The quick backstory is in 2016 traveling Colombia, I met the owner of an eco-hostel Who then referred me to another eco-hostel where I met this incredible community around my age,(at the time late 20s) that were working to live off the land and in harmony with the grandmother Jahe/Ayahuasca medicine. They were the ones that directed me towards my first Ayahuasca ceremony and therefore developed a strong family bond with everyone. Our relationship grew into the following year where we collaborated on a medicine ceremony in Montana in 2017
Fast forward 3 years and I have returned to this same beautiful community in Santander Central Colombia. Except for this time they have inherited a bigger piece of land in conjunction with their eco-hostel, this land is beautiful drive out into the fresh country only to arrive to a paradise nestled into the mountains hugging with the river. Their vision is like many other eco-communities I have covered, to create community and harmony with the land with education, permaculture and eventually retreats as earth stewards. Welcome to Palmita.
A small hike down into the farm first fills your senses with melodies of the running river and smells of lush greenery, and just as you turn the corner a visual of the 13 standing structures on stilts tucked inside the womb of several medium size mountains with a young little fruit forest welcoming you on the way down. Miguel, Louis, Bri, Fabio and Dani, are the original five that I had met several years ago and they are now more excited than ever to be co-leading this new community project into a bright future. Currently about 18 permanent family members live here full time and I happened to arrive on the day of their weekly family meeting and was welcomed with open hugging arms. The meeting entailed upcoming project updates, dates and details, and how everyones week went along with words of gratitude for a woman in their lives.
Creative signs are posted everywhere to guide the unfamiliar where the compost goes, the recycling, the compost toilets, tools, and of course positive reminders such as “you are beautiful and intelligent.” Always in sight in the kitchen is a whiteboard laying out the activities of the week with the names of who is in charge of what for each day, on the other side of the sink is the supplement station of ‘super foods’ and a board to guide everyone with the benefits of supplementing with natural super foods, next to that is the neatly arranged spices, greens and baskets of foods, and at the end is the lounge area/library.
All of the structures are made out of bamboo and are even strategically using some trees for extra support. It was my first time building with this incredibly durable and efficient material and it was fascinating how durable yet easy it is to cut and use for virtually anything. Which is why the circular aspect of bamboo in engineering is to be precise because if it’s not it can easily become a weak point of pressure, but in the same way it also give many varieties to be used. In the beginning they experimented with different types of leaves and methods for their roofs, but because they take a few months to roof, they are now using a recycled plastic which isn’t there a deal roof but they just want to get things going a little quicker. Fortunately there is an abundance of water that a spring provides for cooking and washing and taking a shower is even more adventurous located right on the river for extra cleanliness.
Each morning, lunch and dinner is sounded with the konk that echoes in between mountain ridges bringing everyone into community where each meal is shared together with a preceding prayer and very collaborative efforts of cleaning the kitchen afterwards. Like many other communities they believe that the kitchen and food is the foundation of community. One tasteful evening a few of us took turns working up a sweat grinding the cacao beans into paste, which was completely worth the muscle pump. Each day has some sort of vision but could be subject to a variety of different projects like rearranging, organizing, cleaning, cooking, repairing, food runs. Other days they I have several types of Activities that they share, one I got to see is a good brother from London teaching English to the kids through creative learning games.
The year prior the community did a large fundraiser so that they could get the materials to build a new temple kitchen which was successful and started the beautiful structural design of the bamboo skeleton five months ago. I happened to arrive on the week they have been waiting for for five months to roof it because they were waiting to get the right indigenous maestro from the Sierra Nevada’s down to guide them in the palm leaf roofing process. It was projected to take four to five days of work but I witnessed an incredible community effort even from surrounding farm neighbors coming out to help and we finished the roof inn 2 1/2 days.
Although Before we began with the palm leaves the indigenous maestro had the main community members put their intentions into cotton and then bury it in front of where the kitchen will be so that the land and elements recognize there efforts the maestro said, he also told the group the significance of building the roof; the shell and protective layer of skin is important just as our physical skin is. Since this was my first time learning this type of roof I was excited to learn and eagerly took the first requested job to be on the roof cleaning the bamboo before the palm leaves went on, that was until a branch broke and I caught myself down to safety and then just opted to stay on the ground for the rest of the time, which meant a lot of palm leave splitting. There is a certain technique to split the leaf into thirds and pass it up so that it can hang on the bamboo, the harder we worked meant the quicker the shade we get to reap.
Although there is something about working for each other and the land rather than for a green piece of paper that is so much more rewarding, especially when the timing of the same day we finished it was decided to move a community members marriage ceremony into the newly built temple kitchen and celebrate both matters. The fire, the community shared intentions, the union of marriage, the banana torta cake, the music, the dancing couldn’t have been a better way to break in the the new temple kitchen and be my last night there.
In my 5 day experience I was reminded that peace and quite is a complete luxury especially after staying in busy hostels, It’s as if the sound of silence had been missing. I got to meet and develop new incredible relationships, I got to be woken up by the gradual light of the sun peaking over the full view on the mountain ridge, I got feel the community support and love, I got be reminded of what commitment it is to live this way, I witnessed how new born babies bring community even closer together, I got see how each community had their own personality, and just how wonderful it is good young people to be living in harmony with each other and nature.
Of course as mentioned in other community blogs living in shared spaces and communities is something we are all relearning so of course it comes with challenges, it comes with a heightened responsibility, but as the the bride said so elegantly in spanish is that the challenges are growth opportunities, if it wasn’t for the challenges how would we know which way perfection is? It is clear that I was doing what I believe many others will be doing when they are magnetized to this community and land to re-charge, purify, harmonize the diet, learn ceremony make music, rinse in the rivers and learn about life in a variety of ways through nature and community. Especially for travelers since it’s not the easiest to eat clean on the road people will walk away from this community with a ‘deep cleaning’ sense of self, a new perspective of what community love looks like which others will be able to take with them.
One important aspect of this community is their dedication, devotion and relationship to the grand mother medicine Jahe or Ayahuasca, every week or 2 weeks they have a ceremony as apart of their standard community rituales which understandably provides waves of healing, clarity and direction on all levels for personal and communal growth. It is a very important and serious part of the community relationship. The brothers Miguel and Louis have been properly trained by indigenous maestros and carry the medicine and ceremony in a wonderful way which I have had the wonderful opportunity to sit with them 3 years ago. One of the good brothers and staples of the community left me with some final words, and told me the biggest thing that has kept this project and community going is prayer.
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Also on a side note but same octave, another incredible project that is working in conjunction with Palmita is ‘Ecofinca Alaska Permacultura’ which is only 20 minutes from each other. Paola and Marlin the owners, Are working to replenish the soil’s and produce food, market coffee and take volunteers for education and different community project, as well as different types of ceremony.