Moonriver Lodge, Sigar Highlands
FOR OUR CHILDREN'S CHILDRENFunding
The oxygen of any enterprise is $.
Triple bottom line paradigm: People, Planet & Profit.
Funding is key to ENABLING our PURPOSE for existence.
We need:
SEED Capital
WORKING Capital
INVESTMENT Capital
=> to generate FINANCIAL RETURNS for
REWARD Capital (for rewarding GOOD WORK and correction of market failures of public and merit goods)
RESERVE Capital (emergencies)
BEQUEST Capital (inter-generational – if we borrow from the future, we gotta square back in the near present)
These are the CAPABILITIES that we will need to LEARN in order to SERVE the land & its species. In time, we will know which and what vehicles to create to best enable the management and evolution of ourselves – our resources – in every sense of the word. For now, our needs are in the following:
Moonriver Lodge Fund
Maintenance of the physical and virtual HOME CAMP or BASE CAMP for fostering & nurturing of the pioneering spirit. This fund enables us to continuously improve Moonriver Lodge, the gardens, farm and trails for the comfort of our Guests.
Forest Reserve Fund
Saving the rainforest does not happen by chance. We need to re-forest, we need to study the co-existence of the species, we need to ’protect the forest from the people and protect the people from the forest’ (quote US National Park) . And who enables this – humans. We need Park & Forest Rangers. Park & Forest Rangers can come from all walks of life. You can be an artist and be a Park Ranger. You can be a doctor and be a Park Ranger. How you do that is play a role in the stewardship of the Forest. You go figure what you want to do. You can plan trails, you can run programmes, you can weed or make sure people DON’T ‘weed’.
Orang Asli Donation Basket
The most intricate issue of the entire list of fundings at Moonriver Lodge would be for the Orang Asli. Being our next-door neighbours, more research & compassionate & respectful observation and support is required and healthcare and education is paramount.
Instead of a Fund, which the Government currently provides, what is probably more appreciated from the Orang Asli are your CONTRIBUTIONS in form of used adults or childrens’ clothing, toiletries, simple childrens’ books etc. Please bring them along when you visit and deposit into our DONATION BASKET. You’re helping us to foster closer ties and friendship with the Orang Asli as we learn to understand them and their culture better to work alongside them.
The Prepared Adult Fund
People talk of change, of reforms. When change happens, it can really only happen at an individual level and experientially, and more often than not, it comes through meaningful education, usually preceded by an inspiring model or change agent. So each of us will need to be GUIDES, to be teachers. I find the Montessori Prepared Adult the most sound starting point for any educative work we do; because without this, we haven’t really changed anything. We might have awakened ourselves to some cerebral insights but unless we can truly LIVE what we stand for and make it SUSTAINABLE; we’ve just performed but not lived. Act and you will need to talk less.
Permaculture Research Institute Fund
We struck upon this when we studied Permaculture Design Certificate Course in 2009 under Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton. Excited with a head full of Permaculture Designs and knowledge, we’ve practised and experimented on Moonriver Lodge. We are now exploring Fukuoka and trying to reconcile it all. But first, we really have to know the land & its species and this needs time and effort. We have to catalogue, look and really look again. For patterns, of nature.
Rurbanism Fund
The people who can green the urban world; the ones who have the best chance and know how to make it right are the architects. The dichotomy between urban & rural planning is still unresolved. I like Christopher Alexander and The Pattern Language. But it’s best I don’t say too much because it’s not my domain.
Art & Poetry Fund
Aesthetics, though art is not just aesthetics, is sorely lacking in the world around us. We talk a lot about intelligent design and contemporary art, but where has beauty gone? And what’s happened to our other senses? How has art become dominantly cerebral too? At some stage of our evolution, we started to be afraid and got convinced that being beautiful is bad. The rest of it is not about the art for art’s sake debate. Only those who have experienced why & how the most elusive enablers of self – the poetics – of the multiple intelligences (for the lack of a better word) understand why art & poetry will always have a place as long as there is human activity.
We received our first contribution to the Permaculture Research Institute Fund on 25 Mar-10 from our guests. Truly exciting!