ECHO

Today, February 21, my classmates and I took a trip to ECHO, a self sustainable farm that focuses on efficiency and providing food and knowledge to those in third world countries who unfortunately do not have access to even clean water. Upon arriving, I thought that ECHO would just be a bunch of people who were actual farmers, and that it would be like an actual "farm" and there were just vegetables growing everywhere. But actually it was alot different than I had expected, the people were really nice and informative, and it was refreshing to just walk around, learn all the information that we did about the plants and vegetables. ECHO has made me curious to know if I could ever do anything like this in the coming future. The only hands on experience I have with planting my own plants was when I was in Elementary School in the Gifted Program, and every year we planted something of our choice, which was a way of getting us involved with nature. I actually enjoyed doing that when I was little, and I feel like I would still enjoy it if I picked up the hobby again. It is really upsetting to know that there are so many people out in the world today who barely have anything to sustain themselves such as readily available food, clean water, even supplies to cook their food. It really makes you think how lucky we are that if we are hungry, we can just go to our kitchen and cook something up instantly. It makes me feel selfish sometimes, that we are so much more spoiled than other parts of the world. I really don't know if I could grow my food the way some of these people in other parts of the world do. I don't posses any knowledge about how to nuture seeds so that they will sprout, and grow into something that could sustain me and my family. And for that I give credit to these people who can do that, for I can't even imagine the will power that it takes to never give up in that aspect, to grow something that could feed a family and then not knowing what you will eat later. I would like to become more involved in the community and to give back to others what I can, so that they can feel like everything will be okay for them.