Terra Madre

I apoligize for not writing this post sooner. But, with traveling one last week, and a very hectic first week home, I didn't want to write the post and not give it the true attention it deserves.

Very rarely are people able to attend an event that give them chills down to the bones-chills that are awe-inspiring, that make you want to achieve more, that make the world seem okay again. I have been more than fortunate to have this experience twice-in 2008 and again just two short weeks ago. Terra Madre, and its sister event, Salone del Gusto, in Torino, Italy are two of those events that make you want to act and really get out there. Terra Madre is an all-out food event. Slow Food international brings together 5,00 farmers from all over the world (over 150 countries) to talk, to converge, to exchange ideas, and most importantly, help bring a solution to the broken food system we have in place.

Opening Ceremony-Africa

Opening Ceremony-Americas

Quite a Crowd!

Opening Ceremony-Europe

Founder, Carlo Petrini, Speaking at the Opening

There are people in their traditional dress, with their traditional foods, and their traditional ideas that WORK, so long as agro-business farms and devastating environmental changes don't barge in and render their practices broken as well. Delegates from countries from Africa, South America, and far-out reaches of Asia and Europe seek help and guidance from the new systems in place. Whereas people from the overdeveloped 'West' seek to bring their land and concurrently their food back to the people and the land.

The conference takes over the speed skating rink from the 2006 Olympics for seminars, lectures, and an overall communication space for all the people involved. Attending some of the seminars, I filled my small notebook with ideas, inspirations, devastating statistics and their hopeful solutions. Some thoughts I wrote down:

• Good, Clean, and Fair Food should be a universal right of EVERYONE, not just the elite
• Get Your Hands Dirty and Your Hearts INVOLVED in Your Food
• If You Eat, YOU Are An INVESTOR. You Are Investing in YOUR Body and YOUR Earth, So Invest Carefully
• See Each NEW Person as a New Link, a New Connection to Saving Our Food
• Fight For the Future as YOUR Asset
• Terra Madre is the "Woodstock" of THIS Generation-Use It to CATAPULT Change in the World
• See Food as the "Rocket Fuel" to Pleasure
• Food is the STRONGEST Element of Them All-It is a Backbone to Nature, the Spirituality of Everyone, and the Happiness in the World

And people from all over offered their projects-from a Wisdom Wall in the UK which promotes a conversation with the past generations of food providers, to  Greening the packaging of food as well as making it healthier at amusement parks in the Netherlands. Then there are the basic projects-get food to people who are starving. Which is creating gardens, building schools, and teaching basic food production skills so that everyone can have a dinner.

The YOUTH Food Movement Meeting-Awesomeee

Carlo, speaking to the Youth

This 'Slow Food' movement is a movement that should be more popular. It is simple-eat well, you'll be well and the Earth will be well too. I don't see anything wrong with that.