mUD MOUNTAIN BLOG
Back in 2011, I found myself camping alone on a remote
Turkish hill. There was no power or water on the land.
It was the start of an adventure that profoundly changed
my beliefs about what is enjoyable, or possible...
I’m ready. My earth walls are thick, in fact they’re bullet-proof, which may be just as well, because whenever you approach the subject of gender, you are guaranteed plenty of disagreement. So I'll dive straight in. It might not be what people want to hear, but I say, if you’re a woman out there wanting the house of your dreams, the chances are you’re not going to get it unless you do it by yourself. Living the life I do, I’ve run into many folk who’ve run from the conventional and galloped into the hills after their dream life. Some are couples. Some are groups. Some are single. Some are continually in transition between all three states. But when it comes to women actually taking a hammer in their hand and constructing their very own dream house, top to bottom, I’ve only ever seen it happen without a man. (Though I’d love to hear a story where that wasn’t the case, so if anyone has got one, let me know). Now, I freely admit, I have been the fortunate beneficiary of barrel loads of assistance from both genders in the creation of my home. House-building is rarely a job for the Lone Ranger. Who builds single-handedly? But the question is, who is owning the project? When constructing something unconventional or even ground-breaking, women, for a variety of reasons, tend not to take ownership when there is a man on the scene. And when you don’t take ownership, you don’t have the final say, which means when it comes to choosing between your dream of a hand-crafted stone wall with natural mud mortar that hasn’t be en invented yet, or a quicker but less earth-friendly concrete solution, your ‘impractical’ vision is likely to hit the wayside. All of this is not necessarily the fault of men. Over the past two years, I have been blessed by streams of benevolent testosterone cascading onto my land; men who have genuinely gunned for me and been there for me when the going has got a little bumpy. But I must add, for the sake of honesty and truth, that there have been deep ravines of misogynist contempt to negotiate, too. Once, before the earthbag adventure, when I was in the Kabak valley and trying to glean how a platform was put together, the builder turned to me and sneered, ‘you’ll never be able to do this.’ His group of cronies laughed so hard, you’d have thought I was trying to push testicles out of my groin, not understand the hardly brain-stretching logic behind what was basically a wooden gazebo light years from rocket science. Events like the one above hurt. And it’s one (but definitely not the only) reason women stay away from construction. But in all honesty, Mr Builder was only voicing a belief that the group subconscious (both male and female) has accepted, no matter how polite a face it puts on it. Please note that I said subconscious. Consciously, many of us want to promote equality of opportunity. The trouble is, women whacking nails in, or revving a chainsaw, is not an image we have been taught to absorb or project (unless it’s via a few music videos of buttock-wobblingly dubious content). And women can excel when it comes discrimination, too. How many times have women gone through my site and referred to me as a man! But let me get the plywood straight, before a thousand and one oestrogen propelled jigsaw blades are whirred in my direction. This isn’t about blame. I can be just as bad. What this says to me is, forget the guys, quite a few women don’t view women as being able to build. And the reason for this is that there are some deeply-rooted, widely promulgated myths floating through the ether, and they flit in and out of our ears, time and time again. They are in women’s heads. They are in men’s heads. And they are lethal. I have, at various times in my life, believed some of them. But over the past two years, pretty much every single one has been smashed to genderless smithereens. Myth 1. “Women aren’t strong enough to build alone.” Oh yeah, the all-time classic. I’m sorry to say even the most well-intentioned are prone to voicing this. Really, shelve this belief right now. We live in the 21st century, and there is a tool for pretty much any job you can think of. And when there isn’t? Well, you’d be amazed at just what you can lift, or drag when you put your mind to it. In my experience, physical fitness, stamina, lateral thinking and sheer obstinacy are far more useful than size (which rarely equals strength anyway). But whoever you are, however big you are, the more you lift, the stronger you get. If the worst comes to the worst, you can always hire some muscle. This way you retain ownership of the project rather than having to compromise your vision. Myth 2. “I have no experience. No one builds without experience.” This is a tough nut to crack. When you have no experience, it’s hard to find someone generous enough to let you get your greenhorn mitts on their prized Black and Decker. That’s why ultimately, I think women only build alone or in groups of other women. Because it’s nigh impossible to get a foot in the door otherwise (though I am indebted to Adam Frost back in 1987 for patiently letting me grapple with his bike spanners and Swarfega, these things are not forgotten.) Myth 3.
“It’s much easier just to flirt a bit, and get a guy to do it.” Yeees. It’s so very “convenient” to allow the man in the group to sweat through all the “difficult” jobs, right? (I raise my hand here, guilty all the way to the compost heap). Though, seriously, I’m starting to think our human bent for convenience is our worst enemy. It makes slaves of us all. We lose our independence, our muscles and our self-belief for what initially appears to be an easier life, and invariably is the road to ruin. The physically challenging jobs can often be the most rewarding ones, too. You finish the day exhausted but aglow with a feeling of self-confidence and accomplishment. Who needs a gym? Myth 4. “When I mess up, I’ll be ridiculed until kingdom come because I’m a woman.” This is not a myth. It’s absolutely true. One only has to skim through the net to see the unparalleled mockery women are subject to when they make the slightest cock-up in any area considered male. But the beauty is, the derision always seems to come from small, jealous wannabes who’ve never managed a single gutsy project in their life. So take refuge in that, I know I do. Personally, I’ve never met anyone that’s actually built an eco-home who has criticised anyone else. It’s a supportive community. It is also why I proudly display every blunder I have made, because if you haven’t made an error, you haven’t built a damn thing. You’ve sat in front of a screen and typed instead. Myth 5 “I don’t want to build. I can’t think of anything worse!” I have no idea how much of this is self-imposed myth and how much is a genuine dislike of construction. There are presumably people of either gender who have as little desire to build, as I have to organise a dinner party. My poor, long-suffering friend Elif is one of them. No doubt traumatised by my relentless efforts to ‘give her a chance’ to build (I’ve had her plastering doors, holding up beams and carrying water tanks), last month she drew the line. When I offered her the drill, she shook her head in outright refusal. ‘Ooof! I’ve no idea what you see in all of this!’ She said. ‘Now, I’d like to cook dinner if that’s alright with you.’ And yes. It was very alright with me. The best I’ve eaten in a long while.
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The lid of the night is fixed firmly over the sky. The stars peer through like thousands of shiny, white eyes. The lights of Alakir burn in the distance, faraway lanterns rocking gently in a sea of pitch. And then it begins.The muezzins start the call to prayer, their voices wafting between the mountains; an audible morning mist. Too bad if you don’t live in a Muslim country. There’s nothing quite like their haunting dawn arias. Back in 2011, when I was living in a tent, that potent pre-dawn awakening was a ritual. It changed the flavour of my entire day. But after a while I moved into my mudhouse, installed solar panels and light switches, and forgot all about dawn just like everyone else. I would smile when I heard the muezzin call, roll over and go back to sleep. Yet nothing stays the same in life, does it? Which subconscious demon it was that drew me to the idea, I don’t know. One way or another fate conspired, and I did something I had said I never would. I adopted a dog, Rotty. I would kiss goodbye to those lazy, late mornings there and then. All too soon, it became obvious. The call to prayer was Rotty’s cue. Before daylight had so much as stretched a finger over the horizon, she would begin to whimper, then howl, then bark – anything to get me out of bed. How I cursed her! I tried everything to restore the previous order of mornings; I reprimanded her, ignored her, put her close to my bed when I slept outside (she licked me to death in excitement), put her in the kitchen (she cried so mournfully I had to get up). I buried my head under my pillow. I moved inside my earthhouse to drown out the noise. She scratched my doors and wrecked my walls. Finally, I threw in the towel. ‘Agh! Have it your way, Rotty!’ I got up. I remember that fateful first morning well. The muezzins’ chorus coiled around the valley. Rotty’s whines spiralled in sync. I groaned. I blinked and stretched. Then I began to fight my way out of my mosquito net. Now, the mosquito net is both an indispensable and simultaneously devilish contraption. It is designed for use by sober, fully-functioning individuals with 20/20 vision. For reasons known only to mosquito net makers, there is no emergency exit. And this is why, if you have to evacuate your net in a hurry, you will fail. After much flailing about, I gave up trying to find the net's opening and slid commando-style under one edge. Bang! I rolled off the bed, onto the floor. Half of the web came with me. There was some bad language. I disentangled myself, pulled myself up and promptly tripped over Rotty’s lead. After all this, I staggered stroppily in the direction of the bathroom. The turmoil was all the more unbearable, because Rotty was leaping about squealing in excitement. ‘This is all YOUR fault!’ I grumbled, shaking my finger in my pup's face. She sat her bottom in the dirt and wagged her tail inanely. It was a routine I was to enact every day from then to the present. Even now, each dawn call to prayer, I curse the day I got a dog. Then I fight a blind duel with the mosquito net, fall over a shoe, grumble at Rotty, and stomp off up the hill with her bounding along behind. But after a few steps, everything changes. From way off east, light begins to pry open the lid of the night. The stars close their eyes one by one. Mountains appear from nowhere with cloaks of fur pulled over their jagged, old shoulders. Birds crank up their morning twitter. I can literally feel the Earth coming alive. Rotty and I will have walked for no more than ten minutes before the sun pushes over the ridge of Moses mountain. And when it does, the entire valley is washed pink, and then copper, then gold. I turn to Rotty. Now it’s my turn to grin inanely. ‘Oh I’m so glad you got me up for this!’ I gush. I wish I could say that Rotty winks smugly here. She doesn’t, because Rotty has no idea why I wouldn’t get up at dawn in the first place. Everything that’s not nocturnal gets up at dawn. It’s only humanity that has gotten out of the habit. And it’s true. Ever since I have been rising with the sun again, I have been feeling extraordinarily well, both in body and mind. There’s no doubt about it, we are designed for that rhythm. Sales of Prozac would plummet if people simply went to bed and got up a bit earlier. Which brings me to Winter Time and the invidious reversal of daylight saving. Yes, it’s that time of year again. As if we didn’t have enough trouble rising with the sun, the government orders us to put the clocks back an hour. Am I the only one to find taking an hour of daylight from a highly productive time of the day, like between 5:30 pm and 6:30 pm, and then wedging it into a predominantly useless time, say between 6:00 am and 7:00 am, fundamentally flawed logic? From the groans I hear each year, it seems I’m not alone. ‘Ooh the nights are drawing in now!’ We say. There are scowls. ‘I hate it when the clocks go back, the days are too short.’ I’ve often wondered why we do it at all. Back in the UK, there are a couple of minority groups (farmers, and an extinct creature once known as ‘the milkman’ that only people of a certain age will remember) that dislike daylight saving, because it means darkness until 10 am. And on the basis of those dwindling voices, the entire country puts the clocks back. Other countries like Turkey follow suit so that they stay in sync with European business hours. Yes, we on the Mediterranean are essentially reversing the hands on our timepieces, because a deliverer of milk in 1970’s Yorkshire wanted to see the sun rise before he finished his shift. On this basis, one might ask why we don’t put the clocks back eight hours instead of just the one, that way night-shift workers in Asda would get a fair deal on sunlight too. Such is life in a centralised system. And that is why, this year, I decided to put an end to the tyranny and rebelled (nothing new there, some might say). The last Sunday in October came and went, and my clocks remained unchanged. I wasn’t entirely sure how the experiment would unfold. But it soon became apparent that the advantages of holding on to daylight saving are many, and they multiply when you are the only one to do it. Not only do I still enjoy daylight until half past six in the evening, but the banks now open at ten and close at six, which is a lot more convenient if you ask me. No longer do I arrive in town and find the Post Office about to close for lunch. And whenever I meet up with someone, I’ve always got another hour to spare. Yet now of course, out from the night of convention, another more profound truth dawns; the arbitrariness of clock time. Yes, be it Winter Time, Summer Time, or Greenwich Mean Time, do I really need a chronometer to schedule when I eat, sleep and work? Hmm. I’ll let you know the answer to that next year perhaps, when I throw out my clock instead.
Someone interviewed me the other day. ‘What was the biggest obstacle you faced?’ She asked. We were sitting on a rug under the shade of an olive tree surveying my mud house, which will presumably never actually be finished. Obstacle? By and large, I haven’t really suffered too many major obstacles. There were small annoyances, like running out of money, or the weather not following my timetable, but these were challenges rather than great iron doors slamming in my face. They often forced me to dig down and find skills I never knew I possessed, or slowed me up and stopped me from making any number of mistakes. No, money, weather and time are not insurmountable obstacles. They are the crucial limitations of the physical world that shape any creative project. But, there was an obstacle, a slobbering, great beast of a hindrance. As I sat, my dog gnawing relentlessly on a stick by my right leg, it welled up inside me in a bubbling wave of frustration. It’s a hurdle I seem unable to get over. And it is still driving me crazy to this day. The biggest obstacle I faced, still face, and that anyone who dares to create anything faces, is the seemingly endless deluge of naysayers, hell-bent on darkening your day. ‘It won’t work.’ ‘You can’t do that, such and such will happen.’ ‘Olmaz!’ (Turkish for all the above) The chorus resounds, on and on. Where does this incredible onslaught of negativity come from? And what is behind it? Why, when someone has never even thought about trying to do what you are already doing, when not even a single letter has been typed into Google, does he or she find the audacity to say ‘it won’t work’? I’m dumbfounded by it to be honest. I’d say, for pretty much every single thing I’ve done on this piece of land, there has been a squad of head-shaking, sighs of disapproval, or snickers behind my back. And if I had a pound for every time I’d heard the word, ‘can’t’, I’d be starting a Mud empire by now. First, I was told I couldn’t live alone on a mountain in a tent because I’d be murdered or raped, or snakes would bite me, or heaven only knows what else (I camped for eight months and I loved it), next I was told I’d never survive up here without water (I managed for two years thank you very much). As far as earthbag building goes, my house has apparently been falling down ever since I laid the first bag. I was told, including by architects, that under no circumstances could I build a house without concrete foundations (the house has survived a 6.1 quake in perfect condition), people said the walls were going to melt in the rain, that it would never be strong enough, some ‘friends’ turned up and even tried to push the walls down just to see (I believe they bruised their arms). I realise I may be on the verge of ranting here, but I’m starting to feel like Joan of Arc hacking her way through droves of invading skepticism. My right eye is beginning to twitch at the mere mention of the word ‘can’t’. And I can quite see myself pulling the next unsuspecting naysayer up by the lapels and roaring, ‘Have you actually TRIED this?’ The reason my voice is now rising an octave and I’m exhibiting a few traits of persecution complex, is that words have power. When someone is in the process of creating something new, a positive mind-set is crucial, and this ‘can’t, won’t, you’re mad’ type doomsday mentality can scupper a project before it even gets off the ground. Yes, telling someone they can’t do something is just about the worst thing you can do for them, no matter what your intention (and I’m dubious about that, too). Because you are actively helping them fail. It stops them in their tracks. It makes them feel at worst incompetent, and at best marginally unhinged for daring to step out of the herd. They waste precious time and energy doubting themselves (Can I really live in a tent? Can I build a house? Perhaps I can’t. Probably I can’t. I’ve never done it before. Perhaps I’d better give up.) Everyone has more than enough hesitancy of their own, they hardly need some other clever dick to pop his head over the flimsy parapet of faith, and add fuel to the fires of self-doubt. Which brings me to what I assume is behind this bird-brained ‘can’t’ attitude; the insatiable need for people to cut down anything created by another in a subconscious effort to boost their own flagging self-esteem. Let’s say your project didn’t work out how you planned. Perhaps your earthplaster crumbled, or the windows fell out, or the whole construction was sucked down a sinkhole. So what? Would it have been really so much smarter never to have tried, to huddle within your comfort zone and play it safe? I say those who shy from the edge wind up bored and dissatisfied, hence why they have nothing better to do than tell you, ‘No, you can’t.’ And when things do go wrong, as they do from time to time, then you’ll see the truth in the smirks lurking behind the naysayer’s veil of concern. They actually WANT you to fail, simply so that they can be right. And that, quite frankly, is just not cricket, if you ask me. So, that is my greatest obstacle. And if anyone else is daring to build from the earth, that will probably be your greatest obstacle too (unless you chance to live in North America, where folks say ‘awesome!’ and ‘hey, that’s great!’ instead). Forget about the rain, and the roof rafters, the weight of the bags, or your lack of experience. What you need, throughout, is confidence. And sometimes it’s hard to find. There is really only one thing to do about it, spend less time with the wet blankets, and more with those who believe in you. And your solace may well be online communities of people who are actually doing things, instead of just flapping their tongues.
The latest in the firing line of ‘No, you can’t’ is my organic garden. Apparently, you can’t grow plants using broken down manure from your composting toilet because a) they won’t grow, b) you’ll contract bacillary dysentery from your compost, c) you have to be a goat to make decent fertilizer(?). To see how the above is all patently nonsense, please look at my organic garden to find out the easy, clean, and healthy way to grow vegetables. I might never have dreamed of being an earthbag builder, but I did always harbour a lust for writing. So while some vocations might be unplanned, others are locked in our hearts from the word go. I think I’ve wanted to write since I was about six years old. Yet, it has always seemed so dauntingly out-of-reach. There are publishers to convince, cynical editors to win over, networks of the ‘right’ people to circulate among. I’m not really a circulator. And I’ve never felt particularly congruous with the literati, nor am I able to see the world in the ways that journalistic convention necessitates. I have often felt I must have been born with alien lenses grafted onto my retinas. So, I buried that little dream years ago and became a teacher instead. But it was there, it was always there. And then along came the internet. You’d think that my writing would have immediately found its expression in a blog. Yet, I never saw myself as a blogger. I’d got it into my head that blogs were the diaries of bored housewives, or the ramblings of conspiracy theorists. My hands, all callouses and scratches, were too dirty for all that typing, my brain not wired for the information technology required. I was completely computer illiterate. But underneath that bank of preconceived ideas subsisted the cornerstone of my prejudice. I thought writing was an art confined to books and newspapers, not something that flashed up on screen. And then, as usual, something in my life went ‘wrong’, and I was forced to reconsider all of that. It is just now, as I tip over the first birthday of The Mud, that I remember how and why I started. It all began a long way from my remote mountain roundhouse in Turkey. The Mud actually took off in Taiwan. It was January 2012. Winter had dug its icy claws into my hillside. The house was up, the roof was on, but my mudplaster wasn’t working. I was out of physical energy and out of cash, and a well-paid teaching job in Taiwan was as available as a waiter in Kuşadası. If truth be told, I had no inclination to go East at all. I wanted to finish my house. But with only a thousand dollars left in my account, reality was staring at me hard. And it had a face I didn’t like too much, one with haggard jowls and a mouth full of scurvy. So, I buckled up, gritted my teeth, and braced myself for a stint of school teacher confinement in Asia. I have to say, after a year of living under the wide, blue bowl of the Turkish sky, it felt like doing time. Yet, how grateful I am now. Because it was in Taiwan, land of sleek high-speed rails, and hi-tech madness, that my Mud blog was born. There really can’t be two more opposite places on Earth than Turkey and Taiwan. With the exception of Istanbul, which is nearly a country in its own right, Turkey is all boundless space and rural wilderness. It is hirsute men and voluptuous women, exploding emotions and laissez-faire, tea breaks and ‘tomorrow’. Things take their time to move upwards in Turkey, just like the olive trees in the fields. And nothing goes to plan. You either learn patience, or you leave. Taiwan, on the other hand, is cluttered and fast. It is an island the size of Belgium with a population dense enough to make a mountain nomad’s eyes water. Metropolises back onto each other the length of the west coast. They form long trains of cuboid urbanity, and their streets are tight braids of scooters tied with colourful ribbons of fluorescence. Wherever you go, clouds of people (neither hirsute nor voluptuous) are going there too. Taiwan is convenient. It’s also workaholic. At least, I’ve never worked in any other country where a teacher grafts from 7:50 am until 5 pm. So, a little over a year ago, I was sitting in front of my classroom monitor in Taiwan repressing the urge to keel over from boredom. The question of why a teacher spends hours in front of a monitor is one you have to go Taiwan to find out. But that’s how it was. And instead of just swiveling right and left on my chair and clawing at the window, I decided to do something constructive. I taught myself how to build websites. And I can tell you, this was quite an undertaking for someone who two years prior hadn’t even known what a PDF file was.
Slowly but surely, The Mud emerged from the swamp of my ignorance. And low and behold, a niche for my dream of writing was sculpted into the ether. Thus, one year on, it’s time for a little gratitude towards Taiwan. The money didn’t last all that long, and I’m almost certain I’ll never teach in a school again. But I thank you Taiwan for technologising the hillbilly, so that she can live every aspect of her wildest dreams. And I thank all these things that go wrong too. Where would I be without them? I’m skint, and I have been for about four years. But, it wasn’t always this way. Before 2009, I was flush. I waltzed about the city of Antalya throwing money left, right and centre like confetti. I nibbled on absurdly priced pastries in top-notch restaurants. And I terrorized the streets of Turkey in a spanking new Toyota Yaris. Oh, it was the highlife, and I wouldn’t deny it, I loved it. And then, as often happens in life, one day it all disappeared. How it disappeared is not the issue. We are usually curious about downturns in other people’s luck, because we think if we uncover the ‘mistake’ the other made, we can safeguard ourselves from the same fate. But, safeguarding isn’t the point here. Because what we’re so often safeguarding against is the best thing that could happen to us. So I’ll say it again. I was prosperous before. It was fun. And now I’m skint. And do you know what? It’s better than being flush. Skint is a fantastic word, often to be heard scudding through the dulcet vowel tones of my native Essex vernacular. It’s a variant of ‘skinned’, referring to the condition of not having money, and it is precise in its meaning. This meaning is important, because skint is not poor. Though you’d think, from the way we have been educated, that moneylessness and poverty were one and the same thing. Poverty is a scourge that has little to do with your bank balance. There is cultural poverty, emotional poverty, material poverty, intellectual poverty and perhaps most detrimental of all, poverty of the imagination. It’s a state of privation and a mindset of neediness, dark and thwarting in its suffocation. Losing money made me realize that I could never really be poor, for the simple fact I am already inherently rich. We all are.The idea that we desperately need money has created a deep poverty of spirit, and the advertising industry, with its empty obsessions, has turned our imaginations and self confidence to slush. I earn on average less than 200 pounds a month from editing and stone painting. I have no car, no iphone, no Dolce and Gabbana handbag. I live in a mud hut up a mountain. Well . . . only when it rains. Apart from that, I sleep under the stars and recline on second-hand armchairs in the forest. This isn't a stance of moral or ecological one upmanship. It's a preference. It’s true I have worked for money, and that money has bought me my land. But, by peeling away the layers and layers of the unnecessary, I have somehow, almost inadvertently stumbled into the life of my dreams. I no longer experience the lurching dread of Monday mornings, and there is no seven am panic. I take an hour or more to eat breakfast. I have no boss. But let me get it straight, I’m not judging all that money can buy as bad. And to have no money at all, or to be deprived of the basic resources is a desperate state of affairs. But let's be honest, those necessities are things like clean water, air, food and shelter, not a car or a new pair of shoes. Not that I'm exhorting the world to suddenly give up their cars. I've spent years loving driving and only sold mine last month. I'm merely pointing out, the car is a preference, not a need. And the moment you no longer have one, that becomes obvious. Money, when it works, is a useful exchange system (though there are others that are fairer and don’t involve banks), and there is a certain pleasure to be derived from some of the merchandise it can procure. Even so, money is not all that it’s cracked up to be, and acquiring the stuff can prove far more painful than the experience of living without it. Which brings me back to why I actually prefer being skint. Because I've woken up (a little late some might say) to the severely unadvertised fact that there are many things that only moneylessness can buy. So, just for the record, here it is; a list of some of the benefits of being wonderfully, gloriously, luxuriously skint:
1. You don't get ripped off when you’re skint. Fraudsters know you're an empty vessel, so they steer well clear. Burglars are apathetic as well. You can leave your door unlocked, because there’s naff all to lock up. 2. You soon learn who your friends are. And believe me you DO have friends who like you for more than what they can squeeze out of you. It’s comforting to know you are worth more than your status symbols and the 'prestige' of your career. 3. You have nothing to lose. That’s liberating. 4. You become extremely creative as your imagination starts to burn on all thrusters. 5. You stop throwing things away. This is both good for your soul and the environment. 6. You make ‘downgrades’ which often prove to be upgrades. I sold my car and bought a motorbike instead. I cannot tell you how much I love the feel of the wind in my hair as I roar along the country lanes. 7. You engage in bank free, money free exchanges. I scuba dive as often as I want all summer long thanks to an exchange deal with my local dive centre. Everybody wins. They get a free helping hand for the busiest three weeks of the year, and I get free dives. 8. You slow down and watch the flowers grow. Money and earning it often seems to involve a lot of haste. Things take longer without heaps of cash . . . but who cares? It’s not a race, is it? 9. The best bit about being skint is that soon enough you learn to live on very little, which means you no longer have to work all the hours to 'survive'. With all that free time you can explore any number of hobbies that don’t require money, things like: Creating your own blog and waffling to your heart's content on it, tree climbing, philosophizing on the meaning of life, Armenian reed flute playing, Oolong tea drinking, Stargazing, Anatolian lace making, wine distillery, playing chess, Ludo or I spy, trainspotting, planning revolutions, ricotta cheese making, Bagua zhang or Indian stick fighting, squirrel and tortoise watching, potion creation from wild herbs, and a whole host of other things the morons on TV think are ‘uncool’ (YAWN), but those of us who actually have a personality and more than a breadcrumb of intelligence can find deeply engaging. 10. You can even create a kitchen spending almost no money at all. If you're wondering about that take a look at Building for Free. “Don’t you get lonely up here?” It has to be the question I hear most often whenever someone is intrepid enough to pay me a visit. True, that question make take a while to form.The journey to my home is a process after all. Tongues loll out as friends hike down the sun-broiled track. At the bottom they spot my earthroof, and my water tank skulking behind the undergrowth. A corner is turned. Hearts probably sink as my guests step past my compost heap on the right and a tower of dusty lime bags on the left. I admit the entrance needs some work. Finally the land is reached. The view rolls away from the visitors. It’s a fir-speckled rug of undulations unravelling down to the sea. My earthbag house now looms. It's a circle of dirt poking out of the land like an upturned hat. There is often some analogy to the Smurfs at this point, and more pertinently to Smurfette. My visitors take a peek inside. They imbibe the earthplaster sculptures, and again the view framed in the doorway. They become quiet. My land has a habit of quieting people, I’ve noticed that. The key is turned in imaginations, and visions move into gear. I think I know what my friends are thinking. Could I do this? Would I want to do this? And if I did this, what would I do differently?” Sooner or later the question pops out. “Don’t you get lonely up here?” And I don’t know how to answer it, because the answer I give always sounds trite. No. I NEVER get lonely. But this isn’t because I’m a freak, nor a Buddha, nor even Smurfette. I’ve felt lonely many times in my life; lonely in crowds, lonely at parties, lonely when I didn’t fit in, and loneliest of all in romantic relationships. But it’s difficult to explain why there’s no loneliness here in the mountains unless you experience it. I think loneliness is the sensation of not being accepted for who you are. It is also a feeling of disconnectedness, of not fitting in. And here snuggled in the arms of pure nature, where the judgments of other humans are inaudible, I am accepted. I am whole. I fit in. I am also never alone. It might look as though I’m alone if you think aloneness is merely the absence of other human beings. But I’m not. I’ve become very clear about that over the last two years. The land and every living entity in it communes with me. It is obvious. But only if you are quiet. And only if you meet it half way. People scoff at the idea of plants and insects possessing any kind of sophisticated sentience. I would certainly agree that it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. So you can choose. Either you see life and love in all things, or you don’t. Either you reach out to the trees and the lizards, and let them speak to you, or you focus blindly on humanity as the only source of intelligence and filter your ability to connect accordingly. It’s a free world. It’s a choice. But when you do give nature a chance, when you ratchet up the sensitivity dial inside you and tune in, magic blooms. Vegetable plants burgeon before your eyes, trees pour energy into you, vipers leave you alone, and camel spiders begin to look charming. Whether it’s pheromones, energy fields or some sort of shared consciousness I have no idea. I only know that attitude is everything. The moment you treat any living being with respect, when you consider it as your partner or friend or equal, when you genuinely care for it, that being transforms. And conversely when you mock, abuse, fear or disregard the same thing, it disengages from you or attacks you. So when the sun sinks a little lower behind the great pines, and the coffee pot is empty, my visitors make their way up the track and back to the world out there. As dusk rises and does away with the shadows, the plants begin to glow. It’s an ensorcelling colour green they emit at that hour, a light that evokes Narnias and Secret Gardens. I begin my watering ritual. As my vegetable patch shudders under my simulation of rain, I feel a sense of connection and well-being I rarely experience with people. It seems to radiate through the pores in my skin and fill up the entire garden. This land is a part of me, and I’m a part of it. This has made me understand my place on the planet too, a
place of connected participation. I see the first street lamp pierce the evening down in Alakir bay. I imagine the prattle and the gossip down there, the noise of humans and their desperate clamour for attention, the competitiveness, the condemnations hidden in the creases of smiles, the obsessive need to be right, the disguised slights, the guilt-tripping, the empty talk about nothing. Perhaps not all human interaction is quite this negative, but when you pull the façade off most conversations, how many are really based on mutual respect, kindness and caring? How many make you feel truly fulfilled? Then it’s my turn to ask. I whisper into the wind, and let it carry my words all the way over to the lights at sea-level. “Don’t you get lonely down there?” Ten days ago I hurt my knee. It’s a recurring injury exacerbated by car driving. The repetitive tension while pressing the gas pedal has caused inflammation of my knee tendons. Hmm. Am I the only one seeing the metaphor? Being the obstinate sort that I am, it’s taken a while for me to accept that I might need to slow down a little. I really don’t want to. I have so many plans and ideas, and I’m itching to bring them to fruition. No chance right now. My knee has given up the ghost, temporarily at least. So, with all this immobility, there has been time on my hands for a little reflection. A few mornings ago, I took time to stretch my ailing leg. Stepping onto my wooden platform, I struck a few yoga poses. I inhaled the clear, late-spring air. Looking over the yellowing hill, a slope that was as verdant as a rainforest a month ago, I was reminded of how quickly things change. This plot of land, the valley, in fact our entire worlds are perpetually dynamic pictures.
As I finished my yoga session and lay in relaxation, I heard a flurry of activity from the pine tree next to my kitchen. A swirl of bee-eater birds rose like a plume of electric blue smoke. The cloud pulsed in the air. It looked like a genie, inhaling and exhaling. Bee-eater birds migrate from Africa in late spring. As their name suggests they munch on bees. My village holds a huddle of bee-keepers, which is why these attractive and vividly-marked birds grace us with their presence. Naturally, bee-keepers and bee-eaters are not the best of friends, and the locals will routinely pull a shot gun out whenever they see a bee-eater swarm in the vicinity. Seeing as both bees and bee-eaters are dwindling in numbers I’m ambivalent about the ethics of that. But I’m not of the shooting disposition. And the bee-eaters choose my pines to overnight in. As I lay on the platform post-yoga that morning and stared into the sky, I was mesmerised by those bee-eaters. They circled and dove directly above me, creating a living, moving display of such beauty and precision it was almost hard to believe it hadn’t been choreographed for the purpose. My mind returned to my knee and the gas pedal, to driving at break-neck speed after goals, to all the grand plans of my life, none of which have ever turned out how I thought. This adventure, the mountain-house adventure, is an anomaly in my life. It was never planned for. It was never on my ‘to-do’ list at all. I had no great vision of building my own home because I had never considered such a thing could ever give me so much pleasure. But this space apparently didn’t need a plan. It was almost as if it grew by itself, a little like the wild grape vine next to my toilet. Before this home, I thought I had to do yoga, to breathe and meditate, and follow a set path, in order to find peace and happiness. I was driven, hot on the trail of the elusive goal of enlightenment that so many people bang on about. But awakening is everywhere. It surfs along the sunlight that illuminates the leaves, it flirts with the movement of the air, it thrives in the plants bursting through the soil, it lives in us too. It’s all quite peculiar really. My bank balance is fairly pathetic. I have no romantic relationship, no prestigious job, no luxury car. In fact I have none of things the powers-that-be would have us believe we need to for success or happiness. None of this matters one iota, because however it appears on the outside, on the inside I feel overwhelmingly complete, almost as though I’ve made it. I think life is like the bee-eaters. It swirls and dances and makes us gasp in wonder. Things appear and disappear in their own time. Often when we look back over our shoulders, we haven’t a clue how it all came to be. It’s almost as if it just ‘happened’. Even so, every now again I’ll still kid myself into believing there are things I have to do. I’ll look life in the eye and issue it a few ultimatums, things like, ‘the kitchen MUST be finished by next month.’ or ‘We’re going to get that plaster on, whatEVER it takes.’ And life looks at me, nods ironically and grins. ‘Really?’ it says. ‘You think so?’ Then it’ll give me a knee injury. Or send a deluge of rain. Or make my car break down. Because the picture of our lives can’t be forced or mapped, or even perhaps imagined. We are both creators and creations simultaneously . I still do yoga and meditate. I still drive too fast as well. But honestly, it was participating in the creation of my home – a home that listened to the Earth – that was ultimately the most enlightening. One summer morning back in 2011 something significant happened. The sun had turned into a blazing white ogre. It had a pelt of fire and a stare that could fry the skin clean off a capsicum. It was the end of July. And July on the southern coast is when folk run for shade, or water, or air conditioned malls. Nothing can survive in that heat. Grass withers. Mammals flop dejectedly under trees. Even the great pines, some at least a hundred years old, no longer stretch for the heavens. Their stance becomes one of stoic endurance as a lifeless dust slowly coats their branches. This wasn't in itself significant, however. Summer happens every year. Granted, we always forget. From the lamenting every July you’d be forgiven for thinking it was the first summer to ever see the wrong side of 40 degrees. Streets empty, people flake out in gazebos. Sometimes they refuse to get out of bed at all. ‘Çoook sıcak yaaa!’ (It‘s sooo hot!) They wail before they drop back and reach for an ice-cream. But that July, the July of 2011, I wasn’t one of those late risers. I had to be out of my tent by seven. It was no longer because I was bounding with enthusiasm vis-à-vis any number of construction projects, nor was it eagerness to watch the pink wave of dawn roll over the mountain peaks. I had to be out, because being ‘in’ was tantamount to wrapping yourself in cellophane and bedding down in a Turkish bath.
I reached forward and pulled myself out of the canvas. Immediately I winced and grabbed back my hand. I’d branded myself on one of the tent pegs that had the misfortune of being in the sun’s path. Finally I stood up and surveyed my Queendom. It was a sorry sight, a rolling slope of yellowing expiration. The top terrace of the land, where my tent was pitched, was even worse. It was south Turkey’s answer to the Gobi. Cracks zigzagged through the waterless earth. And where there were no cracks there was dust. I turned to head for ‘the kitchen’. It was then that I noticed it. The significant thing. There, a little in front of the tent, was a small patch of green. I blinked. No. Nothing could ever grow independently on this broiling plateau of death. It was impossible. I moved towards the mysterious green entity in disbelief. There before my eyes a plant was sprouting. ‘Seeing is believing,’ they say. Well sometimes it’s the other way round. Now I believed, and thus I saw. As I picked my way through my desert, I found tens of these plants. Where had they come from? It was as though they’d been waiting all summer for everything to collapse, before they raised their hairy little arms and shouted, ‘Ha ha! Our turn now.’ I think I mentioned that I had read a certain book. And it stated when you love your domain, everything in it tilts towards you. After my experiences with carpet-sweeping ants and kitchen-cleaning lizards, I was gradually becoming something of a natural magic apostle. The land itself was my balm, the animals my affection. What about the vegetation though? Was there a reason this strange little plant had popped up? Should I make a tea out of it? Was it medicinal? Hallucinogenic even? The days went by and the peculiar heat-spurning plants grew. They weren’t particularly attractive, a little like rosemary but floppier and messier. And that was unfortunate. I can become obsessed with aesthetics at times. The plant was ugly, so I began to ignore it. I think I might have even called it a weed. Then one day I noticed this ‘weed’ cluttering about a tiny grape-vine remnant I was trying to salvage. At some point in the past either a person or a bird must have dropped a grape seed. The seed had struggled. It had sprouted. Now, in midsummer a few feeble cricket-eaten leaves were hanging desperately onto existence. Every now and again I’d throw my washing up water over them and try and talk the baby vine into surviving. Now here was this opportunistic weed cashing in and usurping the moisture! Grrr. I stormed towards the prolific newcomer with intent. Ha! In one quick snatch I’d uprooted it. I threw it to one side. Or rather I tried to throw it, because it was sticky, as if secreting oil. Pausing a little, I noticed a smell. It was a cross between lavender and eucalyptus. I took a deep breath. The aroma was out of this world! And it was coming straight from the ugly heat-loving weed. I found the fragrance so refreshing I began to use it for washing in, a sort of natural aroma-therapy. When I did I was swept away by the cooling sense of well-being it bathed me in. As the summer deepened, our village became steeped in such high temperatures we all developed heat rashes. Our legs itched. Our arms itched. And the hotter it got, the more red spots appeared. I washed in my weed-water. My rash vanished. Soon enough the sun began to shed its monstrous summer bulk. As it slimmed it dropped lower in the sky. The days drew in. My herb receded back into the earth. I never learned its name. No one around here seemed to know. ‘Smelly weed’ was the best anyone could do. Since then all sorts of other natural growth has come to my attention. I have only two acres of land but it’s a living, breathing apothecary. Some of it is edible, some drinkable. Some plants heal ailments, others nourish, some are so beautiful to look at you can’t help but feel inspired. There are gels and fragrances and poultices, berries and potpourri, colour therapy, pollen and herbs. And each month the selection changes, as do my needs. We are all–from the earth, to the plants to the animals–moving in sync. This rediscovery of what at one time must have been common knowledge is enthralling. I’ve merely stroked the grassy surface of my wonderland. But I’m sensing very deeply that well-being isn’t something we have to struggle for years to earn. It’s our birthright. It’s where we come from. All we have to do is go home, live there and notice it. How does anyone go from not being able to bang a nail in, without either bending it or smacking a finger, to constructing a house, in the space of six months? The answer lies far from building manuals, and workshops, and training. It resides a long way from the Turkish mountains too. But first, let me rewind to the beginning of my building adventure. The first month on my land. Just one woman, a tent, and a dubious stick creation that paraded under the term ‘washing-up rack’. The month of May was gobbling up its days like they were baklava. Syrupy, sweet days they were too, with clear skies of cobalt, and mountain outlines sharp enough to cleave the unblemished blue into bite-sized triangles. The green slopes that rolled and swirled about me were on the brink of yellowing, late spring flowers itching to scatter their seeds. It was with this backdrop that I embarked on my first construction project. The toilet. There were always plenty of questions about my lifestyle. But, it was in particular my bathroom habits that seemed to ignite people’s curiosity. Where did I crap? How did I wash? After a couple of weeks of answering nature’s many calls in various ‘off-land’ locations, I accepted that some sort of bathroom was imperative. Thus I made one . . . in a manner of speaking. And, as with every new step I took up there on my mountain, I looked to the land to show me the way first. Was there a spot that nature had divined would be my WC?
I found a small rock-strewn cove at the edge of the forest. It was surrounded by wild shrubs and trees. Thorn bushes scratched at the gaps with their thick green claws. Pushing through an olive tree, I edged into the space within. I was almost invisible to the outside world. Yet, the clearing looked out onto the pomegranate fields beyond. A loo with a view? Ha ha! It seemed my bathroom space had made itself known. But how to go about constructing it? It was then that I drew on the only building resources I had. Den building. And I had to dig quite far into my memory to pull those now indispensable life lessons out. The last time I had made a den, I'd been seven or eight years old, at most. I don’t know if all children build dens, but I think most of the kids on my street did. There were bedsheet hideouts, shelters woven from branches, and my favourite was a moss-carpeted kitchen I made with a girl called Isabelle Dobby. We crafted it under a knotty old tree near her house using the gaps in the roots as cupboards and shelves. Yes, indeed. A moss carpet. It was state-of-the-art in the den world, even if I say so myself. Back in Turkey, well over thirty years on, this was all coming back to me. As I examined the circle of greenery at the edge of the forest that was bidding to be my bathroom, I looked at it as a child might. I studied the shape of the rocks, the placement of grasses, the spaces. Then, I rolled up my sleeves and set about the brambly little circle. Oh what happy hours I spent that day, clearing a showering area, collecting small stones to spread on the floor to stop the ground becoming muddy, inventing a neat little canister-with-hose-shower. But, it was the bathroom ‘door’ that was my pride and joy. I found two sturdy sticks, buried them in the ground, searched out a third branch that arced beautifully and rested it over the other two sticks. And then…wait for it…I NAILED THEM TOGETHER. This may seem like rather a piffling achievement to other more experienced artisans, but for me it was the first thing I’d ever nailed in my life. And voila! A doorway appeared. I found an old curtain and pegged it over the top (den-building tactics revisited) and that was that. It might seem that I’m over simplifying, but that bathroom ‘door’ was a turning point. It was the baby step that empowered me to move on from toilet to tool shed to wooden deck to house, all in the space of half a year. Each time it was the same process. Look at the land, look at what you have, use some logic and just try it out. About two months later, one of my neighbour’s relatives turned up to take a look about my homemade kingdom on the hill. She tucked a grey, silken headscarf around her head and wobbled as she walked the length of the track. On arriving before the toilet, she tweaked the curtain and peered inside. Next, she looked at my tent and my kitchen, with its tree-branch hooks and random wood slats for shelving. She turned up her nose. ‘Ooh, I don’t like it at all. Its … it’s like a kid’s game or something. Why don’t you make a proper house?’ She was right. It was just like a kid’s game. And that’s exactly what made the entire adventure so much fun, and ultimately possible at all. Now, two years on, I’m sitting in a roundhouse made of mud. My kitchen is a rubble-filled mess. There are stray stones everywhere, and my sink seems to change places every day. There are still gaps all over the walls where I need to finish the earthplaster. The window sills are not yet in, nor do I have any furniture. I sleep on the floor in a sleeping bag, like a child in a backyard. Does the chaos drive me crackers? No. Strangely, it doesn’t. Because it’s a game. A big, muddy game. And I love every single minute of it. “So you can’t watch any television up there?” I shook my head. My cousin Jeanette tugged at her bangs and sat back in her armchair. We were far from the hills of Turkey now, snuggled in my aunt’s home in deepest, darkest Norfolk. “But, I do have the internet. There’s a great little USB device I can use in Turkey. As long as my computer’s charged I can connect pretty much anywhere.” Jeanette grinned. “Internet in a tent? That’s hilarious.” Then she picked up her coffee cup. “But I could never live like that, I mean no electricity. It’s great, I love hearing about it, but I’d never do it.” From the distant place her eyes went, I gauged she was imagining the implications of my life in all its powerless waterless glory. And from the look on her face the implications weren’t good. My 94 year-old gran was huddled in the leather sofa next to us, ears straining to follow the conversation. She screwed up her brow on her beautiful (and yes my gran is still beautiful) face. “Did you say you have internet in your tent?” She said. Gran’s eyes – eyes that have seen the birth of television, world wars, the Berlin wall go up and then down, and the techno-revolution – wrinkled in disbelief. She crossed one leg daintily over the other and folded her hands in her lap. “Well, I never did!” she said. “I couldn’t fathom it even in a house. But a tent!” From the way her face had crumpled we gathered she was caught somewhere between amazement and dismay. “Ooh,” she shuddered, “It’s all beyond me.” We all laughed. The light was already dying in the room, so my aunt reached over and flicked on the lamp. The hedgerow outside faded out of sight. Suddenly Jeanette pulled herself upright. Her eyes widened like a pair of liquorice allsorts. She opened her mouth. “Oh my God!” We all turned in her direction. She was staring at me, appalled. “You mean you can’t use HAIR STRAIGHTENERS?” *** Back in the Carrefour tent on the dry summer hills of a Turkish village, I woke up. The sun had just crawled over the first mountain peak. From my bed I could see the slopes bathed in the rosy glow of fresh morning. The birds were chirping in such a state of excitement, it was infectious. I had no alarm clock wrecking my slumber, no job to get up for. It was still not even six am. Yet I sprang out of that bed like a hare with a pin in its backside. I didn’t want to miss those early morning hours. They are sublime. As life goes by I realise just how gifted humans are. We are adaptable beyond belief. Yesterday’s inconceivable nightmare becomes tomorrow’s reality. And all realities have their pros and cons. I was without power which had its limitations. But a new life was unfolding. And the fact was I loved it. I’d been on the land about three months now, and something of a routine had emerged. As soon as I had stepped out of my tent, I stretched, and walked about my domain. It was the beginning of July, and those early hours were pleasantly cool. The plants gleamed as the first rays of sunlight hit them and everything on the land began rushing about its business before the heat of the day set in. There were no rough man-made noises. No cars, no machines. Instead I was wandering within a symphony composed by nature. It made me feel happy and alive. After my walk I would do some yoga, followed by a bit of meditation. Next I’d prepare myself a nice, big Turkish breakfast; eggs, salad, olives, cheese, bread, honey, fried peppers and potatoes, all washed down with a pot of coffee. The day would by now have rolled on. The land would be buckling up for some serious sun. As I swung in the hammock, I would look about my campsite and wonder what today’s project would be. Should I start the tool shed? Or paint some stones to sell? When it got too hot I would drive to the sea for a swim. Thus my days unwound. I have to be honest, I wasn’t missing hair straighteners. Nor television. The view from my land was so inspiring and the wildlife so varied I felt constantly entertained. I was also locked into a pyramid of need in which electricity was the least of my worries. Water was always my number one headache. However, there was one issue related to power that changed my life. Night time. Without power you’re well and truly in the dark. True, there are torches, and candles, but it’s still difficult to cook, read or have any sort of nightlife without decent lighting. Thus very quickly my days morphed into new shapes. I switched from late nights and leisurely awakenings, to early rises and early sleeps. Unwittingly I fell into what Chinese medicine would call the ideal sleep cycle. Our bodies are designed to wake up with the sun. Our internal organs rest and clean themselves in the dark hours. When we don’t respect this natural rhythm, we get sick or depressed or both. By July I could feel the difference. The lack of electricity had inadvertently done me an enormous favour. Now 18 months later it pays for me to remember this. Because there has been a revolution on my land. Last week I installed solar power. It’s incredible. For the first time in nearly two years I have light, I have sound, I have a jig-saw. And most importantly I have a computer that I don’t need to run up the hill to my neighbour every day to charge. This is all fantastic. But before I rush to buy speakers, or begin a 12 hour electric sanding campaign, I’m pausing a little. I can hear the noise of the wind rushing through the great pines, a robin is twittering in one of the olive trees, the plants are rocking in the air, waving to me to get off my computer and touch them. When I pull back from my laptop screen I see from my window the mountains cascading into Alakir bay. The creases in their slopes dance as the sun moves over the sky. It’s never the same dance. Blink and you’ve missed it. Yes I need to remember this. It pays to go slow. From one day to the next I’ve gone from zero power to being inundated with electricity. But I have learned something very important these past two years. And it’s nothing to do with survival. What I’ve learned is that convenience doesn’t necessarily make you happy. And that life is much more than just being comfortable. Learn all you need to know about solar power HERE.
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AuthorAtulya K Bingham Sick of the screen?You can now get a beautiful, illustrated paperback edition of Mud Mountain.
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