Garden We-Search
By: Youth Skolas 2013
Seven Curley, 9 years old
I’m Seven Curley, I live in Oakland, California. I went to the first gardens that is on 51st st. I found blueberries, raspberries, and black dragon pepper. Marinette said that the most important thing about the garden is the soil.
Dante, 13 years old
We went to Muteado and Marinette’s house and seen their nice garden and they had a lot of things. Chili peppers, bell peppers and pineapples. Their stuff was nice and I wish I could have seen more if it. Then I went to my house to see cabbage, greens, strawberries, and blood tomatoes. My mom said she built the garden on August 29, on her grandma’s birthday. I said the more you water it the juicier it gets.
Alexes L. Capers, 19 years old
I am youth skola Alexes L. Capers. I am 19 years old and I am currently homeless with my mom and my brother. We are also a part of Homefullness, building healthy gardens with no GMO’s which we dedicated to Trayvon Martin, and our gardens are also to help feed the community and the homeless of this community. Today in camp we had a field trip in which we visited 2 other fantastic gardens in this East Oakland community, now the first one we visited was the Muteado garden which is near the BART station, and they grow jasmine, bell peppers, broccoli, purple tree kale, raspberries, and black dragon chili which is good in helping speed up metabolism, also echinacea and aloe Vera which is an indigenous medicine and mullein which is good for asthma and other issues with the lungs. Now one of the issues with Muteado’s garden discovered when they had first started out was that their soil wasn’t very clean, so the solution was to bring in clean soil and quote, “grow selectively”, also they grew some things in garden boxes and now a beautiful healthy garden now grows. Next we were off to Ms. Sherena Thomas’s garden and a quite beautiful garden at that. Now I worked the camera at this garden so I wasn’t able to get all the notes but here is what I got. Ms. Sherena Thomas grows fresh squash, broccoli, collard greens, sage, tomatoes, greens, and strawberries. Ms. Sherena and her family quote “We planted this garden August 29, in memory of our grandma.” So with that being said it is truly a blessed garden and a blessing to everyone in many sense of the word because Ms. Sherena and her neighbors barter and barter means to trade things between each other without money. So this in my opinion is very fabulous and not to mention GMO free. Another thing I got from the garden is the fact that Ms. Sherena was letting some of her lettuce dry out so she could harvest and that healthy organic celery is hard to come by. Ms. Sherena also grows chamomile and that is good for anxiety, a fact that I did not know ‘til I visited Ms. Sherena’s garden.
Michael Capers, 18 years old
Today we visited 2 neighborhood gardens. The first garden was Muteado’s, I got to use the camera, so I wasn’t able to get notes and it was also my first time using the camera so I hope I got some good footage. The second garden was Sherena Thomas’s garden. I learned that she started the garden August 29th of last year which is also her mother’s birthday. I also learned that she helps feed her neighborhood with her garden. In her garden she grows strawberries, tomatoes, squash, greens, broccoli, and celery. I learned that organic celery helps your kidneys and helps fight anxiety. Once again nature shows us peace and power, I think the more we support nature the more nature can help us.
Jiisary Chatman, 12 years old
When I went to Muteado’s garden, I saw green, red and black bell peppers. Dante tried the black one and I tried the red one but they weren’t spicy. Muteado said he had lots of pineapple sage. But I only saw white and growers friend sage. Then when I went to Dante’s garden we saw squash, strawberries, and tomatoes. The people who helped Dante’s mom who helped build her garden was the Black Riders, Dante’s family and I.
Sahara, 8 years old
I built my garden on the 21st of August. My garden is the biggest one seen. I planted chamomile, tomatoes, and purple beans. Next I went to Muteado’s garden. It had lima beans, black dragon beans, semolina and mullein.
Tiburcio Garcia, 9 years old
I went Muteado’s and Marinette’s garden, it was fun because I got to eat a very hot chili pepper. A healing thing in their garden is white sage, it heals sinus pressure and helps with coughs. There was also Aloe Vera, “we’re not sure if the soil is safe” said Marinette, the owner of this beautiful garden as well as Muteado Silencio, “So, we grew small plants in containers.” After we ate a few more chili peppers, we went to the garden of Ms. Sherena Thomas. There, all the plants were big. There was broccoli, tomatoes, strawberries, squash and plums that were pruning. “The more water them, the juicier they will be.” says 13 year old Dante Curley in his mother’s backyard gardens. Afterwards we came back to our own garden and said, “I’ glad to be back.” I live in 45th Ave and I am really poor, my mom had a hard life but managed to have me.