Day 1: 29.08.24
After Alissa and I arrived in Pau a day early and had the opportunity to explore the beautiful city of Pau yesterday, today was finally the time to meet our exchange colleagues.
We met in the morning at the CLAB initiative (Conservatoire des Légumes Anciens du Béarn) in Assat, where we were warmly welcomed by the organizer Nicolas from Piste Solidaire and Florence from CLAB. As soon as we arrived, I noticed that CLAB is not an “ordinary community garden”, but a rather professional initiative. There is a building with an office, a store with its own products and a training room, and the garden has audio-visual signage. After a coffee we were invited to explore the garden on our own. Although the signs were only in French (which I don’t speak), I was able to get information on various topics thanks to the multilingual audios.
The garden is beautiful and lovingly maintained. There is a lot to discover. I was particularly impressed by the great variety of plants (szechuan pepper, huge ginger bushes and many plants I have never seen before), the fact that there was so much flowering in general (even though it is almost fall) and the wonderful orchard with many different varieties of apples. The garden definitely lives up to its description as a “conservatory for old species”.
Back in Pau, we had lunch together and visited the castle of Henry VI.
Later, we visited a relatively new community garden in a neighborhood that has been developed in recent years. Nicolas told us that it used to be a rather disadvantaged neighborhood in Pau and that the city was and is trying to improve it. The garden is located on public land and was built and financed by the city. The garden reminded me a little of an allotment garden. It consists of about 16 plots with a fence around each plot and a central walkway in between. Each plot of about 30m² has its own small hut and its own rainwater collection system. There is also a communal area at the entrance to the garden with an arbor to sit in and several herb beds, including raised beds that are easily accessible by wheelchair. We were warmly welcomed to the garden by two of the gardeners, who showed us around and answered all our questions. They told us that the garden had brought about a huge positive change in the neighborhood. The community has grown together much better and there are far fewer conflicts. The garden seems to be very well received and very popular. As the plots are very large, not so many people can take part (compared to other gardens) and there is a long waiting list. However, they are thinking about allocating plots to two people/groups who can share them in the future. I thought it was great to hear how well this project has been accepted and is working, which is not always the case, especially with top-down projects. In my opinion, this project would have the potential to become even more communal and enable more people to garden if, instead of many small huts and rainwater collection containers, a larger shared infrastructure was built and/or the plots were divided up a little differently or used more communally. However, I think it’s great that the city of Pau has made this garden possible and that the value of such a place for a neighborhood is seen.
Day 2: 30.08.24
On the second day of our exchange, we visited the two gardens “Guynemer” and the garden of the organization “Berlioz” in Pau. The first garden was a more classic community garden that was still relatively young. About a third of the area is meadow and there is still room for more beds. In addition to the wide variety of things grown, I really liked the beautiful pergola in the center of the garden and the playhouse for children.
The second project we visited was a garden project at a youth center. It is actually a combination of several projects, because in addition to gardening with the young people, there are two different neighborhood gardens and a huge tree house that is repeatedly used by artists as a place to live. The organization also regularly hosts events and small festivals. I was particularly impressed by the variety of activities and the combination of youth work, neighborhood, art and culture, which seems to result in a wonderful synthesis.
In the afternoon, we visited a community garden that is located right next to a canal and a busy footpath. This special location, together with the fact that there are a lot of rabbits in this place, poses a challenge for the gardeners. For the first time in this exchange, we heard from a garden community that they are really frustrated because of problems with theft and that they no longer want to maintain the public part of their garden. Other projects we visited were also fully or partially open to the public, but this place is particularly busy compared to others. I was excited by the raised beds with special protrusions designed to enable wheelchair users to use the garden. Unfortunately, these beds (which are located in the public area) are not really used and were a telling symbol for me that a good idea to promote inclusion, which was even supported with public funds, does not automatically make a project inclusive if the framework conditions are not taken into account enough.
Day 3: 31.08.24
We spent today in Assat at CLAB. We were able to see how apple juice was made with a large electric press and were able to taste the fresh juice straight away, which was a very nice experience and reminded me of autumns in my childhood in my grandparents’ orchard. It was also great to see how committed everyone was to what they were doing. There was also a talk about fruit trees in the morning (unfortunately only in French again, so I didn’t really catch anything).
Many of the garden’s volunteers were present and preparations for tomorrow’s big annual festival were in full swing. We guest gardeners didn’t really know how to get involved as we weren’t really scheduled to do anything, so we more or less sat around all day, which was very relaxing anyway and gave us plenty of time to observe and exchange stories about our gardens, ideas and more.
At lunchtime, we were very well catered for with a rice salad and fresh crêpes, which we ate together sitting under a large lime tree.
Day 4: 01.09.2024
Today was the big CLAB annual festival. We were a little worried in the morning as the forecast had predicted very unstable weather, but in the end the weather turned out to be perfect, just like the day before. When we arrived in Assat, it was already buzzing. Many local and regional initiatives and producers were setting up their stalls and the atmosphere was happy and joyful. Gradually, more and more people arrived. Together with Alissa, I looked after the EU stand for a bit and we told a few people about the Gardeniser project.
A little later, Alissa and I had the opportunity to give short talks about our garden projects in Vienna and Nicolas kindly translated my presentation from English to French. After a delicious lunch, I had the opportunity to stroll through the many stalls myself, buy a souvenir and have interesting conversations. It was very inspiring to meet all these people. From the mushroom society, local organic farmers and beekeepers to the spirulina start-up and artists who dye their own clothes, make jewellery from beans and lamps from pumpkins, everything (and more) was represented.
Later, the Italians and Spaniards presented their garden projects. Both times in French, which I really admire them for, but which in turn meant that I sadly understood very little. But the photos alone were also interesting.
The CLAB annual festival was definitely an all-around successful event where people laughed, ate well, explored the garden, networked, acquired local treasures, gained knowledge and enjoyed life. It also gave CLAB the possibility to raise money for future projects through the sale of food, their own products and garden tours.
Day 5: 02.09.2024
We spent the last morning together, reviewing the many impressions, learnings and experiences and reflecting on them. Then it was already time to say goodbye to each other.
Merci to everyone of my lovely group and all the people in Pau and Assat who so warmly welcomed us, opened their gardens and shared their time!
