I almost cried

Going to Mawe Hai today was so awesome. After a lazy morning talking with the Wisconsin team at breakfast, I headed out to Mawe Hai around 9 and it was great. I walked around a bit and they made some more raised beds (well, they outlined them in rocks to be filled with soil when it is available) and are looking towards expansion. I talked to one of the workers a bit and then walked over to the nursery. Then I headed down towards the lake to check out the sights. One sight that hit my eye that I was not expecting was about a dozen compost piles that were made yesterday. I wasn't there yesterday and didn't say I was coming today, so there was no fear of being reprimanded in any way (a couple times they quick start to do things Wilfrieda suggested they do on her last visit as soon as the car comes in sight). It was good, honest acceptance of compost as they made each pile. They continued to make it today, and it will be three weeks or so before it is ready to put in the afore mentioned new fields.

The other day too we were weeding soy beans and there was one part where there was a huge contrast between the beans grown in soil and the beans grown on rocks. They planted soybeans in these fields because nothing else would grow there and in a place where there was some soil, the plants were doing well, were dark green, and looked great. Two feet away it was all rocks and the plants were severely stunted, yellow and even brown from death. It was a great visual of the power of soil. I mentioned this to the workers and said we needed more compost because compost is good soil. One of the workers then said "yes, compost is the best soil." It's pretty exciting to see things that I've been doing for a couple months now finally taken hold of. It goes to show though how much work sometimes needs to go into acceptance of something new. I spent a lot of days making compost alone and now they are doing it. I almost wanted to cry as I walked towards the small brown mounds of freshly made compost piles.