BOM DIA!!... from an Irish Ethnobotanist in Brazil : Wild Food - Amazing Nature - Hippy Souls - Shamanic Shenanigans

kate-m (52)in #introduceyourself • 7 years ago

HELLO WORLD!! I’m Kate. Eek, first post on steemit – kinda exciting!!!!! Want to introduce myself and my interests, who knows maybe I’ll start to blog on some of these themes?

An Irish Cailín

I’m the “psychedelic sheep of the family”, of a family of four from Donegal, N.W. Ireland (think wind-swept wide-open beaches and rolling hills blanketed in glorious purple sheep-nibbled heather, rugged castles and megalithic tombs, faeries, and cosy pubs with turf-burning fires and eccentric publicans). Although my feet have since wandered far I will always be a Donegal girl! My friends say I’m cheerful and sometimes they think I’m “a bit different” (depends where they are on that scale themselves!).

Researching in Brazil

I’m currently single and living in Paraty, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, writing up a doctoral thesis about the wild food plant scene here (or ‘PANCs’, non-conventional food plants, as they are known here). I was thinking that it could be interesting to share on here in Steemit some of my experiences in Paraty and from fieldwork, and maybe even geek people out with some of my thoughts on my research. It seems like a fantastic platform for researchers to reach a broader audience (whoever reads theses anyway??). What do you guys think?

Lovely lovely Brazil...

So you might be thinking to yourself, “that’s very cunning, choosing one of the top tourist destinations in Brazil, renowned for its lush Atlantic forest, pristine waterfalls and beautiful tropical beaches to do your PhD fieldwork”, and I would say, “yes, yes it was very cunning!”. Okay, well there’s more of a backstory to it than that, but it has been rather lovely living here for the last two years!

A transformative experience

It has transformed my life getting to know the ins and outs of the wild food and agroecology scene, to taste the beautifully slow rhythm of life of modern ‘neorurals’ (young city folk seeking a simpler rural life), and to also discover the hidden universe of contemporary shamanism (this last hadn’t a huge amount to do with my research I’ll have to admit – but was very transformative!).

My Interests

Rather than waffling on, here’s a list of some of the things I‘m properly interested in:

• Biodiversity Conservation (from a social sciences perspective)
• Ethnobotany / ethnoecology
• Wild food plants
• Agroecology
• Permaculture
• Bushcraft
• Travelling & knowing new places (not a whistle-stop backpacker)
• Language learning
• Amateur psychology (attachment theory, mindfulness, enneagram)
• Neo-shamanism
• Sacred plants
• Nature connectedness
• General alternative living sorta stuff
• Van-life (I have an unhealthy obsession with the idea of campervan living – I’ll have to show you photos of a Bedford van I had a while ago!)
• Capoeira
• Yoga and massage
• B-movie zombie flicks
• And more recently - Cryptocurrency mania ... woohooo! All in on Steeeeeeeem!!!!!!!! Chooo Chooo!!! (he he, not that I have all that much to go "all in"!)

My Photos

And here’s some photos to give you a taste of my Brazilian life…

The view from my apartment’s balcony:

Me and Safo the cat, who deigns me with his company and permits me to feed and cuddle him:

A visit from my bestie Amanda all the way from Ireland:

Getting in with the agroecology crew during a permaculture event in a local quilombola community with Senhor Alcides (I think this is the 'roça' with the best view in all of Brazil!):

Helping collect juçara, the “açai of the Atlantic Forest” (some brave souls head up those palm trees without a ladder!):

Helping sort through a juçara harvest on another occasion:

Visiting an urban agriculture centre in São Paulo (Arboreser):

Visiting a family farmer growing passion fruit among other things:

Visiting farmer’s markets in Paraty and asking interminable questions about plants (this is Senhor Valdevina, a much respected agroforester): IMG_20170217_105812103_HDR (1).jpg

Left holding the baby whilst spending time at an informant’s family agroforestry farm inside the Bocaina National Park:

Attending lots of courses about wild food plants (photo credit to Thai Frô/Satya Thai who's in front - check her music out on Soundcloud, it's amazing! Also check out "Gourmet PANCs- Alquimia alimentar" on Facebook to know Poliana who ran the course):

Wild food salad:

Basically, life involves eating lots of marvellous wild food creations:

Visiting my favourite local waterfall:

Shamanic drumming at a local yoga festival:

Taking part in shamanic ceremonies…

Enjoying the vibrant night life in Paraty’s beautiful historical town centre:

Visiting Rio de Janeiro and humming Barry Manilow to myself the whole time that I’m in Copacabana:

I hope you enjoyed my little Kate intro! Maybe I’ll take some time out from thesis writing to write some blogs about my experiences and research. PhD students are always looking for a bit of good distraction!!

Lots of Love Peace and Harmony to the whole Steemit community!! Ahooo!

#nature #science #travel #steemit

7 years ago in #introduceyourself by kate-m (52)

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annsita (52) 7 years ago

Hi @kate-m nice to meet you my ann @annsita....i come from Thailand.....welcome to steemit , i just new here and hope you have fun and share more post and hope we can be friend enjoy about our post...so my Englisg is't very well, but will try the best for that....
so have to be nice if we are follow each another and vote... i will follow you and vote, have a nice day dear. and see you soon dear ^_^

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kate-m (52) 7 years ago

Thanks Annsita :) I hope things are well over there in Thailand!

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luny (42) 7 years ago

Nice meeting you on Steemit Kate! I'm sharing a lot of your interests and really love to read more about all your personal and job experiences! To be able to fulfill my dream in working with nature, I became an ecologist in The Netherlands. At the time I think nature is not really present anymore in this country. But people start to get more aware nowadays, so that gives me a little hope. Looking forward to read more about the researches you conduct in Brazil and also your spiritual experiences :)

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kate-m (52) 7 years ago

Nice to meet you Luny. I studied a first degree in ecology and worked as an ecologist in Ireland for 6 years. Then I felt an itch to look at things from the human perspective as it felt a lot of ecologists weren't very interested in understanding humans, whom to me seem to be central to conservation. Subsequently, as part of a masters in conservation and rural development I spent three months in Gabon studying with the Baka forest people, so-called "pygmies". I was really impressed with their spiritual relationship with the natural world and I really started to feel that this is perhaps a fundamental challenge that we face in today's world (in which we face a global ecological crisis), re-establishing some semblance of connection and fundamental respect for the natural world. This is one of the reasons I think wild foods are so interesting, it seems to awake in people a curiosity and awe about the natural world that inspires them to look at the natural world around them in a completely different way, and with much more respect and appreciation. I'll look forward to reading some of your thoughts about animism and the human-nature relationship!

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luny (42) 7 years ago

Hi Kate, wow that’s been spoken really well. I couldn’t agree more with you on this!
More and more people start to realize now that they can’t live without nature. Also more and more researches show the relation between for example nature and recovery from illness and wellbeing. Nowadays people go to churches less and less, and instead have a belief in science. Interesting to see that through science and researches we can now slowly start to reach more people around the world.
How amazing that you have seized the opportunity to be among the people who still know how to be in touch with nature and communicate with everything that is around them. This is giving me some butterflies in my stomach when I think about creating this opportunity for myself as well 😊
I hope by the end of this week I have a knew article to post!

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kate-m (52) 7 years ago

It's a very exciting and relevant research area I believe. Seems like psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists will be the ones who make the most interesting contributions to conservation in the coming decades! Imho. Of course you don't need to do an academic course to make a contact and share experiences with indigenous peoples... some of the most personally important learning experiences can happen in your own personal adventures and missions whilst travelling. Here in Brazil for example there's lots of opportunities to share experiences with indigenous peoples. I was chatting today with a friend that here in Brazil perhaps people have a bit more opportunity to orientate and align themselves with the wisdom that is there to be learnt with indigenous peoples. Indigenous wisdom is contained within the lived experience, to a secular westerner who honours science, forms of knowledge that aren't transmitted by written word can seem less valid, less important, or simply invisible. At times it seems that regardless of all the technological advances that the human race makes, for every step we think we take forward, we are sliding back another two steps. Putting so much importance on technology we neglect our own spiritual well-being, we neglect our own physical practical capabilities, we neglect the nurturing of a caring, loving feeling of relationship with our tribe, with our surrounding nature, our home (in the sense of our own bodies and our ecosystems that we inhabit). I've really started to see that people who discard religion and superstition and fixate on science as the one truth, sometimes can be sadly closing themselves off to what might be very important lessons and wisdom (I know that there are many exceptions to this!!!).

Quick definition from Wikipedia:
"Positivism is a philosophical theory stating that certain ("positive") knowledge is based on natural phenomena and their properties and relations. Thus, information derived from sensory experience, interpreted through reason and logic, forms the exclusive source of all certain knowledge."

The thing is, science (positivism) is pretty limited in what it can prove, but for sure there's phenomenon occurring that simply can't (or won't) be proved (yet). More and more I see "positivists" as actually being very dogmatic in their beliefs, which of course they would receive as anathema, surely it's all the religious people that are "dogmatic". Yet science is actually peppered with blind belief (there's a great Ted Talk on this), and I often feel that they [the millions of positivists] arrogantly believe that science is the holder of the only truth. I think it's useful for scientists to be a bit more humble in their stances at times. I'm really interested in the tension that exists between Western knowledge systems and traditional / indigenous knowledge systems, a lot of the literature on this totally taps into this dialectic and contradiction within positivism.

I'm rambling now. I guess the point I wanted to make was a response to your comment about people abandoning religion and moving to a secular stance and belief in science. I personally have come full circle on this issue, from being quite a staunch atheist and proponent of scientific approaches. I still highly value and promote a scientific, that is to say, systematic, studious, rational analysis of a situation and using that as a guide to decide how to go forward. But along my path I came to see that spirituality has a profoundly important role in human society and well-being, for ethical behaviour and moral reasoning, as well as well-being in society. And sometimes as part of that you need to give in to the irrational, to honour ritual and mysticism, to connect directly with feeling, to channel creativity, to encounter the mystical unknown. And we could do well to look to some of the long traditions of religions that have mastered techniques to connect people to the sacred.

Ha ha, still rambling! I'll shut up now.

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luny (42) 7 years ago

Don’t mind the rambling, I’m very interested in hearing your point of view 😊

I have some difficulties in expressing myself in English, but I’ll try my best. I really agree with you that science is still very limited in what it can prove, but it is still the one thing that millions of people (at least in The Netherlands) have a blind trust and believe in. Spirituality and phenomena that can’t by proven or explained by science on the other hand, are waved away almost immediately by a lot of people.

Nowadays for example, a lot of children in The Netherlands don’t even know anymore that milk comes from a cow and meat that is in store comes from living animals as well. Or another example, that a lot of western diseases have direct links with the foods we eat today and the materialistic world we live in. To me the answers to these problems lie in being in contact with (your) nature and attuning to nature. But a lot of people think this is nonsense and decide to see nature as an enemy and something that we have no part in. How can we reach these people? How can we show them the benefits of connecting with nature ones more. I think for a lot of people the answer lies in communication on a level that they understand and believe in. For example in The Netherlands more and more food-forests start to arise and people remove bricks from their yards and plant trees and plants (project ‘Operatie Steenbreek’) because to them it lowers temperatures and attracts bees to pollinate their flowers. These people are being convinced through scientific prove and results. These steps that people make are still small, but to me every small step towards nature and towards being in contact with your spirituality, is a step in the good direction.

This was what I meant to say about people not going to churches anymore but instead have faith in science. I have come from this same place and believe that a large amount of the people need to be spoken to in a (scientific) language that they understand in order to want to open themselves to spirituality and to grow on a spiritual level. Some scientists and writers to me can be that bridge between science and spirituality, for example Lloyd Pye and Bryan Hubbard.

I hope I’ve been able to explain my theory in a way that it makes sense..

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kate-m (52) 7 years ago

Hello,
Just home from a long walk so don't have the umph to write much, but yeah, totally. :) You gotta communicate with people in a language they know!

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nickmorphew (63) 7 years ago

I agree, Kate - I studied environmental science and management, but I prefer referring to it as environmental science and people management. If we can change the actions of people, our surroundings change as well. I was working in mining, of all jobs and quit before the end of my scholarship to become a teacher. Now I get to run my very own gardening club at one of the schools I work at.

Take care :)
Nick

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