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Gathegu Gatungo

@islandshamba

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Agroecological guide, garden designer, and mother.
Growing food and medicine while accompanying children on the land in the mountains of Puerto Rico.

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The land is telling me that nothing urgent is more important that paying attention to what's ripe right now.

Honestly, you have never had a banana until you have eaten a sun-ripened one in a tropical climate. Your banana love will be transformed and you will look at your local supermarket bananas like imposters.

The bananas sold in the USA aren't the color of yellow crayons (what is the history there?) and their are so many different cultivars with complex flavor profiles. Ripe here is the moment before sweetness turns and fruit flies throw a party. There was a festival underway but luckily, it was just the beginning of the celebration.

The banana trees are the symbol of abundance and are wildly generous. They’re one of those plants where almost nothing is wasted if you’re paying attention. It gives fruits, fibers for textiles, fertilizer for plants, healing for the gut, nutrients for the body, natural food wrapper for boiling, and roasting food, macro/micro nutrients, banana fruit (purple part is edible), pollinator for hummingbirds, natural plates, waterproof leaves provide shelter, natural mulch, shade and water for plants, and it just brings so much joy. Once the tree is cut down for harvest, new shoots push through the soil and the cycle begins. Imagine we could clean up the environment if we demanded clothes, rugs, and other textiles made from banana fibers. Easily the most affordable and regenerative solution right in front of us. No more plastic on our bodies!

#Food
#Fiber
#medicine
#shelter
#textile by @islandshamba

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9 months ago

Don’t compare. Honor.
Same family. Different callings. Both heal.
One makes cotton.
One makes fruits.

Cotton heals through fiber and structure
protecting wounds, holding warmth, absorbing, supporting recovery.

Flor de Jamaica (hibiscus) heals through fruit and infusion, cooling, cleansing, nourishing the body from within.

~Plant wisdom.

No compares. Honra.
Misma familia. Distintos llamados. Ambas sanan.

Una produce algodón.
La otra produce frutos.

El algodón sana a través de la fibra y la estructura:
protege heridas, conserva el calor, absorbe y sostiene la recuperación.

La flor de Jamaica (hibisco) sana a través del fruto y la infusión:
enfría, limpia y nutre el cuerpo desde adentro.

~Sabiduría de las plantas. by @islandshamba

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10 months ago