Gezer, my kibbutz, has its own olive grove, for oil. The trees are not nearly so old as those in Deir Hanna; many are mere babes in their late twenties. Nonetheless, they have their own history.

For some reason, the olives have always attracted the kibbutz members who are dreamers, or those who are most committed to living an alternative, sustainable lifestyle. Most were planted by my friend, and one-time neighbor Shimson. 

Shimshon was the “noynik”– in charge of the gardening –when I arrived on the kibbutz, but his real passion was trees. He planted fruit trees of every kind around the kibbutz – figs, mangoes, loquats, avocadoes, peaches, etc. When he decided that the kibbutz needed an olive grove, he took his gardening team – Su and I – on a hike, armed with sharp little axes. We spent the day chopping side shoots from the bases of the olive trees left over here and there from previous occupants of our area and carrying them back to the kibbutz, where we planted them in the nursery. I thought I’d been toughened up after months of pulling watering pipes, weeding and planting, but it turns out that olivewood, especially near the tree’s base where the side shoots grow, is one of the hardest substances known to humankind. Twenty-plus years later, I can still remember the blisters on my hands and aching muscles the next day.

When Shimshon eventually married and moved to Winnipeg, Jan (pronounced Yahn) took over the olive grove. Jan, a “communard” in the true sense of the word, had connections with communes of all shapes and stripes around the world: He once brought a group of Mennonites to stay on the kibbutz. He also brought permaculture to the kibbutz and to Israel, (including Permaculture founders Bill Mollison and later David Holmgren, who gave us a three-day course), and the olives were an extension of his forays into sustainable farming. 

When the kibbutz voted to go over to privatization, Jan picked up his family and moved them to a Steiner village in his native Norway. He has since published several books on permaculture and ecovillages, and he travels the world giving lectures and seminars. (The visit to the ancient olives in my previous post was prompted, in part by Jan’s half-year stay in Sakhnin to work with and write about the ecocenter there.)

Eventually, the olives were taken over by Dani, who might be the most practical of the three. He is an environmental lawyer who has taken on the olives part-time. For Dani, the olives are a way to keep something of the communal nature of the kibbutz alive, even after privatization. He gets the young people of the kibbutz — sons and daughters of us older members — to help him out, and wwoofers come to pick in the fall. (If you fancy spending a month getting out your aggressions by whacking olive branches, check out Dani’s olive blog.) Kibbutz members show up to help pick on weekends, and enjoy eating breakfast out among the trees and reminiscing about when we farmed for a living.

The point of me running on here about all these people is that sustainable agriculture is, of course, not only about the earth, but about the people who care for it and who grow the crops we eat. So my connections to Shimshon, Jan and Dani, as well as my ties to the kibbutz olive grove, have made olives a natural place for me to begin blogging on sustainability. Because, when I eat bread dipped in Gezer olive oil, all of those connections and experiences are a part of the taste.

Next:  Eating olives