A Letter to viewers from Zac Fabian

I filmed for the entire 6 week tour, almost everyday straight. I had a few days of rest. Thank God!  We travelled over 9,000 miles, to 32 cities, in 19 states, from San Francisco to New York City, going up and down each coast.  There was the Polish Ambassador tour bus and there was us 5 packed into a suburban: Ryan Rising, Jasmine Saavedra, Erin Bishop, Jade Hawk (for most of the way), and myself, Zac Fabian.  Imagine all my video gear (including 3 pelican cases) with 5 people, oh and all our stuff for 6 weeks: 5 people’s bags of clothes, computers, promotional materials for the shows, a table, pots, and anything we got from sponsors along the way. It all sounded like a good idea.  Particularly, Ryan brought 2 extra car batteries and camping supplies.  It was a wonder how we fit.  I think urging Jasmine strongly to pack light had something to do with it!  The rental agency did hook us up with a 2014 suburban upgrade for the month rental so yes to that.  And special thanks to Guayaki, which supplied their yerba mate energy drinks for the first leg of our journey.  Their delicious tea definitely helped us get through the most difficult beginnings.

We made a lot of mistakes. It was all of our first time doing this kind of 32 city permaculture action and community organizing tour.  We really weren’t sure what to expect.  Once on the road, I taught Erin to use apps on her phone like Instagram and to download photos to her computer. We made huge progress with Facebook, and by the end of the journey her writing made huge improvements.  I repeated throughout the tour, “don’t write about how cool it was or how much fun we had.”  Yes, it was cool and yes, it was fun, but we need engaging content for our blog! This makes our content worth reading and sharing!  Ryan really grounded the team. I really have never met anyone like him and I am grateful I was glued to his side for 6 weeks. I learned so much in his presence, communication skills, endurance, survival, selflessness, and a drive to build strong communities. I will never forget our long, deep talks. Let’s just say the rabbit hole is very, very deep.  You could find Jade on her laptop working either in the super hero suburban or back-stage putting together the Resource Lists. If she wasn’t there, then she was grabbing food or most likely rushing to print copies of the resource list and flyers so we would have them before the show started.  Jasmine kept the air light, when she wasn’t organizing for the next action day, she was on-stage dancing and getting the crowd hype. Let’s just say she likes to make jokes.

The journey challenged me tremendously.  I have a strong work ethic and thrive under stress, but this was a lot. I broke several times, and actually quit, only to get over it and continue on.  All moments passed and only lessons learned, but nonetheless, it was intense.  I  was not only attempting to produce several videos to release while on tour (there were 6), filming, and then editing on a laptop in the car, but documenting constantly, taking photos to post to Facebook and for promo, meanwhile posting updates to twitter, Facebook, and our website as often as possible.  When I wasn’t working on the computer, I was driving. When I wasn’t driving, I was filming, interviewing, or taking pictures.  Sometimes I could chat to great people and I met so many amazing individuals. Passionate, inspired, creative people, using their hands to physically regenerate soil, produce foods, offset carbon, and lead the shift to a sustainable culture. This all inspired me with a newfound awareness that climate change is a serious threat right now. The intensity of weather will only get more severe — ramifications of rising waters, toxic environments, even instability in the political and economic spheres.

The film is the story of the journey from my perspective. The issues I learned about on tour are real and serious, but the amazing thing is the action days we organized are some of the first steps to regeneration:  youth and all ages coming together to build gardens, learn about sustainability, food production, permaculture, and community organizing. The film is not what I set out to capture, but it’s the story that unfolded.  We pushed through the pavement and planted a seed that will with effort catalyze a permaculture movement!

Thank you so much for your support!

-Zac Fabian

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