Last Week's Events - Fair Fair, Judy Wicks, Mill Creek

(This was drafted last weekend - and I had trouble with embedding photos, so I'll add those later!)
Just Food has been pretty busy getting everyone riled up and ready for spring!

Last Wednesday was the Fair Fair and Judy Wicks's visit to Villanova. Emily did an amazing job organizing everything, and we welcomed Greener Partners, Philabundance, and Grid Magazine, in addition to featuring our Peace & Justice student groups, including CRS Ambassadors, FaceAIDS, Villanovans for Life, Villanovans Against the Death Penalty, Progressive Student Network, Bread for the World, and Just Food, of course! Sun & Earth also sent out a bunch of their sample-sized non-toxic cleaning products and a prize for the raffle, which the student intern representing Philabundance won. We had a great day socializing, networking, and learning from each other, and even getting some new people interested in what we do and signed up for these crazy-long updates (they had no idea what they were getting themselves into, right?)!

The Fair Fair was a perfect preamble to the CPJE's honoring of Judy Wicks with the Adela Dwyer-St. Thomas of Villanova Peace Award that evening. The CPJE put on a fantastic spread for the pre-speech dinner, with, ahem, Emily's and my suggestions for local/seasonal/organic dishes. I wish I had taken some photos (there was a photographer there, so I'll ask Sharon for some of those), because it was really beautiful and delicious; there was a microgreens salad with baby radishes, goat cheese and potato gratin, marinated button mushrooms, roasted beets with beet greens, a very winy ratatouille, fish (which kind?...I am embarassed to say that I use my vegetarianism as an excuse not to pay attention sometimes, but Emily can fill in the details), flourless fair trade chocolate cake, and fair trade coffee. It was so yummy, and I luckily scored leftovers for the next two days!

Judy's acceptance speech was interesting if not that surprising. She talked about her future plans to move into a more stable community now that she's sold the controlling share of the White Dog Cafe and closed the Black Cat giftshop. She explained the social contract she had the new owner sign in order to use the name White Dog, something about which I am now wishing I had asked more questions. Another thing Judy talked about was integrating one's life, so that the values one holds about community, solidarity, justice, the good life, etc., at home are carried over into the workplace. Our friend Bree seems to have especially enjoyed the soundbyte that accompanied this: "Usually, at home it's the golden rule, while at work, gold rules." That was a good one, Judy!

In other news, we went back to Mill Creek, accompanied by some members of the Philosophy class Food, Sustainability, and Place. It was a gorgeous spring day - so perfect for finally getting outside and in the dirt! After enjoying some cinnamon swirl bread from Great Harvest Bread Co., we all loaded into the old P&J van and made it down to West Philly without anything falling off or breaking this time. When we got there, Jo, one of the farm's directors, gave us the tour and then got us set up to work. Some of us turned the compost, while the rest of us prepped the soil beds for pea planting. Not to brag or anything, but a little birdie told me our group was more enthusiastic (ie: better!) than the Penn kids that had been there earlier in the day. I'm not surprised! The time passed so quickly, and before we knew it, it was time to load up the future farmers of America and go home. I think everyone had fun and I would like to keep going back.