Back to real life! Well as 'real' as life is here in the Bay Area (I can just hear the grumbling comments about this being vacation-land Mom and Kurt...I agree it can be, I know). Last night I went with Kerli to the "Future Food Careers: Wholesome Food, Vital Rural Economies, Dynamic Professions" symposium at Berkeley. I could not believe my luck when I saw a listing for this lecture series. It's a two-month long series of lectures by 'women practitioners of sustainable agriculture [speaking] on their involvment in and understanding of a regenerative movement."

Last night, one of the speakers was a Berkeley professor, Dr. Clara Nicholls from the Center for Latin American Studies who spoke to us on AgroEcology and the Slow Food movement. I respected the fact that she is a renowned professor in the field of AgroEcology, as well as a good friend of the man who started the Slow Food movement...yet she was critical of Slow Food as an organization in that it's very elitist and avoidant of many issues that are integral to the agriculture and food problem, for instance, true agrarian reform. I agreed at the time, but then I came home and read the Slow Food Manifesto, which states: "...We are enslaved by speed and have all succumbed to the same insidious virus: Fast life, which disrupts our habits, pervades the privacy of our homes and forces us to eat Fast Foods...[man] should rid himself of speed before if reduces him to a species in danger of extinction. A firm defense of quiet material pleasure is the only way to oppose the universal folly of the Fast Life. May suitable doses of guaranteed sensual pleasure and slow, long-lasting enjoyment preserve us from the contagion of the multitude who mistake frenzy for efficiency. Our defense should begin at the table with Slow Food. Let us rediscover the flavors and savors of regional cooking and banish the degrading effects of Fast Food..." Perhaps this organization is for the haves, and not the have-nots; founded with the idea of enjoying fruits of labor, but not in facing the issues that plague that labor. It almost seems to imply that in the manifesto. I'll continue to support the organization, but I think that I'll focus my energies more on groups that are getting at the roots of the issues, rather than just admiring the fruits.

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As I was sifting through the myriad informational materials they had at the lecture, I came across the October issue of The Ecologist. Kerli confirmed that it was a very good issue for people like us to read...and so after the lecture I walked through the rainy streets of Berkeley to moe's bookstore in hopes that I could get the magazine. Sadly, I realized when I got there that they don't carry periodicals and Cody's, who used to be right next door, is gone. I walked back to my car, dejected. On the way home, though, I stopped at Whole Foods (I know, so wrong) for some Soy Dream..and what was on the shelves by the register but the Ecologist!? I got it, I read it, and I highly recommend reading it! The magazine is from the UK and apparently BLT's are pretty popular there, because the cover story is "Inside the BLT Sandwich...The True Cost of Convenience" and it details the "trail of devastation" that the ingredients in the sandwich leave in their wake.