Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - May 2021
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Guardians For Nature on Issuu
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On Homing and Healing: A Call to the Lifeblood and Marrow of Being
Walking alongside moss-covered, granite boulders, along the lake of Mustalampi and between the pine and silver birch trees of Nuuksio National Park, we watch the sky transform as its light adorns the dark, still waters with cerulean hues and ripples of sun-dappled clouds. In these strange and uncertain times of suspended systems and activities and, with the earth’s call for […]
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Earth and Nature: On Integration and the Power of Place
Angelique Michaels, Return To Origin Leader, writes from her internship in Finland.Feb 27 2020 For repatterning to occur, a certain unraveling is required, and most essentially, a period of conscious vegetation. Appropriated from the Latin vegetatus, to vegetate refers to the act of imparting energy to something. As such, it is to enliven and imbue […]
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Baphumelele Fountain of Hope
The trees we planted here at Fountain of Hope are part of a holistic approach to healing our youth and the trauma that some of them have gone through. It’s also something that gives them a sense of responsibility, caring and taking care of this plant that started so fragile, and nurturing it to be […]
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Intlanganiso Secondary School on Heritage Day
Trees for Tomorrow @ Intlanganiso Secondary School on Heritage Day On a day devoted to honouring and celebrating shared legacies of cultural, material and symbolic attributes inherited from past generations, and as part of Return to Origin’s Trees For Tomorrow Campaign, we facilitated a day of tree planting at Intlanganiso Secondary School in Khayelitsha. Thanks […]
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Cave work - with Jethro Boetman Louw
Return to Origin offered myself and my fellow leader Arnoldt Michaels, the opportunity to do cave work with khoi artist- Markus and bowmagician, medicine man and story-teller-Jethro Boetman Louw. Above the milkwood trees, with Oudekraal Beach and the great ocean waves swelling, slapping and lapping at boulders below, we made our way into the hollow of […]
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Baphumele Fountain of Hope
The ‘Trees for Tomorrow’ campaign forms part of a series of projects inspired by Return to Origin’s awareness of the great value and power in reconnecting Youth with Nature. In sowing seeds of promise and purpose today, we aspire towards leaving a legacy of healing and abundance for the generations who are to inherit the world tomorrow. Thanks […]
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Desert Tracking with the Khomani Bushmen
Through watching and tracking some small creature going about its life, you begin to see the way that Nature provides for its every need, and you can begin to feel the Love of the Divine that is inherent in everything in Nature. This is how Nature connects you to the Divine. Oum Gert Khomani San Bushmen […]
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The Rock Wizard
"How can we own the land when we belong to the earth? Each of us, whether we are aware of it or not, has a unique, sacred Earth calling via which we discover, assimilate and express aspects of Earth’s legacy that we have come to explore, both individually and collectively. Life is offering each of […]
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Umfolozi Trail and Tales
‘Where the Spirit resides’ Angelique Michaels In the clacking world of unabating activities and tireless pursuits, a creature, though fashioned from its troubled soil, suddenly found herself a stranger to the familiar faces and places she had for so long known and called her own. Bewildered by the scampering haste and scrambling words, something in […]
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Ocean and Devotion
"Children are born with a sense of wonder and an affinity for Nature. Properly cultivated, these values can mature into ecological literacy, and eventually into sustainable patterns of living.” Ernest Becker Return To Origin’s Guardians For Nature, (theme: Ocean as Home) took us to our beautiful False Bay, neighborhood to many of the children […]
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Monsters, Heros and Liberation
The group that I facilitated during my Guardians For Nature was comprised of youth from the Baphumelele Fountain of Hope program, which provides orphaned youth of the Cape between the ages of 18-21 with a safe and nurturing environment to transition positively towards adulthood. I could not have had a more perfect group for […]
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Earth Home and Belonging
Baphumele Youth Nature Connection Day On Saturday January 26, 2019 Return To Origin, https://www.returntoorigin.org.zatrainee leaders in the Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program, were delighted to return to the young men and women of Baphumele, Fountain of Hope. Last year we planted 10 trees there on their farm and the trees are thriving, we are pleased […]
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Trees for Tomorrow, Mandela Day, Leave a Legacy, Vryground
"For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver." Martin Luther King Trees for Tomorrow is Return to Origins signature campaign. A significant symbol of our origins that represents our work. Youth and nature connection, homecoming, healing, […]
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Community, Nature and Culture
Sowing The Gifts We Reap- Angelique Michaels, Trainee Leader This month has been one of planting and of sowing seeds, and for me personally, one of remembering the value of community and connection. On July 15, Return to Origin hosted its annual fundraiser and we, trainee leaders of the organisation’s Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program, being […]
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There is Power in Presence and Healing in Listening
Blog Angelique Michaels, Return To Origin Trainee Leader, Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program On June 16, Return to Origin facilitated another Guardians For Nature in Muizenberg with a group of kids from Capricorn Park, located on the Falsebay coast and referred to as the oldest informal settlement of the Cape. On the important day marked in […]
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Finding Elders and Friends in Nature
The elements provided Return To Origin trainee Leaders, in the Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program, and 13 young people aged between 7 and 13 a beautiful day at the Vlei in Muizenberg. Part of the sandvlei nature reserve, calm waters, grassy verges dotted with mantatoka trees, perfect for climbing and hiding.
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Storytelling, Memory and Food
“But there is nothing that can be hidden from the mind. Nothing that memory cannot reach or touch or call back” Don Mattera, quote from District Six Huis Kombuis: food and memory cookbook Return to Origin www.returntoorigin.org.za was honored to have Zayaan Khan, working with us. Zayaan is a food activist, who works with food […]
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Nature's Mirror -Vision Quest
“Something ancient in us bends us toward the origins of the whole thing. We either drown in the splits and confusions of our lives, or we surrender to something greater than ourselves.” Michael Meade Arnoldt Michaels -Trainee Leader Indigenous Knowledge Program Life, death and rebirth… During this month past, I have had one of the […]
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Nature Meets Culture -Art and Craft Market- July 15th.
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Inspiring people to re-imagine their relationship to their world
Blog Post: Arnoldt Michaels Return To Origin Trainee Leader, Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program. Our Guardians For Nature Day kicked off to a great start. As the school holidays take place during December, it afforded Return to Origin the perfect opportunity to use the funds that we raised during our Origins art exhibition in October to give […]
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WHAT YOU LOVE YOU PROTECT!
Thank you to all artists and buyers who sponsored our 1st Guardians For Nature project, by donating to our fundraiser “Origins” in October. Return To Origin Trainee Leaders, spent the day with 13 youth aged 10-13 years old at Silvermine Nature Reserve from the Vryground communities in Cape Town. After a breakfast of warm milk, bananas […]
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What the Heart Loves is the Cure. African Proverb
Blog Post: Angelique Michaels, Trainee Leader, Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program. This month we, the leaders in training for Return to Origin’s signature program, had the opportunity to facilitate our own youth-nature connection day at Silvermine Nature Reserve, Western Cape, with children from the Vryground underserved community in Cape Town. The day consolidated, in me, the […]
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Supernatural in our mother city
We were fortunate enough to spend time at Lions Head, Table Mountain, with Jethro Boetman Louw, from Khoi Konnexion. Jethro has a wealth of knowledge about our deep heritage from the plants that grow on table mountain and many rocks and stones with which he appears to know each one intimately, like a family member […]
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Origins - A community venture.
Blog Post: Lindsay Burch Trainee Leader, Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program. In Service Training This month is the half way point in our second year as part of the Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program (IKLP). It also represented our first opportunity for Return to Origin (RTO) to begin interacting with community. All the effort from many individuals […]
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When we share our gifts the community thrives
The Art of Bow Making Workshop with Khoi Khonnexion. Angelique Michaels, Trainee Leaders in the Indigenous Knowledge Leadership Program. "With quiet bearing, they ignited in me a renewed sense of appreciation for the marvels of music and the intimately healing chords struck in their heart of the one through whom it finds expression. Giving utterance […]
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Craig Foster's video
Scientists are now calling South Africa's Cape Coast the "cradle of the human mind". This is where humans with intelligence like ours today first emerged. So for "The Great Human Odyssey", we brought the world of the first coastal cultures to life in dramatic recreations. But was it worth the effort? Watch this "behind-the-scenes" and […]
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