Our project at a glance

The days of our youth exchange Test Green Nests have passed, but you can watch the best pictures on the slideshow made by Míša:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8_RSNHEmYg

To look back and sum up the project in exact numbers, this youth exchange gathered together 30 participants, 4 organizers, 4 volunteers, 8 people from the local community, 2 dogs and 12.012.215 wasps. We spent 10 days in 3 yurts, we learned about 8 different sustainable building techniques and we met personally 2 families who live in such houses. We tried to build one superadobe house, one superadobe fireplace, one adobe furnace and learned how to plaster the walls.

Besides the practical workshops, we enjoyed Teambuilding games,

Hungarian folk music,

Contact dance, Thai yoga massage, Home movie projection, we shared our skills during the Skill market and enjoyed other activities.

We tasted each other´s cultures and presented them to the local community during the Intercultural afternoon.

The days were ending by the wonderful fire in the sounds of guitar, singing and drums.

Big thanks to everybody who played his or her unique part in this amazing experience!

What does one need to build up a yurt?

This is how Vašek´s and Míša´s yurt was built... important for Green Nests Testers!

Natural Cosmetics Recipes - Beeswax Cream

You need:

• 20g of beeswax (it’s really good for water absorption into the skin)
• 1dc oliv oil (or you can use other kinds of oil, for example yoyoba oil, almond oil, cannabis oil - more expensive oils are better to use for facial creams); you can also use cocoa butter instead of beeswax, or half of oil and half of beeswax and half of cocoa butter. Cocoa butter is more expensive, but good for face.
• essential oils (be sure it’ s 100% pure essential oil without chemicals – NOT those that are used for aromatic lamps). Different essential oils have different effect for skin and mind – you can check for example pages http://www.mnwelldir.org/docs/therapies/essentia02.htm. It’ s good to use for example geranium, bergamot, lavender, rose, jasmine… You shouldn’t use more than 5ml of essential oil for 0,5 l (but you can mix them if you want)
• water
• a pinch of sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3)
• vitamin E liquid concentrate as a preservative (not necessary)

How to do it:

1. You melt oil and beeswax in a double boiler (for those who don’t know this word in English, check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_boiler. First put oil, than beeswax.
2. When oil and wax fuse, you can put the pot out of the fire, put boiled water in it (hot, but not). It’s recommended to add the same amount of water as the amount of wax and oil together (If you have 30ml of wax-oil, you will add 30 ml of water). If you add more water, the cream should be more liquid, if you add less, it will be thicker… So it depends on your taste. When you have thicker cream, it’s good to use it on wet skin (right after the shower), because it locks the water inside the skin and thus hydrates it more.
3. Ok, now you have strange liquid, you should gently mix it, add a pinch of sodium bicarbonate (it helps to connect water with the waxy liquid).
4. Add essential oil/oils
5. You can pure the cream into the prepared containers (in the Czech Republic you can buy them in pharmacy for 50cents). But for nicer consistency it’s better to mix it continuously until it’s cooler, but still possible to pure it.

Tip: You can also use fresh herbs. You boil the water; add lot of herbs in it (as if you want really strong tea). You let the herbs fuse in the water the whole night, next day make it hot again (but don’t boil) and use it as the water for the cream (instead of pure water). In this case, you don’t have to use essential oils (or you don’t need to use so much).

Good luck!

(If you try, let us know if you were successful or if you have more tips!)

Eva

Day 8 - Intercultural evening

Saturday was the last working day. We were finishing what we started, but unfortunately we could not finish everything. Even though there is still so much work to do, we are all glad that our effort and enthusiasm are visible now. It was amazing to see how things grow right in front of our eyes. 

 On Saturday afternoon every group had presentation for others and also some local people were invited. During this intercultural program we could for example see Germans playing funny theater, taste Czech specialty called “bramborak” or herbal spirit becherovka,

Czech girls in the bathroom

 taste Italian bruschetta and parmesan, hear different Austrian dialects and enjoy Austrian performance with singing and dancing, taste Latvian non-alcoholic beers and breads and finally experience Hungarian music. Everyone was in such a good mood that we continued this nice evening all together by the fire place.

Austrians and their performa     

Day 7 - Thai-yoga massage afterparty

On Thursday night new volunteer joined us. He is a rastaman looking like dreadlock Jesus. Friday was hard working day. The flow of work was much more better than previous days and everyone seemed to enjoy it.

The view from the top of the bathroom

Evening was dedicated to presentations of sustainable houses and then there was amazing massage workshop led by real expert on thai-yoga massage that is good not just for the one who receives but also for the one who gives. It is based on unconditional love. We were taught just four exercises, but there are hundreds in fact. For our tired bodies it was the best what we could experience to relax and feel really really good. 

Thai yoga massage

After workshop we had lot of energy to enjoy the fire in the hole (for those who do not know – the fire place is placed in the little valley and we call it “the hole” :-) and sing and play the musical instrument and celebrate Soma’s 20th birthday. He looked very happy to share this special day with us.

Day 6 - work in progress and trip

As usually, the sixth day started with another great lesson of yoga which filled us up with energy we needed straight after for work. We've advanced very rapidly and did lots of work because we were efficiently divided into groups. 

In the afternoon, some of us went to visit the Adobe house about two kilometers from our spot. The others wanted madly to complete the work. The farm was very beautiful, as well as the shape of the house. Karoly espacially warmly welcomed us there. He showed us everything about the house and answered all our questions concerning adobe construction techniques.

Meanwhile, the others were working at the construction site. After the dinner we heard a very interesting presentations about straw-bale houses and yurts. The night programme ended with the film HOME by the French director Yann Arthus-Bertrand. There were beautiful pictures of our fragile planet and it was shown that we have to protect it. It was a hard working day and we easily fell asleep after it ;)

day 5 - the day with the best night (up to now)

Hello green people !!

Let us tell you the story of our fifth day in the nature.

We woke up into  a cold and windy morning, but after Agi’s energizing yoga lesson and delicious breakfast everything seemed to be alright again.  Sun started to shine and (except of Mark’s yelling) it was the right impulse for us to start to work . |So as to be more efficient and finish all our great super-adobe buildings on time, we were divided into several groups. We started to work at other places: super adobe fireplace nearby the kitchen, plastering of the bathroom and summer kitchen and creating a new ‘‘outdoor‘‘ stove. Comparing to the days before, we were much faster. We managed to make two layers of future house to be, plastered all the kitchen and the majority of  bathroom walls , .....

In the evening, we all, tired workers,  fell down on the floor of the big yurt, and started the cycle of our own presentations about different ways how to built nature houses. Introduced by a short funny movie, the presentations contuinued: since today we (at least theoretically) know how to built an adobe, cob building and an earthship.

 After these we tried a really strange but great dance called contact dance...

... and then some of us sat around the fireplace, and we were singing and laughing a lot. It was a great end for this beautiful day. 

Day 4 - fourth day, but the first of hard work

Dear  green people,

after getting to know each other and the beautiful eco-farm of Karcsi and his friends, lots of watching and learning we finally started today building the sustainable Super-Adobe house. Also today the smart Italian team discovered not being in Gardony, but in Bocsa. Congratulations!!! 

After waking up with a nice Bob-Marley-song from the Czechs we had our breakfast and we heard lots of interesting and useful stuff about Super-Adobe houses from a little bit confused Mark (professional Super-Adobe architect). Divided in two groups, we worked on digging away the earth from the door parts and the others enjoyed designing some idealistic eco family houses. They tried to fix their crazy ideas into clay sculptures too. But guys – always be careful not to dig shit out of the ground instead of clay! 

Getting new energy from traditional hungarian vegetable dish from lentil we relaxed while playing some football, playing the guitar, reading and stuff like that...

Switching the groups afterwards we changed our calories from lunch into real hard nature work and lots of sweat, blood and tears. When Master Mark wasn’t interrupted by curious junior builders‘ questions  he could explain the most useful details of constructing work to us. Thanks so much for this! 

Unfortunately time was running faster than a turtle could go and the sunset came while having typical working dinner. We are ready to meet experienced Cob-house inhabitants this evening and of course also to party all night and having lots of input and hard work on next days. That’s all folks...! 

Day 3 - Teambuilding in a storm

Hello Test Green Nests people,

today we don't have so much time, so very faster  about yesterday! It was nice day full of games, activities and dance! We spent the morning with Agi and her interesting pictures of families from all the world. The all family was in front of their house (or dwelling) with everything what they had. It was interesting that we could see big differences between people from different countries.

In the afternoon we were divided into 3 groups and we tried to improve our cooperation and communication skills during three teambuilding games.

After that a sudden storm, heavy rain and strong wind came, and this was the real task for the whole group to show, how we can cooperate in a difficult situation. Everybody did his best to save the yurts and our things from the rain, tying the yurts to the ground and digging ditches around them to channel off the rainwater. 

When the storm was over, it was a big relief for everybody, and our happiness even raised during the Hungarian folk dance in the freshly built yurt, where we could test the floor dancing - it was proved to be very stable!

Meghívó Ökoépítész Nyílt Napra

Kedves Barátaink, Érdeklődők!
Idén Mindegyszeren rendezzük a “Test Green Nests” Európai Ökoépítész tábort, melynek keretein belül 35 fiatal látogat a tanyára. A résztvevők 18-22 éves, környezetbarát építészetben érdekelt diákok, akik egy egy hetes, igen színes program alatt fognak ismerkedni a magyar ökoépítészettel (szupervályog, rönkház, hagyományos vályog, zsupfedél, és esetleg , ha az időjárás kegyes, szalmabálaház), a  környező zöld tanyákkal (fészkekkel), projectekkel. Építkezésen kívül lesz ökomozi, jurtatábor, több féle ökobudi használat (pottyantós, komposztálható, hagyományos), több féle egyszerű mosakodási módszer kipróbálása (tűzzel melegített hordós, kerti zuhany, hagyományos),néptánc, népzene, masszázs, jóga, kontakttánc és látogatások a régió egyéb ökotanyáira. A tábort egy nyílt nap koronázza meg, melyre sok szeretettel meghívunk benneteket. Augusztus 13-án kora délutántól lehet érkezni,  rendezvény 15 órakor kezdődik. A program: eddigi elkészült építészeti munkák bemutatása, az egyes nációk (olasz, osztrák, német, cseh, litván) kulturáját bemutató programok, kulináris produkciók, népzene estig. Aki szeretne, sátorral maradhat éjszakára, a következő nap (Vasárnap) 7,45 kor jógával indul, majd reggeli, és 10-től biofogkrém készítés lesz kis csoportokban (az itt készített fogkrém ajándékként elvihető). Várunk szeretettel!