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Hey Everyone,

I e.mailed Mike and asked him if we are on a right track, well we are so far. The only thing he mentioned is to be clearer with the ideas we are presenting. So when we are presenting in class we should relate everything and anything we have learned from Amish culture/practices/values and how they have inspired us (as an individual) to make right choices/ to live a healthy life. So for activities Steph can relate her experience of how gym can be avoided and one can lose weight/live a healthy life style by jogging, yoga, going for walks etc. we don’t have to get up, burn the gas, drive all the way to the gym and use electrical machines to lose weight/healthy life.

For electricity I can say how I have applied certain things like using water/electricity/laundry/dishwasher off peak time (after 7-in Brampton) this safes us money and is better for environment as less electricity is used. For farming we can say how we are using our backyard to grow plants etc….

Basically relate things with your own personal experiences and explain him hos this assignment or Amish society (in some way) has left an impact on us/inspired us.

Sonia/Nida

Here are more drawings I work on today...as far as the farming part goes I've started the sketch for that one and I think it would be super cool to have a big communal farm part in the centre of the little town where the bakery is and so on..you can sort of see this in the sketch..the center would be the farm land and the little boxes above that that I have started could be the stores and people can walk around the sidewalks and stuff here. It'll be more clear when the drawing is done. I also included a litle farm plot in front of the homes for the family to keep a garden and the kids to get involved.







Nikki

Hey so we asked Mike about the final project. There is NO final essay, we are going to be marked on the presentation. He will look at our proposal and report to register our progression for this project. He liked the blueprint idea. He prefers that we stick to an area like the one we chose in Brampton close to other communities to show that we are integrating Amish values in small ways, not like drastic lifestyle change. By having it close to other communities, they too can learn and perhaps integrate these changes into their lifestyles as well. He also said that communal farming is very popular. The point is for small changes over time to make a large impact on the environment. He also said that he will get back to us on feedback as soon as he can within the week. -Stephs _-- Hey guys,

I emailed Mike about what it is we need to include in the interim report and he answered this: " It's really an update and indication you've thought through ideas from the first iteration. So, any relevant facts and ideas would certainly be valuable. You're getting closer to the solution - not necessarily there yet, you might still have open questions to consider - but you're at least more expert in this report than you were two weeks ago."

StephS

Hello Guys,

http://www.veoh.com/watch/v18617077kSpqaret?h1=The+Amish+A+People+Of+Preservation

Have a look at this video, it talks about there prespective of life and also the fact that they are very close to nature, and they avoid "our" world, they do not face the camera as they strongly follow 10 commetmentz...

Amish ppl have small communities.... like church where 25-35 ppl come and follow the rules set by that particular church--> we are/can work on this idea of having a community which we follow and set the rules which accepts Amish rules and modern society as well... sowont be neglecting any of the socities...

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/12057/1210135-67.stm

Have a look at the above link as well..

NIda

Hi guys these are great ideas,

If you can get ahold of another documentary called "The Devil's Playground", watch it (I found it on youtube a while ago, if I can get the links I will. Otherwise, many sites have it posted). At the age of 14, children of the Amish community are allowed to go out into the modern world (aka what they call Devils' Playground) and experience technologies and temptations. At which point they decide whether they want to continue the Amish lifestyle or venture to the world we are used to.

This can give us insight to the things the Amish find attractive in their own community (reasons they would be drawn back to their lifestyle).

I think we should try building a community, like occupy a small geographic area that can almost be like a native reserve. It can be a small area like Streetsville, for example. I know there are areas in Oakville, Brampton and Milton that are not yet developed. We can develop small populations using the tools/ideas of Amish communities, which will be voluntary for people to inhabit for reasons other than religion.

Keep these things in mind & we can discuss further tomorrow.

--Chris

Hello group, Hope you are all enjoying your reading week. Nikki has found a documentary film site that has a film on the Amish Lifestyle called "Trouble in Amish Paradise." If you guys could just watch it it actually provides a really good insight into their way of life, and has some really good ideas should we decide to move forwards with this idea.

The link is: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/trouble-in-amish-paradise/

StephS

I watched the video (SHOCKED) here is what Mike wants us to focus at if we are going with Amish concept:

"Burt Sharkey (Day 2 on the itinerary) lives 100% off the grid on a ranch that's not on any map. My best guess is about : @http://maps.google.com/?ll=49.789022,-120.795708&spn=0.177985,0.398598&t=m&z=12 Great hospitality in a very isolated place. Brookmere is about 30-40 people. His mailing address is in Tulameen, 30-40km to the south.

He's doing this by choice, not due to religious commitment, but it shows people can do this if they put their mind to it, and you end up learning a lot camping out on his grounds about how you can live just fine.

 what do such individuals and communities do that we can learn from. .

Another possible resource for deliberate off-the-grid living: the Whole Earth Catalog addressed similar low-tech living in the 60s and 70s mostly, exchanging plans and ideas for how to do it to communes and communities who for whatever reason wanted to drop out from modern technology. @http://www.wholeearth.com/index.php

(Ironically, many of this crowd later went on to be big names on the Internet - the Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (WELL) was an early thought leader in online/Internet communication studies, and Steve Jobs worked on a farming commune in the early 70s.)

So, think less about what we can do for these groups, and more along the lines of what we can learn from them. Even small, cheap DIY technologies can be valuable in today's world. And DIY is back in force nowadays (e.g., hacking/hacktivism technology is back in vogue with homemade electronics, etc.)"

-Nida

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Hey guys,

Nikki and I (steph) spoke to Mike Jones today about our idea regarding the Amish. It seems this is the best way to go. So if you guys could all please watch the documentary I posted it is actually really insightful. For the Interim report Mike Jones told us to focus on building a community where we can extract some values from the Amish lifestyle and apply to this community. For example, existing residential communities have events like planting trees together and cleaning trash from the community parks as a community in order to benefit everyone. We should go along with this idea like the Amish, creating a tight knit community where residents VOLUNTARILY partake in communal events that benefit everyone in that community. Jones mentioned for example, pumpkin carving as a fun community event for kids. Having residents come together and appreciate a tight knit community would benefit everyone, everyone benefits from a clean park, or everyone benefits from socializing with one another making them happier people in a nicer community. Also, like the Amish they can voluntarily donate $150 per person per month that goes towards a fund used to help one another in the community with medical bills. The Family needing the help pays a certain potion and the rest is paid off by this fund. We should have something like this too, helping one another in this community that need it most, like serious high cost medical bills, NOT FOR AESTHETIC PLASTIC SURGARIES like boob jobs, but for like prosthetic or if someone has a disease or something. people who dont contribute then wont get the help if needed when the time comes.

The main thing would be that this community is VOLUNTARY not based on any religious beliefs like the Amish, or demographic. It will be for people who are willing. If they are not willing than perhaps they in a way will (like the amish family in the documentary) be shunned/ isolated from the community because they won't be benefiting anyone and no one will want to associate themselves with them.

In this community we could have weekly challenges that reflect a minimalistic lifestyle that the community adopts to reinforce the feeling of being "lighter" and what it is like to live without a certain type of technolgy for a short period of time ex. no TV for a week. With the challenges, if there's a motivational challenges for the kids it would be cool to have kids be more involved with working with their parents. Like the Amish, the kids grow up leaning how to do everything with their parents, we can have challenges that have kids help their parents with duties (if they dont already) and if they like the idea as a family then they can adopt this type of lifestyle. for example like if they realize they don't need TV or watch less TV. We were thinking that like the Amish, this community can learn from weekly challenges how to get a taste of a minimalistic lifestyle in small degrees. For example we live in a consumer lifestyle where we base our purchases mostly on wants and not needs.

We need to figure out what it is that we can classify as this voluntary community, like a street? people from a town that meet up in a building each week? what would get the best response? what would get the most people? community center each week? or a neighbourhood? We can't force people to do things they don't want to? so what would make them be a part of this would be for things that would benefit them too in some way.

-Nikki and Steph