A sense of joy comes to me with bringing to you part 2 of my journey of discovery, self-sufficiency and Earthships. In part 1, I shared the inspiration and people that led me to travel to India and to my first Earthship construction site. In this post I will be sharing that experience and what came in the year after the Earthship experience.
Travelling India was an eye opening experience. I felt fully in the moment and found a profound sense of gratitude for being alive.
I learnt to value myself. Travelling there for 6 months was a path that had to be taken.
It was the end of the monsoon season in October 2009 when I arrived at Karuna Farm, India (where Alex’s Earthship is located). This meant that construction was slow and the most I could offer was to help build a planter wall, to house the indoor garden (pictured before and after).
This did, however, give us plenty of time to chat. Alex taught me a lot about the Earthships principal functions and how the building responds to a lot of the question of self-sufficient living. It was a paradigm-shifting time for me, that to this day still influences me! I can recommend the books 'Earthship' by Michael Reynolds, 'Earthships in Europe' by Mischa Hewitt and 'Water From The Sky' also by Mike Reynolds.
Here are some photos from then.
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After Karuna Farm, I spent 5 weeks at Sadhana Forest, on the outskirts of Auroville.This futuristic model of a town is built on the principles of sustainability and spirituality.
There, I lived a strict no-processed food lifestyle that taught disciplined and the reality of life-without modern comforts. We worked in permaculture and reforestation as well as teaching children vital survival skills. To talk about personal growth, I felt that those 5 weeks were a time of real personal growth and self-reflection for me. I can recommend the book 'Secret of the Ages' by Robert Collier.
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I met my partner Lisa in Hampi, India. We eventually built our first low-carbon and ecological structure together, but I will get to this soon.
I arrived back to the UK in 2010. Lisa soon followed, 3 months later. I set about getting involved with Earthship Brighton, as well as attending sustainability conferences, talks, eco-building festivals and events as much as possible. I took Lisa along with me as often as I could. She too got inspired to get involved! We attended two Earthship construction courses as well as a Straw Bale course together, held at the Earthship itself in Stanmer Park.
There we met Mischa Hewitt, one of the project leaders for Earthship Brighton. He and Alex Leeor actually worked together on projects between C-level solutions, The Low-Carbon Trust and Earthship Brighton. ( A few years later I would be sitting with Daren Howarth who was also pivotal in the above projects, and would later be featured on Grand Designs for his Earthship house in Brittany).
In the meantime, I took a level 1 carpentry course in Brighton.
By this time I was almost certain that I wanted to build my own house and that it should be in some way made low-impact with elements of self-sufficiency and with sustainable or recycled materials.
We used to dream of the possibilities of building a prototype house to get experience in self-building.
I remember the day that Lisa called her dad in Sweden and asked if he would let us build a summer house on his land.
I was so happy when he agreed, and we set about starting a build date in early summer of 2011.
Sustainablebuilds..
...Is the name that stuck (for a while) for the summer-house project; a single roomed building made from upcycled, recycled and natural materials that use energy efficiency principles and sun-based orientation. This was my first building project completed without any previous construction experience, for Lisa too. 
We took a lot of inspiration from the Earthship movement and had a brilliant group of volunteers who helped us on the build. We both learnt A LOT from this little project, mistakes and all and I owe thanks to both Lisa and her father Peter for giving me this opportunity.
Some of the building stages can be found on this page
(https://sustainablebuilds.wordpress.com/)
Some photos of the summer house.
Before too long, we both felt that we needed more education. Lisa took a multi-trades and skills course in Umea, Sweden. I signed up for MSc Architecture: Advanced Environmental and Energy Studies at CAT, Wales.
It felt like a new chapter was opening in my life! Through the ups and downs, things were moving forward. A string of events were forming that I knew I needed to follow if I was to stick to my goal of one day living in an Earthship inspired home.
In my next post, I’ll be sharing with you what the MSc course taught me and the I job I got working for the coolest, innovative dude, Dan Warburton. I became a board member for New-Earth UK, the Super-Adobe Earthbag movement and I will be sharing where my life has taken me so far.
Look out for my next post in a couple of days!