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Ananda Jimenez |
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Many gleaners know Ananda Jimenez as the volunteer coordinator for Ag Against Hunger's gleaning project. She's a gleaner herself and was an organic farmer for many years. |
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Childhood in Motion Ananda grew up half in California and half in Vermont and New Hampshire. Her mother moved them around, but gardens were always part of the scene. |
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Apprentice Farmer A desire for a connection to the land and growing led Ananda to apprentice on small organic farms … both vegetable farms and farms that grew for seed … in Oregon's Eugene-Covallis area when she was 19. |
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Gleaning and Canning Oregon was also where Ananda started gleaning and canning. She later went to school to study food preservation. Gleaning, canning, and self-reliance have gone together her whole adult life. |
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Family, Florida, and New York In Oregon, Ananda and her partner started a farm and a family and soon moved from Oregon to Florida and then New York. |
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Home-Schooling and Field Experience Though regional differences in soil and climate meant somewhat different vegetable crops in Florida and New York, they always grew many kinds of greens. And because she home-schooled them, her kids spent a lot of time with her in the fields. |
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Waste Farming showed her up close just how much waste there is, even on small farms. She knew folks who felt so strongly about how wrong waste was that they became what today might be called "freegans," living off what would otherwise be wasted in fields and in cities. |
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A Baker for a Grandfather Ananda's mother's father was a Jewish baker in Needham, MA. Her grandparents' experience inspired in her a sense of independence and self-reliance. |
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A Father from a Spanish Village Her father's family lives in a small, close-knit village in Spain, where they eat locally by tradition. |
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Community Our mobility has made it harder to find that kind of community in many parts of the U. S. |
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Making Community Community gardens and neighborhood-building practices like sharing backyard produce feel important. |
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Partially Funded by the California Council for the Humanities, UC Santa Cruz, and INTA - TrainingWeal.