Hedonisia - Week 3 (Final Week)

Aloha!

This past week was our last at Hedonisia Eco-Hostel as work-exchange volunteers. The whole experience was absolutely incredible and packed full of education. Though the work we partook in was primarily more chopping, weeding, and cleaning - we are always observing and learning.

I'd say that we took in a lot of information about coming together on common goals, organizing projects and project leaders, and the benefits of a solid structure for guests and volunteers. Though the idea of having rules and structure can sometimes be a restrictive, we have learned that the proper amount of structure accompanied by fair rules leads to a much more effective living and working environment. This also allows for the boundaries of guests, volunteers, and residents to be respected - which is of utmost importance.

With the quick coming of our last days at Hedo, we had to pour on the steam to complete the Earth Charter Assessment (EC-Asses). Earth Charter is another educational non-profit that has been in operation since 1999, that offers free educational material to those interested in improving sustainability. Their EC-Asses is a subjective evaluation of any entity (individual, group, organization, company, government, etc) attempting to quantify their level of sustainability. The assessment evaluates on Social, Ecological, and Democratic levels and invites these entities to create a campaign for change.

It has been one of the goals of the Hawaiian Research Project to offer this assessment. It's intensive, but very enriching. So, during the last week at Hedo we completed the assessment and are eager to set up a later appointment to review the results as well as the other observations while there.

Our next move is to recollect ourselves at the house of a beautiful friend and former manager of Hedonisia for a few days. Then we plan to take on the next community!

~Dani