Finca

It was a gorgeous place with such great potential and possibility for growing local produce and giving people a place to get back to the earth.

Ciclovida event in Framingham

We saw many Brazilian flags waving as we rode our bikes into Framingham from Boston. The Ciclovida team had a great 20 mile ride together as we headed for our event at Casa do Trabahaldor in Framingham for our screening. It was a great event with Portuguese as the primary language spoken; this time the small group of us who could not converse in Portuguese had to wait for translation, a nice switch from the usual. We met some great companheiros from Brazil, and Ivania and Inacio even discovered that one of our new companheiros, Diego, actually used to live in the same part of Brazil and had the same friends as Inacio in the 80s! What a small world! Everyone enjoyed sharing stories and connecting experiences, and Ivania even led everyone in a shared often sung by women activists in Brazil! “Pra mudar a sociedade do jeito que a gente quer, participando sem medo de ser mulher” (“To change society the way we want, we have to participate without fear of being women”)

We were invited to come to an action for Brazilian workers in Framingham who are each owed between $1000 and $6000 of stolen wages that the contracting company, Pulte Homes,  has not paid for the work they have done. Casa do Trabalhador organizes to fight for worker’s right and everyone’s right to get paid for the work they do. We joined about 20 others at the action on the company’s job sight at 6:30 in the morning to stand in solidarity with workers who were striking. It was the first action taken by Casa against this company and they are hopeful that they can negotiate to get the back-wages paid for workers who are owed in total over $40,000.

Protest of Pulte Homes, demanding that workers get paid for the hours they work

We enjoyed a great time with new and old friends in Framingham and were glad to connect with so many welcoming people. It was a great town to pass through that made Ivania and Inacio feel a little bit more at home meeting so many other Brazileros who have crossed borders into the United States. We were invited to return to help start up a community garden and hope that we will be able to reconnect with the companheiros we met here and work together.

Time is flying and so are we! From place to place as we connect with companheiros and spread the seeds of the Ciclovida project and the struggle for justice and ecology.

We had a great weekend getting to connect with friends and companheiros in Providence, Worcester, and Boston.

English For Action Cup

On Saturday morning we wrapped up our time in Providence with  English For Action‘s annual Soccer Tournament. The Ciclovida team kept our wheels spinning on the field: showing off our bike system and charging our batteries for the Worcester May Day rally later, while also playing a bit of soccer ourselves! No big wins on the soccer end of things, but we had plenty of success with people hopping on the bikes and bringing energy for the Ciclovida tour!

Worcester May Day Rally

We headed off to Worcester for the May Day Rally on Saturday afternoon where we were welcomed by many familiar faces from the Worcester Immigrant Coalition, Stone Soup, Worcester Earn-a-Bike, Worcester Roots, Mosaic Culture Complex, and more! It was a beautiful event in preparation for International Workers Day on Sunday and brought out many people to enjoy the many talented Worcester musicians, and speakers from Carpenters Local 107, the African Council, and the Ciclovida team, as well as Reverend Sarai Rivera, Randy Feldman, and Kwasi Sarpong.

Evan Greer performing at Worcester May Day

So many friends in Worcester were excited to meet Ivania and Inacio after seeing the incredible movie premier last fall, and Ivania and Inacio were excited to see the rest of the Ciclovida team’s home city of Worcester.

On Sunday the Ciclovida team pedaled out of Worcester, headed for the May Day Rally in Chelsea that afternoon. We enjoyed a beautiful ride through the hills of Massachusetts, taking a stop in Framingham for some Brazilian fare, since Framingham and the Greater Boston area has the highest concentration of Brazilian people in the world, outside of Brazil.

Chelsea May Day Rally

We continued on our way to Chelsea where we connected with others at the rally at Chelsea City Hall. Then we headed off on our way to Cambridge for an event at the Harvard School of Design, organized by Matt’s sister, Rachel.

Jarabe performing at the Cambridge Event

We had a great event with over 25 people coming out to see the movie and engage in discussion afterwards about the challenge of changing consumer culture in the United States, seed-saving networks, and how to raise awareness about GMO foods and the health problems they pose. We also heard about local projects including a community garden in Arlington, the Cambridge Climate Week (May 13-21), and work being done by an audience member from India with Association for India’s Development.

Spirit Child performing at Roxbury event

On Sunday night we had an amazing, high-energy event with United Neighbors of Lower Roxbury – A Village at Work, South End Lower Roxbury Open Space Land Trust, and Boston Cyclist Union.There was a very welcoming and social atmosphere to the whole event as everyone gathered around for a barbecue and delicious food.

Outdoor Screening in Roxbury

The night was perfect as everyone took seats in the Frederick Douglass Peace Garden to enjoy the musical performances of Evan Greer, Spiritchild, Jarabe del Sol, and Inacio, but it was a little chilly for Ivania who sat huddled under the mounds of blankets.

Evan Greer and Spirit Child rocking together for their "Back to the Roots Tour"

After the screening there was a smaller, more intimate discussion as everyone huddled in closer, and we closed with a prayer to ground everyone in the moment and bringing us all together

The Ciclovida team wrapped up the night be having tea with some new friends, some Northeastern students who lived up the street and invited us in to warm up, talk some more, and sing some songs before we headed back on our bikes to Cambridge.

Closing Circle

Check out the video coverage of Ciclovida by the Providence Journal: http://www.projo.com/video/?bctid=930114926001

We kicked off this past weekend with an amazing event at PrYSM, Providence Youth Student Movement, an incredible community space for youth whose vision is “to confront and end state, street, and interpersonal violence affecting the Southeast Asian community in Rhode Island”. It’s a beautiful, colorful, open space full of energy with powerful words about the mission, vision, and value posted all over the walls as well as art and signs of all the incredible organizing work being done here.

The night kicked off with the PrYSM break dancing group rocking the floor and blowing all of our minds with their incredible moves! Then we enjoyed the powerful music of Soldiers of Life (SoL), Butterfly and Big Sythe who moved the audience with their soulful singing, and resistance-inspiring lyrics.

SoL rocks PrYSM with beautiful powerful rhythms

We had a full house at PrYSM, full of people from many different groups and communities, young and old. We’re feeling the power of people tonight as we see all the incredible work of the youth here involved through PrYSM’s SOUL (Students Organizing for Unity and Liberation) and SeaQuel (Southeast Asian Queers United for Empowerment and Leadership) programs for young people. We also got to hear from other people involved in Fuerza Laboral out of Central Falls who are organizing to stop the exploitation of low-income and immigrant workers in Rhode Island and a couple people spoke about the experience of coming to the US from Colombia and the Dominican Republic.

 

We also heard from the Environmental Justice League of Rhode Island and ECO Youth about their food justice program to make more healthy food options available to people living in Providence. The energy in the room was incredible as people shared information about all the work they are doing on the ground and connecting it to the continued struggle and resistance of Ivania and Inacio.

Full house at PrYSM!

The night closed out with Evan Greer and Jarabe del Sol sharing more of the revolutionary rhymes and rhythms as they did a collaborative free-style, and the room was resonating with energy and resistance. As everyone stayed around after the event to connect, trade contact info, and share ideas, Inacio’s words rang true: “there are seeds here that will grow the large tree that will bring social revolution.”

Rocking the green at Brown University

Today we rocked Brown University, pumping music from our pedal-powered PA system on the green. Jarabe did some free-styling on the mic while biking at the same time! Incredible! We had a great film showing last night and today had the great opportunity to talk to more people about how our pedal-powered system works, during our workshop in the center of campus. We met many curious Brown students who took turns powering the system and charging up our batteries for the show tonight at Providence Youth Student Movement (PrYSM).

Screening at Brown University: Rachel moving the audience with her poetry

Last night we kicked off our tour in Providence with a great event at Brown University with the Brown’s Earth week and emPOWER, a coalition of the environmental groups at Brown. We had another charged event as Rachel, a Brown student, opened with some incredible eco-poetry.

Evan Greer bringing the energy with "Ya Basta!"

She was followed by Evan Greer, who played her first show with us tonight and rocked the audience, as we all sang out “Ya Basta!” together, calling for an end to hundreds of years of oppression, colonization, racism, domination, imperialisnm, homophobia, and sexism.

In the discussion that followed the film, we were excited to hear about local projects including the efforts of the  Providence Fair Food group that is working in solidarity with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, fighting for worker’s rights and fair wages for farm workers.
Some people also shared announcements about May Day (International Worker’s Day) rallies coming up this weekend for International Worker’s Day: one in Providence and one in Boston on May 1st, which Ciclovida will be at. Also, Ciclovida will be joining the May Day rally in Worcester tomorrow, Saturday, April 30th.

Jarabe del Sol of the Readnex Poetry Squad

We had a very special screening at Manhattanville College as we were joined by two incredible artists, Jarabe del Sol of the Rednex Poetry Squad, and Sam Leopold, musician from New York. The night started off with high energy as Jarabe slammed poetry about our relationship to the earth firing up the audience with his passion and energy.  

Sam Leopold singing "Cheap Seed" ("costs more in the long run...")

 Inacio and Sam did a bilingual rendition of Sam’s song “Cheap Seed,” which talks about the real cost of cheap seeds. Afterwards,  Inacio charged the audience with his beautiful song “Ciclovida,” that challenges us ”What is the best way to do good?/Going to all parts bringing ecology/Biking night and day/And still have time for poetry.”

We were hosted by the Theater and Music Department at Manhattanville and had an incredible turnout that brought many new perspectives to our to our tour. People shared some great projects after the movie, including the Lots to Gardens project in Lewiston, Maine which gets young people biking , gardening, and eating and selling their fresh produce! Another student shared more informatio nabotu how to get involved in actions opposing fracking (a  new extraction technology for natural gas that is destroying communities and contaminating ground water), and mentioned the work of local NY organization, United for Action. Ivania challenged everyone present to keep hope in the world of solidarity and the belief that a world outside really exists. This tour continues to bring us that hope as we meet more incredible people working on world-changing projects. The passion, hope, and action of the people we meet along the way continues to inspire creativity in me and all around us. And I am challenged (as we all are) to continue to express and create in order to make this issues visible as well as envision and imagine new ways of being, like the wonderful artists, poets, musicians, and creators we are meeting all along the way.

 

Saving Natural Seeds Workshop

Last night we had our event in New York, held at the Commons in Brooklyn. We started the event with our first Saving Natural Seeds workshop in which Ivania and Inacio shared the importance of saving seeds as well as some practical tips on how to do it. Attendees had questions about Ivania and Inacio’s advice on how to follow the cycles of the moon to figure out the best time to save seeds and how to store them properly.

Event at the Commons in Brooklyn, NY

The crowd grew as we prepared for the movie screening, with a turnout of over 30 people coming out to see the film. People excitedly hopped on the bikes, snapping photos as they pedaled along with the film. After the movie we had a great discussion session with Ivania and Inacio sharing stories about people they met along their trip and Ivania sharing a really difficult story about an indigenous community in the Mato Grosso region of Brazil that was displaced and driven to hunger and malnutrition by the encroaching soy plantations.

Meeting great people at the Commons in Brooklyn

A couple people shared information about local projects, including one person working on the Palestine Farm Project to create cross-cultural unity and sustinability in the West Bank through farming, cooking, and community events. A couple other people are working together to start up their own farm just outside of the city and invited the Ciclovida tour to come when they are up and running. Also, the Commons, where we were for the event, houses organizations that run workshops on social justice, gardening and farming, seed saving, resistance, natural health, and more, and they even have a farmer’s market there every Sunday, year-round!

Making music at Jarabe's house

Now we are in Warwick, NY, joining up with Jarabe del Sol who will be joining us for the next few events, relaxing, preparing for the next event, and making some music in the meantime.

 

Inacio engages the audience with revolutionary songs!

We just wrapped up a powerful and intimate event at the Flying Brick Library in Richmond, Virginia. About 25 people from the area came to the outdoor screening on a beautiful Virginia spring night. The night began with Inacio’s revolutionary songs about the Interamerican Development Bank, land occupations in Brazil, and riding your bike day and night, sending energy through the audience as the sun slowly ducked into the trees.

Discussion after watching Ciclovida

The event closed with a discussion among people present about the Ciclovida movie as well as local actions and projects people are working on that connect to the work and struggles of movements in Brazil. One person shared the story of a local struggle in Richmond around Monroe Park, to stop the city’s attempt to close down and remodel it as a way of forcing homeless people outand continuing to gentrify the neighborhood. This has similar injustices, as Matt shared, to a displacement struggle in Brazil around the World Cup and the city of Rio de Janeiro’s plans to remove/displace anyone who is homeless or poor living in areas that are proposed for World Cup-centered urban development projects. Through our closing dinamico we reaffirmed that connections like these that build solidarity across borders and space are important in necessary in organizing for justice and social change.

Today Matt, Ivania, Inacio, and I took our bikes out for a ride in Richmond to get outside, explore the city, and our bikes to use as mode of transportation, not just a source for generating energy (although they are not mutually exclusive uses…). We went to get food at the local supermarket and had an adventure thinking and talking about food as we perused through the produce section. It was interesting thinking about the food choices we have while on this tour, noticing that apples from Washington state were marked as “Fresh & Locally Grown,” organic tomatoes were $2 more per pound than non-organic, and the avocados were a product of Chiquita (one of the largest banana corporations with a bad labor history). Looking at food choices with a new frame for thinking about health, organics, labor, and agriculture opens up whole new realms of complexity for simple daily tasks like this, but our choices are political. And we must find ways to bring our food and agriculture into line with our values.

VCU Students powering a screening of CIclovida

We also had an event last night where the students of Green Unity at Virginia Commonwealth University welcomed us to their campus to show Ciclovida. Over 30 students came out to pedal-power the show, enjoy music, and discuss biofuels, landless movements, and environmental action.

A VCU student presents the "seed bombs" made by Green Unity

After the movie screening, the students presented the Ciclovida team and all audience members with “Seed Bombs” (seeds rolled into a ball of clay and organic material that are used for “guerrilla gardening”) to help us all spread seeds of native Virginia plants (while in Virginia of course!) and grow plants in unexpected and unused parts of the city. Ivania and Inacio also told stories of the importance of sharing and passing along seeds; that seeds have wonderful magic to them where the more you give and pass them on the more they create and grow and reproduce. In this same way we will be spreading the seeds of new ideas and voices from this struggle in order to continue to grow, create, and spread seeds of solidarity to all parts of the world.

College of William and Mary students with the Ciclovida team

After much preparation, hard work, missed connecting flights, and sleepless nights, the Ciclovida tour team is finally on the road together! We held our first event last night in Williamsburg, VA. Matt, Ivania, and Inacio, presented the film and engaged in discussion to an excited, energy-filled audience of over 30 students and faculty at the College of William and Mary. The Student Environmental Action Committee who have planned an incredible Earth Week of events, which we had the honor of helping to kick off! And they really harnessed all that great energy as people stepped up to power the show with their passion for pedaling!

The three bikes used for the event all hooked into the complete Pedal Powered Mobile Movie Theater, supplying the power for al l the audio and visual equipment! The event was a great success with over 10 pedalers throughout the show, great words from Ivania, Inacio, and Matt after the film and excited audience members ready to take action on industrial agriculture and biofuels.

Today we will be doing a workshop with SEAC to talk about biofuels and agrofuels and their impact on communities in South America and around the world! Then we are off to Richmond, Virginia to do a workshop on Pedal-power systems and alternative energy systems with the Flying Brick Library. Our Ciclovida engineer, Scott Guzman, will be skyping in to explain how he built this people-powered energy system in preparation for the Ciclovida tour. We’re excited to kick off this exciting tour and are looking forward to the dozens of stops ahead of us on the spring tour and all the companheiros we will meet along the way.

Scott working on the Pedal Powered Mobile Movie Theater