Slow Walk on the Farm

Today I made a slow walk on the farm of our school, situated at the entrance of a remote village in Bihar (north India) where mostly small scale farmers live. I consider the farm a living classroom – there is so much to explore, discover and learn and unlike books it is always changing. The timing of the walk was around 5 pm as it starts getting cooler and usually students are working on the farm during that time of day.

First I entered the orchard with different kinds of fruit trees and vegetables growing on the ground. The wind was strong and felt relatively cool on my skin (mostly this time of the year we have hot winds called ‘loo’). The wind was blowing the branches of trees in all directions. The soil was hard as rock and uneven – one had to focus while walking. Mindful slow walking was necessary as not to trip up. Suddenly a DJ entered the village blasting music with a strong beat from a vehicle, which I could clearly hear from the farm – but not see. DJ’s are invited into the village during marriages and right now it is marriage season so its visits are frequent. I noticed my students were not on the farm and wondered if there was a connection between the village DJ/marriage and their absence. On the orchard I started smelling plants. The young unripe mangoes had a subtle smell and the leaves of the lemon plant were smelling strongly of lemon, especially when rubbed between the fingers. The brinjal plant had velvet like leaves and I noticed most of the vegetables were being eaten by insects. I wondered how we could manage growing enough food while applying natural methods. I noticed many butterflies fluttering around mostly orange coloured. Looking up into the trees there were different kinds of birds, mostly seven sisters. Their sound was as if they were fighting with each other or at least engaged in heavy arguments. The peacock tree at the well had started to blossom bright red flowers.

From the orchard I walked to the farming field where four village women were harvesting wheat. In exchange for their work, we share the harvest with them. As it was a group of known women (the mother of one of our students and her family) it felt safe and appropriate to approach them and start a conversation. Upon request she showed me her sickle and I noticed that is was a combination of iron and plastic and factory made – no longer locally made by the carpenter and iron smith as was usually the case. I wondered for how long this hand work would continue in a rapidly changing world with less human power, more machines. I touched the wheat, it had a hard and dry texture and the harvested plants were partly bundled, partly scattered around. In the open field the soil was cracked open due to the dry heat which is typical of this season.

From the farm fields I walked to the dry grass pathway that surrounds the farm and noticed with every step many grasshoppers jumping up. I tried to photograph them and realised that before and after their jumping they were invisible – well hidden in the dry grass. Suddenly I heard bells and looked up and saw a neighbouring farmer walking his buffaloes. An old man dressed in traditional clothes (doti kurta) with a cloth wrapped around his head, significant for Bihar farmers, leaning with his chin on his stick and staring at me being engaged in a slow walk. The bells around the necks of the buffaloes sounded as they bent their heads up and down to graze. Just a little further along the pathway I noticed our handyman Dhanraj fixing the barbed wire along the boundary of our farm, to prevent wild dogs and jackals from entering the school grounds. Dhanraj can always be found engrossed in fixing or making something. Entangled in the barbed wire fence multiple weeds were growing, among them a climber with dried curly branches and multicoloured inedible berries. Interestingly it is only on the barbed wire fence that these plants seem to survive. At the back of the farm I noticed creepers on the ground with different flowers that will soon turn into vegetables; a few cucumbers were already there.

I ended the walk by zooming out and glancing back at the farmland; with the heads of crouching women poking above the wheat plants, the quiet orchard and the sound of the DJ that was now deep in the village and less loud. While looking back I realised that a whole book could be written about this one farm and that the farm walk that I make so often was experienced so much more consciously simply by documenting observations.

Note: This text was written as part of a pilot teacher training in Slow Journalism through Harvard Project Zero.