Here’s a short video compilation of clips I took whilst staying at the Eco Yoga Park just outside Buenos Aires in Argentina. You can also view a photo slide show of the Eco Yoga Park here, and listen to the Eco Yoga Park podcast here. Thanks to all who appear in the video. Pete, you’ll get it eventually :-).
Run by Hare Krishna devotees, and known by its other name Nueva Vrindavan, the Eco Yoga Park proved to be a wonderful break after nearly 8 months on the road. At only US $12 a day for food accommodation and yoga and meditation classes, it was also great value.
Show notes
As it’s a longer podcast than normal, I thought I’d include a summary of contents with approximate timings:
0-7 mins – Introduction, temple sounds, why I came to the Eco Yoga Park 7-9 mins – Temple Service sounds 9-19 mins – Interview with Svayam, a Hare Krishna Monk/Devotee 19-21 – Hatha Yoga session 21-29 – Tour of the Eco Yoga Park grounds 29-39 – Interview with Jameson & Laura, two volunteers 39-44 – Sounds, music….
In this podcast, I met up with Peggy and Jo – the two founders of Pun Pun. During the interview, we discussed their views on Sustainable living & farming, Earthen house building, how they started out, and the philosophy & vision driving their work.
Pun Pun (meaning ‘thousand varieties’) is an organic farm, seed-saving operation, and sustainable living and learning centre based about 50km North of Chiang Mai, Thailand in Mae Taeng district. The first I knew about Pun Pun was last year, when I heard about an amazing new organic vegetarian restaurant that had opened in the grounds of Wat Suan Dok temple. I visited it at the first opportunity, and quickly became a regular!
Pun Pun offers a variety of workshops and training courses, from their 10 week internship program offering an in-depth, hands-on experience in organic gardening (including seed saving, earthen building, and community living) through to 3-5 day earthen building workshops, and sustainability study trips. If you’re interested in finding out more, you can contact them via their website – the details are below.
You Sabai – You Sabai Home is located in Mae Taeng, next door to Pun Pun’s organic farm and sustainable living learning center outside a village in Mae Tang province, 50 km from Chiang Mai. They also build and live in simple earthen houses, close to nature.
You might also be interested in reading this article proving a rather interesting slant on the use of organic farming techniques in Africa – Green activists ‘are keeping Africa poor’.