Seven Sisters Festival - Sacred food.

In late March Summer, our beautiful friend Emily and I went to Seven Sisters Festival at Mount Martha for the most amazing three days of music, spoken word, delicious food, workshops and dancing, all in celebration of the feminine. The site is an old scout camp in a pine forest nestled on a hill just near the ocean.
We packed up the car on the Friday and made our way out, slowly letting the tendrils of whatever had been going on in each of our lives fall loose for the weekend.We spent the next three days going from one incredible workshop to the next. I sat in on workshops about birth, Chinese medicine, permaculture, deep ecology and Ayurvedic cooking. 

There was one workshop in particular that had a big impact on Summer and I. It was called 'Spirituality - growing food'. The workshop was run by a woman called Robin Koster-Carlyon who lived and worked for four years in the Peruvian Andes, researching the Andean cosmic vision and its connection to food production. Robin spoke about the way in which the whole design of the Incan communities was based around the worship of their gods and in particular their gods of fertility and harvest. The way of growing, harvesting and consuming of food was considered a very spiritual activity, connecting each individual to the soil, the water and the plant life around them. They saw the simple connection between the health of the soil, the health of the food and the health of the people consuming it. Healthy, dynamic earth meant healthy grounded communities and vice versa, a cyclical relationship. From her experience as a farmer Robyn also spoke about the simple idea that if you are caring for your soil, ensuring that it has as much nutrients and vitality as possible - this will transfer to your food. It made me think about what a great opportunity food gives us to check in and create a spiritual practice that is also grounded and practical within day to day life.

 It made us think about what we consumed each day as food. We came to the realisation that, when shopping at large supermarkets such as Coles and Woolworths and even smaller shops such as IGA, we had very little knowledge of how our food is grown except that some of it was 'organic'. We resolved to try to shop only at small local stores and community gardens and markets. To be fully conscious of where our food was grown and hopefully how and by whom. 4 months on, and we haven't bought veggies, dairy products, grains, flour, bread and even toiletries from anywhere that doesn't support a local business and where we can be conscious of where these products have travelled from. Our passion for our little veggie garden also grew ten fold.  Its inspiring, and gets us excited about cooking/eating each day. 

 

Leah and Summer