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2009/10 Events Overview 

"Build with Us" Natural Building Workshop

Jefferson, Colorado, USA

Come learn to build your own truly natural, sustainable, affordable, beautiful home at this 4-day workshop. 

July 10-13, 2009


Acclaimed Thai organic farmer/earthen builder Jon Jandai and Coloradoan Peggy Reents will teach various natural building techniques using local, readily available materials.  They have been leaders in the natural building movement in Thailand for years and are now starting a sustainable living learning center and home in Jefferson, Colorado.

Learn through building yourself from basic sustainable design principles, selecting clay, making adobe bricks, building walls from various earthen techniques, earthen plasters for earthen and strawbale walls, to natural homemade paints and finishes. 

Click here for more information on the workshop and how to register

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Pun Pun Internship

Pun Pun farm, Chaing Mai, Thailand

An in-depth experience in hands-on earthen building, organic gardening, seed saving, and community living.

January 11 - March 1, 2010

Pun Pun organic farm, sustainable living learning center and seed center, Chiang Mai, Northern Thailand

This year Pun Pun will be offering a 7-week internship program to individuals interested in getting a hands-on experience in organic gardening including seed saving, earthen building, and community living. It is an opportunity to learn through doing where interns will learn the techniques we use while actively applying them to projects at the farm. It is also a chance to live with other like-minded Thai and international folks as well as meet various interesting visitors to the farm.

Click here for more information on the internship and how to register

Sustainability Study Trip Thailand

A personal study trip exchanging and staying with leaders in the sustainability movement in Thailand including a grassroots look at organic farming, earthen building, fair trade, traditional medicine, community empowerment, and self-reliance.

This year we will host two study trips; one week-long trip focusing just on areas in the North of Thailand around the Chiang Mai area and another 10-day trip starting in the Northeast in Yasothorn and traveling to the North, ending in Chiang Mai.

1. Northern Thailand Trip:  November 22-28, 2009
2. Northeastern to Northern Thailand Trip:  March 8-17, 2010

Through our work in earthen building, organic farming, and community living we have established strong relationships with various groups at the forefront of this movement in Thailand.  Each group is diverse in its target and implementation, yet all hold a common vision of empowering people to become self-reliant and sustainable.  We invite you to come to learn from each of them by joining us on this study tour.  

In this unique event you will get a chance to exchange personally with leaders in the sustainability movement at a grassroots level that would be otherwise hard to access.  Peggy Reents and Jo Jandai have both worked with these groups in supporting their development and can open access to interested folks by providing relationships and full translation.  Come and learn together with us from their wisdom, experience and help support their work while also just having a really great time and experiencing Thailand!

Click here for more information on the trip and how to register

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Trainings in Thai

This year we will continually be hosting trainings in Thai on easy living for Thai participants at Pun Pun.  We do not have the dates yet set for these trainings so feel free to contact us for more information and we will post them when we know the dates.  It is best to contact us by phone at 081.470.1461

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NEIGHBOR'S UPCOMING PROGRAMS

You Sabai ------ http://www.yousabai.com/

Building Workshops -------- http://www.yousabai.com/building_workshops.html

Cooking Classes --------http://www.yousabai.com/courses.html

Panya Project ------http://www.panyaproject.org/

Courses and Internships ------http://www.panyaproject.org/spip.php?rubrique7

PUN PUN INTERNSHIP

THAILAND

An in-depth experience in hands-on earthen building, organic gardening, seed saving, and community livingd

January 11 - March 1, 2010

Pun Pun Organic Farm, Seed Center, and Sustainable Living Learning Center
Chiang Mai, Northern Thailand

This year Pun Pun will be offering a 7-week internship program to individuals interested in getting a hands-on experience in organic gardening including seed saving, earthen building, and community living.

The internship will be a combination of organic gardening techniques, earthen building, and appropriate technology. We will learn all of these together through hands-on projects with each. Interns will learn the organic gardening techniques we use at Pun Pun through use on their own experiential garden beds and making compost and cultivating micro-organisms themselves. Interns will learn earthen building techniques by building together a structure and learning all of the stages involved in building your own earthen home. Interns will also get the opportunity to be invovled in an appropriate technology project and learn about the way these can be applied to different contexts.

It is an opportunity to learn through doing where interns will learn the techniques we use while actively applying them to projects at the farm. It is also a chance to live with other like-minded Thai and international folks as well as meet various interesting visitors to the farm.

Topics & techniques

What interns will experience during their time at Pun Pun:

Garden skills:

• Pun Pun philosophy of living
  
• making nursery seedlings and a discussion of what plants need to start as seedlings
  
• garden bed making techniques for different seasons and situations
  
• composting including “Bokashi” composting technique and different uses of human and other animal manure
  
• cultivating micro-organisms for making liquid fertilizers
  
• companion planting
  
• garden care including plant observation and problem solving techniques to understand what plants need
  
• making natural pesticides
  
• harvesting for consumption
  
• discussions on the importance of seed saving, what is happening with our seed biodiversity now, and active seed saving on the farm

Building:

• brick making
  
• design including orientation, environmental factors, usage of building, and aesthetics as well as a discussion of the design for the building we will build together
  
• foundation principles
  
• adobe wall construction including putting in windows and doors
  
• earthen plasters
  
• earthen starch paints and options for finishing sealants
  
• earthen benches
  
• finishing work – relief work, sculptural work, etc
  
• adding of simple electric lines, plumbing lines
  

Community living :

Evening activities and exchanges will also be included. A large aspect of the internship also includes the experience of community living in the Thai context as interns will become community members for the duration of their internship. We focus on this relationship in learning how to be mindful, conscious individuals living in community together. We will meet in weekly group check-ins to work on these relationships.

Additional Topics:

Opportunities for Thai massage, meditation, rice wine making, forest walks, soymilk and tofu production and Thai cooking are available depending on participants’ interest.

General Schedule

Morning and afternoon sessions will be held with an extended break after lunch in the hot part of the day. Evening and early afternoon discussions sessions will be held periodically depending on interns’ interest.

Every Friday and Saturday will be break time to rest or do any other errands necessary in town. If you are planning to do other traveling in Thailand we ask you keep that to before, after the program, or during program breaks.

Teaching team

Jon Jandai, Peggy Reents, Justin Sahibdeen, and Nathan Reents

Living situation

Simple room in one of Pun Pun’s earthen or bamboo guesthouses. A thin futon mat, blanket, sheet, pillow, and mosquito net will be provided.

Meals will be shared and eaten in the communal kitchen, vegetarian and fish options will be available and we will try to use the most organic vegetables as possible from the farm.

Bathing options include an indoor cool shower or a dip in the pond.

Fee

$1,400 US/person. All proceeds go towards supporting Pun Pun community to grow and continue with our seed center and outreach work.

Community living aspect

People who have thrived here at Pun Pun in the past generally:

• enjoy physical work
  
• enthusiastic to work as a group on projects collectively to complete tasks at hand
  
• flexible
  
• have an interest in experiencing living closely with others, aer comfortable living in close quarters with little sound barriers
• interested in experiential learning and a holistic approach to learning
  
• interested in personal growth
  
• have an interest in engaging with people of all ages, including children
  
• willing to participate in the group process
  
• free to express concerns as they arise
  
• practice moderate alcohol consumption
  
• seek to deepend understanding on ways things are done and why
  
• have a willingness/freedom to express concerns without judgement
  
• content with simple, primarily Thai, vegetarian food
  
• happy to find their place in our community
  
• happy to find ways to be helpful to community
  
• enjoy simplicity

Registration

1) Email your participant survey to Peggy Reents at pareents@yahoo.com.

2) Once you have sent your participant survey and have been confirmed, a $500 US non-refundable deposit is due to secure your spot.

• If you are sending the deposit from a country that is not the US or Thailand, please do an international transfer to our account. You can email pareents@yahoo.com for information you need to make the transfer.

• If you are in the US, the deposit check should be addressed to Margaret Reents and sent to:
  

Peggy Reents
Re: Pun Pun Internship
3405 El Caminito
Loveland, CO 80537 USA

• If you are within Thailand,please transfer money directly into our Pun Pun account. To do so, go to any Bangkok Bank and give them our account information. You can also do it from any ATM machine in Thailand.
  

Account name: Jon Jandai
Account number: 458-0-51390-3
If you have any difficulty, please call Jo Jandai at 081.470.1461

3) The remainder of your contribution will be expected on the first day of the internship at Pun Pun community in either Thai baht or US dollars.

For more information
Contact pareents@yahoo.com

Pun Pun Internship Participant Survey:

Please write us a short letter introducing yourself. This will help us get to know you and also help us prepare the program for your needs. It will remain confidential.

Write a simple, honest, authentic letter about yourself and why you want to participate in the internship program. It does not need to be formal, just in your own style. Please include your age, gender, and an overview of your present life (for example, what brought you to want to come, where you are from, where you are coming from at this point in your life, how you hope to integrate the experience/learning from the program in your life, a few of your strengths and weaknesse in living in community/working with others).

If you have any emotional or health difficulties, please let us know how these are effecting your life now. Please wait for acceptance before making travel arrangements.

 

Please send your letter to Peggy Reents at pareents@yahoo.com.

"BUILD WITH US"

NATURAL BUILDING WORKSHOPS

USA

Come learn to build your own truly natural, sustainable, affordable, beautiful home at this 4-day workshop.

Acclaimed Thai organic farmer/earthen builder Jon Jandai and Coloradoan Peggy Reents will teach various natural building techniques using local, readily available materials. They have been leaders in the natural building movement in Thailand for years and are now starting a sustainable living learning center and home in Jefferson, Colorado.

Learn through building yourself from basic sustainable design principles, selecting clay, making adobe bricks, building walls from various earthen techniques, earthen plasters for earthen and strawbale walls, to natural homemade paints and finishes.

Come stay on their pristine land at over 9,000 ft elevation in the Rockies and learn building along with introduction to Thai massage, Thai cooking, and organic seed saving.

Workshop runs : July 10-13, 2009

Topics & techniques

The workshop will include:

• Introduction to our "compound", our vision and tour of the other strawbale house on site as well as our present project, an earthship under construction
• Basic design principles for environmental citing, climatic considerations, and aesthetics
• Adobe brick making
• Adobe wall construction
• Intros and smaller projects using other earthen building techniques including wattle-and-daub, cob, and earth bag
• Earthen plasters for earthen walls and strawbale walls
• Natural clay/starch paints, linseed oil, beeswax and other options for finishing sealants, etc
• And more

Evening/afternoon activities and exchanges will also be included. These include; an introduction to earthen building, introduction to Thai cooking, Thai massage, seed saving and our work in Thailand at Pun Pun organic farm, sustainable living learning center and seed center.

The Project

This building workshop will be held on our family land in the high elevation of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. In the summer of 2005 our extended family bought a piece of land with the intention of creating a so-called “family compound” where we would all come together to live for parts or most of the year together. We wanted it also to be a place which could experiment and demonstrate various sustainable building and living techniques for others to come and learn from. We have started last summer by building a strawbale home for our parents and earthen solar panel shed and in the summer of 2007 will be beginning a home for Peggy’s sister’s family which will be an earthship. We are located just outside Jefferson, Colorado which is on Highway 285 between Bailey and Fairplay.

General Schedule

Morning and afternoon sessions of building will be held with an afternoon discussion session after lunch if afternoon showers persist. Evening and early afternoon discussions sessions will be held after meals.

Teaching team

Jon Jandai, Peggy Reents

Living situation

You should prepare and bring with you your own camping gear (tent, mat, sleeping bag) with the knowledge that it can get quite cold at night. If the weather should be very cold we can all bunk in the living room of the strawbale house as well. You will be able to use the strawbale house toilet and shower facilities.

Meals will be shared and eaten in the strawbale kitchen, vegetarian and non-vegetarian options will be available and we will try to use the most organic vegetables as possible. Please specify if you have any dietary needs.

Fee

$300 US for folks from industrialized countries

Arrangements can be made for participants from less developed countries. Your contributions go toward allowing us to continue to do the work we do in Thailand with Pun Pun with peasant and farmer groups.

Registration

1) Contact Peggy Reents at pareents@yahoo.com.

2) Send in your deposit to hold your spot. A $150 US non-refundable deposit is due to us as soon as possible. The remaining fee will be due on the first day of the workshop in check or cash.

The deposit check should be addressed to Margaret Reents and can be sent to:

Peggy Reents
Re: Build with Us Workshop
3405 El Caminito
Loveland, CO 80537 USA

SUSTAINABILITY STUDY TOUR

THAILAND

A personal study trip exchanging and staying with leaders in the sustainability movement in Thailand including a grassroots look at organic farming, earthen building, fair trade, traditional medicine, community empowerment, and self-reliance.
This year we will host two study trips; one week-long trip focusing just on areas in the North of Thailand around the Chiang Mai area and another 10-day trip starting in the Northeast in Yasothorn and traveling to the North, ending in Chiang Mai.

Northern Thailand Trip:  November 22-28, 2009
Northeastern to Northern Thailand Trip:  March 8-17, 2010

Northern Thailand Trip:
November 22-28, 2009

Through our work in earthen building, organic farming, and community living we have established strong relationships with various groups at the forefront of this movement in Thailand. Each group is diverse in its target and implementation, yet all hold a common vision of empowering people to become self-reliant and sustainable. We invite you to come to learn from each of them by joining us on this study tour.
In a period of 7 days we will visit several communities working on many different models for sustainability.  From small-scale organic family farms to community level, to national networks we will explore the movement for a more self-reliant lifestyle in practical examples.  We will get the opportunity to explore the topics of small-scale self-reliance, women and Buddhism, spiritual sustainability, issues hill tribe and people from Burma face in Thailand, and preservation of biodiversity and living in community. 

In this unique event you will get a chance to exchange personally with leaders in the sustainability movement at a grassroots level that would be otherwise hard to access. Peggy Reents and Jo Jandai have both worked with these groups in supporting their development and can open access to interested folks by providing relationships and full translation. Come and learn together with us from their wisdom, experience and help support their work while also just having a really great time and experiencing Thailand!

We will:

• Stay primarily in Mae Taeng district, an hour north of Chiang Mai at Peggy an Jo’s project, “Pun Pun” (Thousand Varieties) organic farm, sustainable living learning center, and seed center. Pun Pun is a small community of Thais and a couple international people, where we try to be a model for experimentation in sustainable living techniques and run a seed center for the conservation of rare and indigenous varieties. We practice organic farming techniques and are earthen builders as well. Next door to Pun Pun is “Panya Project”, an experimental permaculture center and “You Sabaii” hosting Thai cooking courses, a small earthen guesthouse, coffeeshop and partners in many of Pun Pun’s projects/trainings

• Tour and get a chance to experiment with different projects at Pun Pun on organic farming, the need for food biodiversity and the conservation of our heirloom seeds, natural building, and community living 

• Visit the Women’s International Partnership for Peace and Justice located in Mae Rim, a local, spiritual based feminist organization working to support grassroots women’s activism in Thailand and the Asian region.  Founded in 2002, IWP leads workshops, retreats and training courses which share in common the integration of feminism, social action and spirituality for sustainability and transformation at the personal, community and society levels

• Visit “Suan Sai Lom Joy”, a family farm and example of a truly villager-based permaculture model. Listen to this family’s story of converting their land into a flourishing, bio-diverse, canal and coconut based ecosystem and experience their natural healing techniques at their natural healing center on the farm

• Visit with an organized Karen hill tribe community who work to protect their forests, local culture, and way of life while facing many struggles in the modern world

• Visit with different groups working to make organic, healthy produce and food more easily accessible to people in the city through networks of farmers and organic markets

• Exchange with members of probably the most self-reliant community in Thailand, the “Santi Asok”. The Asok is a network of Buddhist, organic farmers who believe in work as meditation and the ideology of “meritism” instead of capitalism or socialism, produce all the organic produce and food they eat as well as products to sell, home school their children, and work to escape materialism and consumer culture

Hosts

Jon Jandai, and Peggy Reents.

Living situation

Simple accommodation will be provided along with way at every place, primarily earthen or bamboo guesthouses. Bedding will be provided but if you need anything special or more bedding than a thin futon mat, you should bring it yourself.

Meals will be shared and eaten with villagers or in communities. Vegetarian and fish options will be available and in organic farms we will eat as much local organic produce as possible.

Bathing will be provided mostly with a cool bucket shower or at times a dip in the pond.

Fee

Northern Trip:
$300 US/person.  Fee includes all food, accommodation, translation, organization, and transportation.  We will begin and end in Chiang Mai city.
Proceeds go towards supporting villagers projects we will visit and towards support Pun Pun community to grow and continue with our work.

Registration

1) Email Peggy Reents at pareents@yahoo.com and please specify whether you are registering for the Northern Trip or Northeastern to Northern Trip.

2) Once you have been in contact with us, a $150 US non-refundable deposit is due to secure your spot. You can send this deposit by check addressed to:

Peggy Reents
Re: Sustainability Study Trip
3405 El Caminito
Loveland, CO 80537 USA

3) The remainder of your contribution will be expected on the first day of the study trip in US dollars or Thai baht.  

For more information contact pareents@yahoo.com

Northeastern to Northern Thailand Trip:
March 8-17, 2010

Through our work in earthen building, organic farming, and community living we have established strong relationships with various groups at the forefront of this movement in Thailand. Each group is diverse in its target and implementation, yet all hold a common vision of empowering people to become self-reliant and sustainable. We invite you to come to learn from each of them by joining us on this study tour.

In a period of 12 days we will visit several communities starting in the agricultural northeastern region to the mountainous northern region of Thailand. Visit with members of a fair trade organic farmers’ cooperative, community-based herbal medicine facility, intentional communities from small to large scale, leaders in the fast growing earthen building movement, Buddhist self-reliant community based on “meritism”, founders of the earthen village, family permaculture farm hosting natural medicine trainings, and Pun Pun organic farm, sustainable living learning center and seed center.

In this unique event you will get a chance to exchange personally with leaders in the sustainability movement at a grassroots level that would be otherwise hard to access. Peggy Reents and Jo Jandai have both worked with these groups in supporting their development and can open access to interested folks by providing relationships and full translation. Come and learn together with us from their wisdom, experience and help support their work while also just having a really great time and experiencing Thailand!

We will:

• Stay at Jo Jandai’s organic family farm and stay in an earthen house in the rice fields, where their village organic farmer’s group was started, visit with neighboring organic farms, visit their established integrated farms and hear their stories

• Visit an emerging intentional sustainable community called “Garden of Dhamma” who hosts natural health trainings, and organic farming trainings helping farmers to make the transition to organic

• Exchange with members probably the most self-reliant community in Thailand, the “Santi Asok”. The Asok is a network of Buddhist, organic farmers who believe in work as meditation and the ideology of “meritism” instead of capitalism or socialism. Experience a large-scale community of many hundred people as we visit the Ubon Ratchathani Asok and see how they produce all the organic produce and food they eat as well as products to sell, home school their children, and work to escape materialism and consumer culture

• Travel with us to “Mun Yeun” (or sustainable community in English) which consists of villagers who have lost their land and suffered the adverse effects of large-scale dam projects, who now seek to show a more ecological form of development. They decided they wanted to show the public what villager-based development could look. In 2002 they created Mun Yeun community with homes built of earth and other local materials, and food production from organic techniques along with local forest foraging

• Travel to northern Thailand and stay at Mae Taeng district, an hour north of Chiang Mai at Peggy and Jo’s project, “Pun Pun” (Thousand Varieties) organic farm, sustainable living learning center, and seed center. Pun Pun is a small community of Thais and a couple international people, where we try to be a model for experimentation in sustainable living techniques and run a seed center for the conservation of rare and indigenous varieties. We practice organic farming techniques and are earthen builders as well. Next door to Pun Pun is “Panya Project”, an experimental permaculture center and “You Sabaii” hosting Thai cooking courses, a small earthen guesthouse, coffeeshop and partners in many of Pun Pun’s projects/trainings

• Visit the Women’s International Partnership for Peace and Justice located in Mae Rim, a local, spiritual based feminist organization working to support grassroots women’s activism in Thailand and the Asian region.  Founded in 2002, IWP leads workshops, retreats and training courses which share in common the integration of feminism, social action and spirituality for sustainability and transformation at the personal, community and society levels

• Visit “Suan Sai Lom Joy”, a family farm and example of a truly villager-based permaculture model. Listen to this family’s story of converting their land into a flourishing, bio-diverse, canal and coconut based ecosystem and experience their natural healing techniques at their natural healing center on the farm

Hosts

Jon Jandai, and Peggy Reents.

Living situation

Simple accommodation will be provided along with way at every place, primarily earthen or bamboo guesthouses. Bedding will be provided but if you need anything special or more bedding than a thin futon mat, you should bring it yourself.

Meals will be shared and eaten with villagers or in communities. Vegetarian and fish options will be available and in organic farms we will eat as much local organic produce as possible.

Bathing will be provided mostly with a cool bucket shower or at times a dip in the pond.

Fee

Northeastern to Northern Trip:
$475 US/person. Fee includes all food, accommodation, translation, organization, and all transportation from Yasothorn town at the beginning of the trip to Chiang Mai at the end. You will be responsible for providing your own transportation to Yasothorn town and from Chiang Mai city.
Proceeds go towards supporting villagers projects we will visit and towards support Pun Pun community to grow and continue with our work.

Registration

1) Email Peggy Reents at pareents@yahoo.com and please specify whether you are registering for the Northern Trip or Northeastern to Northern Trip.

2) Once you have been in contact with us, a $150 US non-refundable deposit is due to secure your spot. You can send this deposit by check addressed to:

Peggy Reents
Re: Sustainability Study Trip
3405 El Caminito
Loveland, CO 80537 USA

3) The remainder of your contribution will be expected on the first day of the study trip in US dollars or Thai baht.  

For more information contact pareents@yahoo.com

TRAININGS IN THAI

This training is for SE Asian participants only. We are seeking support however so please read on.

This year we will continually be hosting trainings in Thai on easy living for Thai participants at Pun Pun.  We do not have the dates yet set for these trainings so feel free to contact us for more information and we will post them when we know the dates.  It is best to contact us by phone at 081.470.1461

 - Copyright - Pun Pun Thailand Group - 2008 -