Teaching the Past to Build Homes for the Future*

Teaching the Past to Build Homes for the Future*

By Asia Alsgaard

On an average day out of adobe bricks, the Tucson Indigenous Adobe Initiative is building school ovens and sculptures of gila monsters, a lizard native to the southwestern United States with meaning in many local Indigenous cultures, and that’s just to keep the momentum going. The initiative is associated with Sustainable Nations, a privately and individually funded group working to support the economic, ecological, and cultural sustainability of Indigenous communities. The Tucson Initiative is working in urban Tucson, Arizona in the Chuk’son area and with Barrio Indigenous communities to teach individuals skills for constructing and renovating adobe homes. Not only are adobe homes environmentally friendly and relatively simple to build, but they would present a more affordable alternative for Native people in the South West.

Housing prices soared throughout the country after the recession, but where many locations have begun to recover, Tucson continues to struggle. The need for affordable housing on a minimum budget by far out-ways the number of available homes in the area. According to a study conducted by E.C. Hedberg and Bill Hart at the University of Arizona, Native Americans are far more likely to be homeless than in Arizona as a whole. The Tucson Initiative is working to address both these issues through the renovation and construction of adobe homes.

This is just the beginning. The goal is for the initiative to become a long-term program in the area. They have partnered with David Yubeta, a nationally known adobe historic preservationist, who plans to help train the involved communities during an intensive this spring. At the same time, the initiative will also be working on a media project in a partnership with Pan Left Productions and preparations have already begun for spring 2016. They hope to provide a workshop for non-urban reservation communities such as the Tohono O’odham, Yaqui, and Xicano.

PennElys Droz (Anishinaabe/Wyandot) interned at Seventh Generation Fund, an organization focused on historical and contemporary grassroots Indigenous movements. She received her M.S. in Environmental Systems Engineering from Humboldt State University in 2004 before starting Sustainable Nations, an offshoot of Indigenous Environmental Network, with the intention of providing an alternative solution to more current environmentally threatening forms of housing development. The Adobe Initiative developed almost naturally from there, growing out of relationships built by the consultation work provided by Sustainable Nations.

“There had been a lot of talking about wanting to relearn traditional adobe building practice. There are not a lot of younger people with that knowledge,” Droz said.

Gaining the knowledge of adobe practices would allow communities to construct, repair, and renovate adobe buildings that have fallen into disrepair, many of which are still lived in by many members of the community. Currently adobe repairs are very expensive. Only the more wealthy individuals can afford them, creating a situation where the Indigenous people, who have traditionally used these construction methods, are unable to afford the upkeep. Yet the technique is easy to learn and deploy—PennElys Droz recounts helping with her first adobe house renovation at the age of 16. The youth group aims to train native youth in these techniques since, according to Droz, “You don’t have to be a trained contractor to do this work.” One of the reasons adobe techniques are so attractive is that everyone, grandparents, mothers, fathers, and children, can all be involved in the process.

Traditional adobe building is eco-friendly—using mostly earth with limited other materials, is inexpensive, and simple. If correctly made, these buildings can be durable and long lasting. The problem with many adobe houses today is that they were treated with stucco in the 1980s, in an attempt to conserve the buildings. However, the effort ultimately caused damaged to the structures. While the focus is on utilizing traditional techniques, there is an effort to make living in old adobe homes a viable option for today’s communities. This makes it necessary to adapt some aspects of traditional adobe houses. Traditional adobe floors require yearly upkeep that has traditionally involved the entire community in the process. Mobilizing the community for multiple houses in need of refurbishment on a yearly basis to many would be an unreasonable expectation in terms of time commitment. As a result, more modern flooring will be used.

The Tucson Indigenous Adobe Initiative is also pairing with Pan Left Productions to train a collection of young individuals in film production in order to produce a film on the history of adobe construction, highlighting the landscape and ecology of the desert. The idea is that the production will act as an educational tool and will be made accessible to the public after publication. The film is coming at the communities’ bequest to share this information.

While planning intensives and workshops, the initiative is currently working with the Las Milpitas de Cottonwood urban community farm to design and build an adobe oven and grill to keep the energy and flow going. They have also been working with local schools to create ovens and sculptures and have recently completed a project with the help of the 5^th graders at Borton Elementary School.

In terms of the large goals of the project, funding is a challenge and there are a lot of moving parts to juggle, but everyone is working to make it happen. “The amazing thing is as of this moment, the project is coming about at the strong request of the local people and things have been falling into place, “ said Droz.  Adobe construction instructor David Yubeta was so excited about the project that he volunteered to teach adobe construction techniques pro bono.

Droz believes successful projects are those initiated by the local people, as is the case with the Tucson Indigenous Adobe Initiative. The project is also more flexible because it is not going through governmental channels, cutting down the administrative red tape and politics that can often tie up a project. Since the project is community-based and seeks funds from local donors and tribes, it is able to progress more smoothly. “We are running it habitat for humanity style now and in the future, the people we are going to be working with are low income folks that are committed to full collaboration and partnership, becoming trained themselves and working on the homes. There is a lot of sweat equity.”

While current training is taking place within urban Tucson, future plans for the Spring of 2016 are in the works. The focus will be on providing workshops for training Native reservation communities. After training, individuals will be able to return and work with their localized communities to increase the amount of available and affordable housing. The issue of housing is an issue affecting not just Indigenous groups in Tuscon, but throughout the United States. Groups such as the Tohono O’odham, Yaqui, and Xicano have already expressed interest.

The idea is to provide sustainability. Not only will the homes be ecofriendly, but because local individuals are being taught the techniques, they will be able to initiate projects whenever necessary. The Tucson Indigenous Adobe Initiative is a program that aims to start and perpetuate sustainable ways of looking at homes for Indigenous communities in the area.

Source*

Related Topics:

Ancient Indian Ways Used to Change Dust Bowls into Lush Villages*

The Man Who Single-Handedly Planted a Tropical Forest Larger Than Central Park*

The Vanishing Indigenous Nations of the U.S. – Five Facts*

Celebrating a decade of Zapatismo in New York*

Learning New Artistic Skills Develops Creative Thinking that Leads to Creative Solutions*

This Edible Park Feeds 200,000 Hungry People Every Month*

The Watery Road to Serfdom: After Detroit, Baltimore*

The Watery Road to Serfdom: After Detroit, Baltimore*

The city will begin to turn off water to residences and businesses owing $250 or more in unpaid bills.

Despite several days of protests, authorities in Baltimore announced that nearly 25,000 households will lose their access to water starting this Wednesday.

The measure to begin turning off water service follows a decision taken last week by the Department of Public Works to cut water to households owing bills of US$250 or more.

Those affected are demanding authorities reverse the decision, citing the lack of proper notice as well as absence of appeal hearings on the issue.

Local authorities, who said the service will be cut off within 10 days after a customer receives a notice, justified the action as a necessary step to avoid future water rate increases. City officials added that custumers owe a combined US$40 million in overdue bills.

This is not the first time that residents of a major U.S. city face such a situation.

Last year, residents of Detroit were affected when the city began cutting water to households falling behind in payments.

Even the United Nations intervened, advocating on behalf of Detroit residents. However, a judge ruled that the cutoffs were legal and the water department subsquently launched an aggressive campaign, shutting off about 3,000 overdue accounts per week.

Like many former industrial hubs in the United States, both cities have significant poverty rates, as well as serious financial issues looming. Baltimore officials say they must enact major reforms to stave off bankruptcy, a fate that Detroit was not able to avoid when in 2013 it became the largest municipality in U.S. history to declare bankruptcy.

Baltimore activists have vowed to continue their struggle against the measure, saying water is a human right.

Source*

Related Topics:

Detroit: Your World under TPP*

Detroit Residents Fight to Keep Homes They Own, But Developers are Trying to Sell*

The Road that Leads from Serfdom to Detroit*

It Didn’t Stop at Detroit: For Your Water Pay Up or Die *

‘We Won’t Pay’ say Thousands of Irish to Water Privatization*

Schumann Resonance of our Being

Schumann Resonance of our Being

By Hwaa Irfan

If you have ever experienced trying to make a phone call that just will not get through this is the call and we are the receivers.

The signal to our well being, and achieving greater human potential is being jammed. Sounds a bit dramatic doesn’t, but that is the nature of those at the top of the pyramid pulling the strings whose propaganda just doesn’t add up when they spend vast amount of money, yet at the same time impoverish, and make mentally ill the source of their income, us. They meddle with the atmosphere under the myth of climate change, which does exist as it has always existed, with events taking place not only on earth, but throughout the universe which the experts lower down on the pyramid cannot explain within modern science.

Information with-held leads us into the pseudo religion of science and sci-fi which we perpetuate into reality as a manifestation of our minds. Yes, our minds are that powerful and at the top they know this that is the reason for the West’s Brain Project in order to know best how to dumb us plebs down. As such, underestimate the extent to which the life that sustains us, the Earth– the universe and us humans are connected, and how an imbalance either side effects the other.

When the 7.8 Hz magnetic “pulse” of the Earth was first discovered, people thought that this resonance was constant, and we never thought that it would change. With the Pole Shift/Shift of the Ages many assumed that human upliftment is inevitable without the needed spiritual work. However the dismantling of our relationship to the Divine has been happening long before in order to separate our concept of our being in order to make us earth-bound. Earth-bound our reference point becomes limited and entrapped by the constructs of modern man.

Yet, we may go blank when we hear or read the 7.83 Hz, but at no other time has it been called upon us to know what makes us tick, and what doesn’t. Without going into a long history of experiments and evidence, 7.83 Hz is the frequency of the Earth, and the frequency of the human brain. All life forms no matter how slow (e.g. a stone) emanate a frequency which in a state of balance and good health pulsates at its optimum.

The resonance of Earth (Schumann Resonance) has been 7.83Hz for thousands of years. Since 1980 it has risen to over 12Hz. This means that 16 hours now equate to a 24 hour day. Time is speeding up!

Schumann’s Resonance occurs at several frequencies between 6 and 50 cycles per second; specifically 7.83, 14, 20, 26, 33, 39 and 45 Hertz, with a daily variation of about +/- 0.5 Hertz. So long as the properties of Earth’s electromagnetic cavity remains about the same, these frequencies remain the same.

As technology became more advanced, societies built communication systems and military weaponry based on 7.83Hz frequency, which only goes to demonstrate what they know. We utilize the electro-magnetic properties of the ionosphere everyday through wireless communications. However, this level of technology bringing down to the earth’s surface that which has been clearly placed by the laws of nature within the Earth’s ionosphere serves to block the human signal/resonance. Our bodies are having great difficulty in changing with the earth’s magnetic field and that of the ionosphere as exampled by the mass animal die-offs. In other words we are being blocked from a force that is vital to our well-being.

Today, the Earth’s magnetic field is weakening, so this means that our body’s magnetic field is weakening, too. The Earth’s magnetic field protects the planet from solar radiation and from being hit by space “trash” (asteroids and meteors). When the magnetic field, or “shield” weakens, our planet is more susceptible to cosmic influences. When our body’s magnetic field weakens, we are more susceptible to viruses, solar radiation, and the effects from microwaves, radio and television waves, and cell phone waves. This can weaken our immune system, increase disease, chronic fatigue and Fibromyalgia symptoms, and amplify the effects of aging.

We have seen reports of new findings that we have more than 2 strands of DNA – this is a part of the change, and the reason for the panic of those who deem themselves superior.

The Qur’an states there will come a time when the Sun will rise from the West and set in the East. This is the Zero Point of the Schumann’s Resonance. The Inuit of Canada have already informed NASA aka U.S. military that the Earth’s axis is changing. If we are instilled with fear and powerlessness, we won’t be able to change with it to a higher order. What it tells us is that regardless of what our superiors want us to believe, they cannot control the Earth, and/or the universe, but by making us believe they can, they can control us through the mind via technological construct of modern man. But there is also the unknown variable of the human spirit and the in-built drive that it is written in our DNA – a factor suppressed within their own research, as they act as the gods of Greek mythology offering Prometheus the distraction of fore (desire).

Related Topics:

The Main Driver of all Weather and Climate has Gone Quiet*

Sunset Light in the East!*

Inuit Elders Tell NASA the Earth’s Axis has Shifted*

A Celestial Catalyst for Beginnings and Endings

Earth Raising its Own Defence against Powerful Solar Storms*

Wi-Fi from Space – Don’t get Excited Google and Co Just Dumbing You Down*

The Hidden History of the Human Race*

Conscientious Scientists want a Ban on Editing the Human Genome*

The Spirituality of Food

To be Fully Human*

The Self Control Gland and Fasting

The Frequency of Everything*

Reasons to Convert Your Music to 432hz*

And One Ring to Bind Them All*

Fears of a British Policed State Rising Midst the Elite Paedophile Scourge*

Humanity at the Crossroads: The Crisis in Spiritual Consciousness

Five Common Growing Pains of Spiritual Ascension*

The Energy we Pick up Unknowingly*

The U.S. Expanding its Domain to Space and Cyberspace*

Religious Schools Face Closure if they don’t Promote Homosexuality*

Why is the Legalization of Gay Marriage so Important to the Queen?*

U.K. Free School to Close for Allowing God into the Curriculum*

An Awakened Life: Trials and Tribulations*

Why Billionaire Oligarchs Bankroll Feminism*

Gay Commissioner Cracks Down on Churches*

Sex Education, the Key to Social Engineering*

Ontario Teacher Disciplined for Criticizing Child Sex Ed. – Paedophilia Program*

7 Children Kidnapped by the State from Homeschooling Family to Remain in Custody*

The Lie of a U.S. – Israeli Fallout for the Global Stage*

The Lie of a U.S. – Israeli Fallout for the Global Stage*

By Tony Cartalucci

The ongoing conflict in Syria has always been a proxy conflict aimed at Iran, as well as nearby Russia, and more distant China. As far back as 2007, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh warned in his 9-page New Yorker report “The Redirection Is the Administration’s new policy benefitting our enemies in the war on terrorism?,” that a region-wide sectarian war was being engineered by the US, Saudi Arabia, and Israel – all of whom were working in concert even in 2007, to build the foundation of a sectarian militant army.

The report would cite various serving and former US officials who warned that the extremists the West was backing were “preparing for cataclysmic conflict.”

In retrospect, considering the emergence of the so-called “Islamic State” (ISIS), Hersh’s warning has turned out to be prophetic. The destabilization of Syria and Lebanon were noted in particular as prerequisites for a coming war with Iran. Confirming this would be the lengthy policy treatise published by the Brookings Institution in 2009 titled, “Which Path to Persia?”

In it, it is openly discussed that regime change for the purpose of establishing regional hegemony is the only goal of the United States and its regional partners, with attempts to frame the conflict with Iran as an issue of “national security” and “global stability” serving as mere canards.

Throughout the document, US policymakers admit that negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program are merely one of several pretexts being used to foster political subversion from within and justify war from beyond Iran’s borders.

More importantly, Brookings details explicitly how the US will wage war on Iran, through Israel, in order to maintain plausible deniability. It states specifically under a chapter titled, “Allowing or Encouraging an Israeli Military Strike,” that:

…the most salient advantage this option has over that of an American air campaign is the possibility that Israel alone would be blamed for the attack. If this proves true, then the United States might not have to deal with Iranian retaliation or the diplomatic backlash that would accompany an American military operation against Iran. It could allow Washington to have its cake (delay Iran’s acquisition of a nuclear weapon) and eat it, too (avoid undermining many other U.S. regional diplomatic initiatives). 

Various diplomatic postures are discussed in consideration of the best formula to mitigate complicity amid a “unilateral” Israeli strike on Iran. Of course, and as the report notes, US-Israeli foreign policy is unified with Israel’s defences a product of vast and continuous US support. Anything Israel does, therefore, no matter the political or diplomatic facade constructed, it does with America’s full backing – hence the inclusion of “encouraging” in the title of the chapter.

Today, an alleged “fallout” between the US and Israel has been grabbing headlines. Beyond the most superficial of political commentary, there have been no real manifestations of this “fallout.” Israel is still receiving immense aid both military and political from the United States, and Israeli foreign policy is still one with Washington.

The purpose of the feigned “fallout” is to produce room between the US and Israel, so that possible upcoming “unilateral” actions taken by Israel can be disavowed by a “cold” US.

The BBC’s article, “Netanyahu row with Obama administration deepens,” reported that:

A row between the US and Benjamin Netanyahu has deepened, with the Israeli leader accusing America and others of “giving up” on trying to stop Iran obtaining nuclear weapons. The US secretary of state questioned Mr Netanyahu’s judgement on the issue.

This is precisely the political charade implied by the Brookings Institution in their 2009 report as being necessary before any so-called “unilateral” action by Israel could be taken. In reality there is no row, simply a need for establishing plausible deniability ahead of an egregious act of unwarranted, unjust military aggression.

The War on Syria: Containing Iran Before, During, and After Airstrikes 

Such theatrics are but one troubling sign that aggression toward Iran is still very much in the cards, that current negotiations are but a smokescreen for preparations to strike Iran anyway regardless of what concession it is willing to make, and that such aggression may take place once the US and its regional partners believe Syria has been reduced to its weakest state possible – if outright regime change is seen as impossible.

Brookings states clearly that:

As the conclusion discusses, an air campaign against Iran’s nuclear sites would likely have to be coupled with a containment strategy—before, during, and especially after the strikes. Containment would be necessary to hinder Iran from reconstituting its nuclear program, prevent it from retaliating against the United States and its allies, and to deal with Iran’s support for violent extremist groups and other anti-status quo activities. 

Admittedly, part of that containment strategy have been attempts to destroy Syria and Lebanon – where the majority of Iran’s regional support is based and where Iran would marshal support from in the immediate aftermath of an unprovoked attack on its territory by US-Israeli aggression.

In addition to propping up terrorists across the region to attack Iran’s allies abroad, the Brookings report dedicated an entire chapter to “Inspiring an Insurgency: Supporting Iranian Minority and Opposition Groups.” Here, Brookings talks about backing the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and its military wing, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) – the latter being a verified terrorist organization, previously listed by the US State Department as such, and guilty of killing not only Iranian civilians throughout decades of terrorism, but also US military personal and US civilian contractors.

For those who have difficulties believing the US would back Al Qaeda terrorists for the purpose of overthrowing the governments of Libya, Egypt, and Syria, they need only look at overt and continuous support for MEK terrorists in a bid to overthrow the government of Iran to uncover the reality of Washington’s willingness to sponsor terrorism.

Brookings would openly admit that:

…even if U.S. support for an insurgency failed to produce the overthrow of the regime, it could still place Tehran under considerable pressure, which might either prevent the regime from making mischief abroad or persuade it to make concessions on issues of importance to the United States (such as its nuclear program and support to Hamas, Hizballah, and the Taliban). Indeed, Washington might decide that this second objective is a more compelling rationale for supporting an insurgency than the (much less likely) goal of actually overthrowing the regime.

Brookings describes in exceptional detail how the US would organize its proxy terrorists. It would claim:

Insurgencies take a long time to succeed, when they succeed at all. It takes time for insurgents to identify leaders and recruit personnel, establish bases and gather equipment, and learn tactics and proficiency with weapons. It takes even longer to win popular support, erode the morale of the government’s armed forces, and then undermine the government’s legitimacy. 

It would also claim:

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) could take care of most of the supplies and training for these groups, as it has for decades all over the world. However, Washington would need to decide whether to provide the groups with direct military assistance…

And finally, it would admit:

To protect neighboring countries providing sanctuary to the insurgents. Any insurgency against the Iranian regime would need a safe haven and conduit for arms and other supplies through one or more of Iran’s neighbors.

This precise strategy has been implemented regarding Syria. Material support for terrorists operating in Syria has been provided for years by the West, with the West’s vast media monopolies providing rhetoric to undermine the legitimacy of the Syrian government, and US-created sanctuaries outside of Syria (primarily in Turkey and Jordan) for terrorists to to seek safe havens in and through which a torrent of arms, cash, equipment, and fighters flow.

When understanding that the war in Syria is but a lead up to a larger conflict with Iran – with a literal signed confession created by US policymakers clearly serving as the foundation for several years of American foreign policy across the Middle East – one begins to understand the urgent imperative incumbent upon those who, for the sake of their own self-preservation, are tasked with stopping it.

Russian and Chinese efforts to obstruct US designs in Syria are about more than selfish regional interests, they are a matter of self-preservation, stopping the conflict in Syria from spilling into Iran next, southern Russia afterwards, and eventually enveloping western China as well.

That the US has committed itself to fuelling chaos in Syria despite the unlikelihood of actually overthrowing the government in Damascus, costing tens of thousands of innocent people their lives, illustrates the callousness of US foreign policy, highlighting that Western sponsorship of terrorism around the world constitutes perhaps the most egregious, continuous, and most horrifically demonstrable threat to global peace and stability in our age.

As the US and Israel conduct their latest diplomatic charade, a harbinger of even more chaos to come, those concerned must read the policy papers of the West and understand the true nature of their methodology if ever they hope to expose it and stop it.

Source*

Related Topics:

It Is Time for Iran to Tell the West ‘Goodbye’*

Iran, P5+1 Joint Statement Calling For Removal of All Anti-Iran Sanctions*

“We, the elders of Zion, pull the strings of Congress”

Zionist-Saudi Onslaught Reveals Civilian Casualities*

Israel’s Latest War in the Planning Eight Years*

Israel Admits Aiding CIA’s al-Qaeda in Syria*

Greater Israel” Requires the Breaking up of Existing Arab States*

Egypt: Israel to Support Sisi’s Regime*

U.N. Report on How Israel Coordinates with ISIS inside Syria*

Iraqi Forces Arrest ISIL’s US, Israeli Military Advisors*

Behind the Occult Significance of the Israeli Supreme Court*

And One Ring to Bind Them All*