By Marina Carvalho | Project Leader
The end of the year is upon us and here in the forest we’re not short of rain. The trees are overjoyed with the amount of rain that has fallen over the past weeks, which adds to our happiness when we look back at another spectacular year.
The most recent news of the year is really inspiring - we’ve hosted almost a hundred children this past quarter, and our hearts are full of hope to see the new generation that is emergeing with an ever increasing understanding that our environment urgently needs protecting.
In addition to this we also participated in training sessions for local teachers, aimed at encouraging them to give more prominence to environmental issues in their classrooms. Twenty teachers took part in this training, carried out in partnership with the Regional Interagency Commission on Environmental Education.
Project activities this quarter focused on the human body and our relationship with the natural world, students were invited to take off their shoes, lie on the ground and feel the energy connecting them directly with the forest.
As they closed their eyes they could better hear the sounds of the animals in the forest, feel the wind on their faces, and learn that everything in the earth is energy and it’s that which recycles the nutrients in the soil and nourishes the trees. And it’s the energy from plants that feeds us too!
Along with their teachers, the students also learned about the medicinal plants in the forest and their uses according to traditional knowledge, and they painted their faces with anatto, just as our indigenous relatives do. You can imagine what a party it was with all those faces painted!
In this way all the students who visited Iracambi this quarter learned in practice that everything that we do to protect nature is returned to us through the energy and healing powers of plants. So once we know this we begin to understand that, it’s up to us to take better care of Planet Earth, right?
And. following this train of thought, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all of you who support our project and are partners in raising a new generation of young ecoleaders. We’d love to count on your support next year too, and, of course, on Giving Tuesday (December 3nd.)
And so we send you our very best wishes for the holiday season, wishing you the same abundance that the rains are bringing to the forest!
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