Casa Robino

De Spruitjes

13:35 06.08.09
Just back from a bicycle trip to the village of Harmelen, near Utrecht, about 40k south of Amsterdam. 24 hours ago, Kasper and I left, unbeknownst to us, for a marathon bicycle ride. What, do you ask, was so interesting in the quaint village of Harmelen, to entice such a journey.
on the outskirts of town lies an old abandoned farm, which, for the last 8 years has been a squat working with various permaculture and organic gardening/farming practices. As it turns out, Kasper's cousin is living there, but to our surprise Joris had left 15 minutes before our arrival. Naturally we were welcomed to some tea and a bit of lounging around. Befitting the surroundings, i opened my new book, The Secret World of Plants, to the second chapter which tells about the innate psychic connection between plants and humans, describing several experiments.
Several cups of tea later, and no Joris, we decided to leave.. almost, Kasper concluded that if we missed him by 15 minutes, we should wait 15 more minutes before we leave, just in case. On our way out of town, just at the point we were to head north, another route intersected from the south, as we passed by we heard in the distance, "KASPER!". It was Joris, and the cousins Reuinited.
After a few minutes chit chatting we were invited back to the farm for dinner. It was then that i met Kenny, who has been living at De Spruitjes , since the beginning (with longer periods of WWOOFing elsewhere). And of the 9 or so people living there, it is Kenny who does most of the work with the plants, also running the WWOOFing program there. We got to talking about plants and herbs, planting seasons (he just put in winter cabbage, and gave me some extra seedlings as well!), compost toilets, grey water systems and the such. We all sat around outside and ate dinner together with a fresh salad from the land. Long after dinner, it was late into the night that Kenny and I talked about social organizing and the difficulties of motivation in squat like and communal living environments. We talked about some possible solutions and our own personal dreams and desires of sustainable living, loving and life.
I have returned to the city again with the inspiration to spread the seed of life.

You can find De Spruitjes at the end of the Spruit en Bosch, Harmelen.