• Here I am - Jagger - building a raised bed garden in one of Chippendale’s footpath gardens (the blue berries on the plants are edible - Dianella caerullea)
by Jagger Clapsadle
It seems like just yesterday I started my first day as an intern with Sustainability guru Michael Mobbs, 12 weeks ago.
We had just unpacked our tools for the day at Curly’s Café on the northern beaches.
“You hear those birds mate? Those are kookaburras… they’re laughing at you!” he exclaimed, as I haphazardly dug my pick into the earth in an attempt to dig a trench to help save a fruit tree.
“Allow the pick to do the work for you as you slide your hand down on the downswing”, Michael said as he demonstrated the proper way to use this tool.
This is just the beginning of the wealth of knowledge I received from Michael, the community of Chippendale, and the streets there on that bit of Earth in my 12-week internship at The Sustainable House.
It’s funny how things can come full circle like how it did in my last week of internship. I began my first day of work in mid-September at Curly’s on the corner and spent one of my last days on the job at the same place, almost 3 months later.
• Back at Curlys Cafe after 3 months, this time putting compost around little fruit trees in the footpath garden
It was amazing for me to see the amount of waste the café had saved as a result of their new coolseat, and I was astounded at the huge coffee grounds hill in the back that had been reduced to no more than a small mound. Great work Curly’s and co, and your wonderful customers, Linda and Karen, who I worked with to end food waste there.
I began my research on the house when I was first notified of my internship placement way back in July. From the very start I was fascinated at the work Michael had accomplished and was continuing to do here in Sydney. I couldn’t have been more excited for this internship placement as I too am passionate about building a sustainable future and learning what my place may be in doing so. Little did I know just how rewarding this internship would be, and the extent of what I would come to learn!
This placement has allowed me to think critically of the food waste I produce and my place in preventing waste from ending up in landfill and thus producing more emissions. There is one startling fact that I learned in my first week, that if food waste was considered a country, it would rank 3rd in carbon emissions, just under global superpowers China and the US… This fact alone should be enough to inspire more people to start composting their food waste!
After sharing this information with my 18 friends who are also on exchange from America, they were all on board to save their food waste in the kitchen to be collected from me weekly and dumped in Chippendale’s many compost bins! This is an example of a small lifestyle change that can make a world of difference if everyone were to follow suit! My friends even said they would continue this practice back home in the states, which I plan on doing as well. This internship influenced how my food waste practices will look for the rest of my life!
• My first month of composting - 686 kg of composted food, 1640 kg of avoided air pollution
I achieved so much throughout the duration of my internship. In just 10 weeks of collecting food waste data, I composted 1,650 kg of fresh food waste to be composted across 17 compost bins in Chippendale. This includes one 300 litre and one 400 litre compost bins in Michael’s back yard, along with 15 compost bins of various sizes and shapes that are set along the footpaths.
This compost journey helped me to realize a few things about food waste. The first being that you can learn so much just by simply observing. This can be applied to several instances but personally when I was working with the compost, I learned to really take a closer look at what was going on. Are the contents of the compost too wet? It probably needs a higher carbon content or simply shredded paper or cardboard. I also learned later into my internship that the worms like to gather in the corners of the bins… This leads to mature compost “hiding” in the corners where wasn’t initially looking! This observation led me to harvest much more compost than I had before. Nobody had taught me this information, nor had I ever read it anywhere, but this is what I learned through hands-on experience!
Another observation I had come to realize was the sheer amount of food waste that people produce. I was baffled at the perfectly good fruits and veggies that ended up in the bins every day to soon become worm food.
According to the United Nations Foundation, roughly 1/3 of all food produced for human consumption is wasted. At first this statistic was surprising, but after 12 weeks of working with food waste, it seemed like a reasonable statistic. I think this is because most humans don’t grow their own food and in return a disconnection is established so we are more likely to waste it. By working in the gardens and tending to food plants to eventually harvest them, I have a stronger connection with food and I’m much less likely to waste it.
• Cafe Guilia gives away compost in recycled coffee bean bags
Not only did I compost over 1,600 kg of food waste, but I harvested a great deal of that compost to be given away for free at a local café in Chippendale, Café Giulia. This café is home to three coolseats, with 168-litre capacity in each seat. Not only is Giulia saving money by producing less waste, but they are also giving back to the community by giving away free compost for anyone’s personal use. These bags are usually gone within 1-2 days, so you have to get them quick! Over the last 12 weeks, I was able to fill 34, five-kilo bags with excess compost.
I could write a whole book if I were to go into detail of everything I loved about this internship and the things I learned, but to summarize, here are a few.
• Viewing party at Knox Street Bar of a new Netflix docuseries, “Down to Earth with Zac Efron: Down Under”
The viewing party of a new Netflix docuseries, entitled “Down to Earth with Zac Efron: Down Under” features our very own Michael Mobbs and his Sustainable House in episode 8 (18-26 minutes in). Members of the community gathered to support Michael, and 8 American students on exchange program with me were also in attendance. It was a great night filled with laughter and it was so amazing to gather with the community to support environmental awareness. It made me very proud to see my internship site getting the recognition it deserves.
• Here I am giving a tour of the footpath gardens and Sydney’s Sustainable House, this time with my fellow interns
It was equally rewarding to give tours of the house and gardens alongside Michael this semester. In total, we gave tours to 150 local high school students, along with 8 American University students. This was amazing for me because I am very passionate about environmental and outdoor education, especially when it comes to young people. This generation will be forced to deal with so many environmental issues, both new and old, and it was satisfying for me to get younger people involved and talking about these issues. I even gave an urban foraging tour to my peers, and I was able to point out the avocado, pomegranate, and passionfruit trees, and send them home with cherry tomatoes, nasturtium leaves, rosemary, and mint to cook with. Not only did I inspire some to start composting on their own, but I got to share my knowledge with them, and give them fresh veggies and herbs from the gardens! Great success!
Overall, I couldn’t be happier with my internship placement over the last 12 weeks. It challenged me to learn unfamiliar skills, work with people I wouldn’t normally work with, but most importantly, it gave me a stronger connection with our Earth.
Jagger Clapsadle