I first flexed and woke up my dormant green thumbs in Outdoor gardening versus Indoors by growing my first Basil in a planter. A year later when I became comfortable in urban farming, I planted Tomatoes next to my Basil and there you have a Caprese salad. It is so satisfying to eat the produce you plant; words can't describe the feeling.

 

You can farm Outdoors if you have a balcony, terrace, window sill (can use window plant boxes hanging on the outside) or any outside area. If you do not have an outside area, you can still grow food indoors like microgreens, sprouts, and herbs.

 

Farming is therapeutic for me; it transports me out of the rat-race high school life, gives me a break from all my teenage thoughts, melts away my stress and gives me inner peace when connecting with Mother Earth.

 

I even got my family and friends into farming which is a fun & great way to bond and have quality time together. I have also organized a workshop for a few children in my residential complex and introduced them to some gardening which they can continue in their own kitchens. I hope by spreading my love of farming to others, more people will join this urban farming movement.

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Farming our own food means we get to control what we put in our bodies from the seeds to the bug sprays to the soils we use. The produce is fresher and loaded with more nutrients compared to what we get in the supermarkets. Hong Kong does not produce enough food and with China’s food scares, a lot of the food is imported from countries like the US, Australia, and Europe. This means, they travel a long way in planes and by the time, they land on our plates, the taste and nutrients have been diminished.

 

If each one of us grows our own food, we buy less of the packaged groceries, thus collectively can put a dent in the environment by reducing garbage like plastics that only end up in our depleting landfills.

 

There are so many benefits from urban gardening and I really hope my documentation of my experiences will at least motivate you to try it out and find out for yourself.

 

And who knows? You might get stranded on Mars and at least, you will know how to grow your own food.

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