Chickens

ARI, as I wrote about in my first post, is a training center for rural leaders, a type of agricultural school for those who work with or who advocate for farmers in their home communities. Most of the participants are not actually farmers, but NGO workers in the field of agriculture or community development. They're interested in learning about different agricultural techniques can that benefit their home communities - better ways of irrigating rice, of raising livestock, of processing crops. So the ARI curriculum involves work with vegetable crops (rice, wheat, tomatoes, soy beans, Japanese pumpkin, komatsuna...) and with livestock (chickens, ducks, fish, cows, and pigs).

After a month of working with the veggies, I got to help with the chickens for the first time this week. ARI has over 900 chickens. Participants help incubate and hatch the eggs, raise the chickens, and then butcher the birds for the ARI kitchen. I started with the end of the cycle, as I was asked to help butcher one pen of chickens with some of the other volunteers. (Vegetarian friends and family, please forgive me!) We butchered 44 chickens within two hours - first cutting their windpipes, then plucking them, then disemboweling them and preparing them for the kitchen. I was exhausted by the end, both physically and mentally, but it was a good learning experience. I now have a greater appreciation for every piece of chicken I eat. And a greater understanding of chicken anatomy!

Later in the week, I spent time with some live chickens, collecting eggs and preparing feed and cleaning out the pens. At first, I didn't really enjoy working in the chicken house. Chickens are not very endearing animals. In fact, they remind me of the velociraptors from Jurassic Park, except without the smarts - just try grabbing an egg from under an angry hen, you'll get quite the glare. Then Jackson, a teaching assistant and ARI graduate from Myanmar, started talking about why ARI raises chickens, and I gained a new appreciation for the little dinosaurs.

First, many of the participants have some experience raising chickens, since the birds are a relatively easy source of revenue. But the participants (or their communities) often rely on imported goods to raise their chickens, which makes them dependent on outside resources - so ARI tries to teach the participants how to utilize local resources to make their communities more self-sufficient when it comes to raising chickens. For example, many participants' home communities rely on concentrated feed, which must be imported and is therefore very expensive. So ARI introduces the participants to fermented feed, which is simply fermented food garbage (i.e. compost) from the ARI kitchen - it works just as well as concentrated feed and costs nothing. In addition to basic feed, chickens also need nutritional supplements to help harden their egg shells. Traditionally, many farmers use crushed oyster shells or some other type of imported shell, but ARI uses our own crushed egg shells, collected from the kitchen, as a cost-free alternative. Many of the participants' home communities also buy their chicks rather than incubating eggs from their existing flocks. ARI teaches the participants how to incubate eggs (using both electric and non-electric heaters) in order to reduce costs and resource self-sufficiency. Jackson told me that before coming to ARI, he had bought all his chicks. After graduating from ARI, he was able to hatch his own chicks, and he wrote an article teaching other farmers within his community how to do the same. So there's a lot to learn from these feisty birds (although I still prefer working with the veggies).

In other and totally unrelated news, I got to go hiking! Last weekend, I went to Shiobara with some of the other volunteers to see the beautiful kouyou (changing leaves). Shiobara offered some interesting insights into Japanese culture. First, the Japanese are huge nature enthusiasts - it seemed like half of Tokyo had joined us on this pilgrimage into the mountains. But in spite of this, or perhaps because of this, the nature was not very far removed from all the trappings of modern life. The highways continue almost to the very peaks of the mountains, and all the hiking trails were only a stone's throw from the traffic and restaurants and souvenir shops. Yet somehow, it was still a beautiful place and a very peaceful experience. As the German volunteer on the trip said, "The Japanese have a wonderful ability to block out the ugly things and only see the beautiful" - I guess I was able to enter into that spirit and just enjoy the beauty of the trail, which wound through autumn kouyou and tall cedars, past waterfalls and forest onsen (natural hot springs). The day ended with some delicious soba and my first onsen experience (so relaxing!). All in all, a wonderful day of natural and cultural adventures.








That's the news from Lake Woebegone! Thanks to everyone for all the recent letters and emails - it's so nice to know that people are reading and to hear what's going on back home. I'm thinking of you all...