Barren to beautiful

The most generous gift from a mother to a daughter – 6 acres of untouched farm land in Hessarghatta. Nothing could have been more appealing to us, so packed our bags from Dubai and returned to an intriguing life on a farm. We named it “Grassroots”. Though the land was purchased way back in 1984, it was carefully guarded by my parents knowing that someday, it may be transformed into something beautiful. It took careful convincing by Naved (my husband) over many years that living on the land would transform our lives. Though we married in 2001, it was not until 2006 that I was more or less convinced to set up home in Hessarghatta.  Being a Bangalore girl in every way, living away from areas like Indiranagar and Koramangala seemed alien and unacceptable. But after living here for only 15 months, all I can say that I did the right thing. The task of grooming an empty patch of grass and scrub into Grassroots started with a humble effort to build a fence - we chose granite slabs and pillars with barbed wire to make it ‘invisible’ - finding ground water and planting 600 mixed “Bangalore” flowering trees and silver oaks: This was during 2007 monsoons. We let the trees take root whilst we were planning our home and the landscaping for the rest of the land. We were persistent in implementing as many “eco” initiatives as possible so we built a water storage tank on the highest point, dug 2 rainwater harvesting “ponds” and terraced the land into 3 levels with carefully positioned barricades (bunds) to hold water from rushing down into the valley below. Nurturing the land to transform itself needed us to be present every step of the way. Our home was constructed over 2 years (June 2009 – June 2011) using mud blocks and red oxide flooring. Once we moved in (February 2011), we hit the ground running. The April showers were a blessing and abundant, so we planted another 600 plus timber trees like teak, mahogany, cherry, honge and other favourites like banyan, peepal, neem and the fragrant millingtonia. We kept adding a few trees here and there to ensure a forest like feel to 3 acres. We already had a 1 year old fruit “orchard” with about 50 local fruit varieties – mango, guava, sapota, pomelo, fig, amla, musambi, orange, lime, star fruit, banana and papaya. 15 months after we moved here, we await our second monsoon to add more flora (and hopefully fauna and bird life) to our garden. My vegetable patch behind the house in about 100 x 100 ft, now ready with raised beds and porous pipes for drip irrigation. The rows between the fruit trees are being prepared for planting arhar (tuar) daal. An adjoining area has been assigned for growing an arid variety of wild rice(Jaya) and another untouched part of the land is getting ready for groundnut. The front and back flower gardens are a kaleidoscope of colour. Flowers are in bloom and wildlife galore. The front garden is larger and needed careful designation of beds and planned planting. With colour schemes as variant as white, yellow, orange, red, lilac and pink - the roses, helinconia, gardenia, zenia, alamanda, tabaca, butterfly weed, jasmine, tube rose and marvel of peru all pitched in to keep the smile on Buddha’s serene face. The back garden is marked with an imposing rock “hill” which we assembled with rock excavated when we dug our ponds. The flowers are a mix of hedge, bush, vines and creepers, cannas and few trees. We transplanted wild grass to form a lawn and created a private space. Our 2 Tibetan Mastiffs guard the perimeter with all their might ensuring tranquillity is carefully protected at all times. We now belong to the Kukkenhalli village and are part of all festivities and ceremonies. In order to contribute and enable access to opportunity for the youth in the villages surrounding our farm, we launched Grassroots Research Foundation (www.thinkgrassroots.com ) in February 2012 aimed at providing vocational and livelihood training for village youth. In June 2012, I embarked on an endeavour, calling it Earth Kitchen which shares my experiences and enjoyment of being and living a blissful “organic” life and started this Blog and a Facebook page (www.facebook.com/earthkitchen).  The transformation took 5 years. We started with a clean slate and now have the beginnings of what we dreamt of - And 1200 trees to call our own.