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The BeGood Cafe in Tokyo hosted the 3rd Ecovillage Conference just before the Worldview Module of EDE Japan. Read more from Hildur Jackson. Arriving in Tokyo’s international airport, Narita, you drive for two hours through a landscape of skyscrapers. It is beyond my comprehension how humans have built all this and how it is possible to make it work. We were taken to the BeGood Café headquarters, a typical NGO office with books all over, colorful posters and a meeting table squeezed-in. The leader and initiator, Kiyoshi Shikita, welcomed us and introduced the BeGood Café. Shikita-san is an elegant 50-year old man who wears his long hair in a pony tail! The Name BeGood Café has been chosen since cafés have always been places where people meet and discuss. There is actually no café as such, but we did get a cup of green tea.
 Ecovillage Conference in the News
The first day of the conference was dedicated to the global aspects, the second to the Asian region and the third to the Japanese ecovillage movement. There were, all in all, 50 presentations and workshops with many Japanese projects including a presentation by Hidetake Enomoto on the Transition Town movement in Japan. In the afternoons, several hours were reserved for dialogues on the global, Asian and Japanese development. In the last evening, there was a big party with music focalized by Mr. Shikita-san. Overall, the conference was a huge success. Because of BeGood Café’s initiative, word is really getting around Japan, which probably has the fastest growing national ecovillage movement anywhere. We were interviewed and photographed by the biggest newspaper in Tokyo (Asahi Shimbun) and were also interviewed by the 4th biggest daily (Mainichi), two magazines, and the people from YouTube video.
Conference Highlights
One of the important speakers of the conference was Professor Itonaga. He introduced Permaculture to Japan and has written books and many articles on ecovillages. Then Ross Jackson spoke about “Economics in an Ecovillage Future”, which he is developing into a full book for publication later this year. Ross was very critical of the current economic/political system, which he believes is leading global society towards a collapse. He foresees a subsequent period of renewal based on an emerging holistic paradigm.
Gaia Education
 I followed with my PowerPoint presentation on the history of Gaia Education, how it is organized, how it is successfully drawing on the experiences developed in a network of some of the most successful ecovillages across the Earth, and how we are trailblazing in the sustainability education front through its two programs - The EDE (Ecovillage Design Education) a 4-week program having now been offered 40 times on 6 continents and GEDS (Gaia Education Design for Sustainability) which is an Internet-based EDE program in Spanish and English that is enjoying a successful pilot year of testing. I was happy that I had many photos to show. I was asked to join a session where Michiyo Furuhashi from Konohana Ecovillage shared about the first Japanese EDE. It was a joy to see the 100 EDE trainees sitting as audience right there at the Ecovillage conference.
The worldview section of the EDE took place immediately after the conference in the near-by Konohana family, an Ecovillage with a stunning view of the holy mountain. Parts of the EDE also took place at the course center of the Nihon University located at a breathtaking natural park at the foot of Mount Fuji.
Post-Conference Visit to Konohana Family
On our way to Konohana Family, we first visited the Nihon University, Mr Itonaga received us in the campus, one of the biggest in Japan, took us to his office and showed us his Permaculture experimental lot. They are now doing research in straw bale building. After lunch Ross and Dr. Lim of Korea made presentations for 100 students on ecovillages. After visiting the university’s impressive course center at the foot of Mt. Fuji, we arrived just in time for dinner at the Konohana family, where Michiyo Furuhashi, who arranged our last visit to Japan has lived for two years. Ross and I were placed at a small table while the family sat on the floor. After a prayer, a most delicious dinner was artistically served in several small cups and plates.
 People were just so welcoming, that we from the first moment felt happy and at home. The naturalness of this place in is dire opposition to the lack of nature in Tokyo and constant air conditioning. In the evening, they performed a wonderful concert with their own lyrics which is recorded and sold on two CD’s.
They hold meetings every evening, first a children’s meeting (which was fun to witness), then for the grown ups, distributing tasks for next day and talking very openly of their problems and spiritual development. The entire Konohana family works in the fields and shares everything. They cultivate 15 ha. with 260 different crops. They sell eggs, nursery plants and some of their produce. They also work locally in the town council, helping people with stress and mental disorders. As their spiritual leader Isadon says: “when they get good food and work on the land, they always get better quickly—if they want to get well.”
The farm is disjointed with several pieces of land in the region (elderly people near by ask them often to take care of their ancestors’ rice paddies). The visit was very interesting and educational. I just wish we had more days to explore this place, their ideas and their spirituality. One thing made a big impression: their use of microorganism that is arranged EMX in their way --- in many contexts: in the chicken feed, the compost toilets, in the manure as their main source of fertilizer, with no odors at all. Humans also drink it. It is the base of their ecosystem's health.
--- By Hildur Jackson
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