Posts tagged with "sustainable-living"
-
Farm Registration
In a previous post, I wrote about how we arranged money to buy the farm. It was a long and arduous process as it tested our patience. However, we later found out that the pain we have to go through and the patience required is just the beginning :). Anyway, I ended the previous post with us asking our real estate agent Mr. J to start the registration process. He has been very helpful in getting all the documents prepared and visiting the taluk office etc. After a few failed dates for registration, he finally fixed one date that worked for us. He gave us all the instructions and explained the process involved and said it would all be done in a few hours. We won’t even have to step into the office until the signature time. I was feeling upbeat about the registration.
...continue reading -
How We Arranged Money To Buy Our Farm
After zoning in on the farm that we liked, we decided it was time to take the first step forward, which was to come to an agreement with the owners that we will purchase the farm within a certain duration. The way it is usually done is that we write down an agreement stating we will pay a token amount as advance, and will pay the rest before registration. Usually there will also be a time limit specified in the agreement before which the transaction has to happen. If the transaction is not completed in the stipulated time because the buyer could not arrange the money then the advance is forfeited. If the seller fails to clear their documents they will pay back the advance with interest. The trouble started right from there for us.
...continue reading -
A Farm By Any Other Name
I love the quote by Steve Jobs “You can’t connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards. You have to believe that the dots will connect and that will give you the confidence to follow your heart even when it leads you off the well worn path and that will make all the difference.”. We had absolutely no idea that somehow, our decision to unschool our kid, quitting the rat race, minimizing our lifestyle and retiring early will lead us to our dream of owning a farm. There are so many dots that eventually connected. But at the time when we were making those decisions which led us off the well worn path, we had no idea that they will connect. After all the many twists and turns, we eventually found a farm that we loved and knew that it has our name written on it.
...continue reading -
Wisdom From Farm Owners
After having decided not to buy a managed farm and also not to buy farm as a group, we finally settled on what we want. Next we thought it would be a good idea to talk to a few owners of farms to get an idea of what we are going to deal with once we own a farm. We know a couple of folks who are unschoolers and also own a farm. We asked them if we could visit their farm and gain some wisdom. Both families graciously agreed and we visited their farms on two separate occasions and spent a lot of time understanding their philosophy, why they were doing farming, what they learned and what difficulties they faced and how they overcame them. We learned a ton, but in this post I summarize some of our learnings.
...continue reading -
Solar System Comparison with MKBHD
Some of you may already know MKBHD, a popular youtuber in the tech world. He recently posted a video about the going completely solar and not having to pay an electricity bill for a whole year. It is a very well made video which explains how the solar panel system works with batteries (off grid) and with net metering (on grid). Although I don’t have net metering and I am not completely off grid, so mine is a hybrid approach. Still, if you watch the video it will help you understand how my setup works (sort of). My setup is closer to the hybrid system explained in another video. Anyway, I wanted to compare my puny setup with MKBHD’s setup and see how I compare. So here goes.
...continue reading -
Power Bill Is Zero, Thanks To Solar Panel
If you remember, I recently posted that I cannot add any more solar panels given my current setup. You might also recall that I have a lone 320 W solar panel. Surely that cannot generate enough power to reduce my electricity bill to zero. Yet, my latest electricity bill is exactly zero. Thats what happens when you mix politics with lifestyle. Some of you might understand what I am talking about. For others, here is the clue – Gruha Jyothi scheme. Unless you like reading about politics, or belong to Karnataka, one of the southern states of India, you might not know what I am talking about. Let me explain.
...continue reading -
Cost Of Owning Something
Whenever I plan to buy something expensive, I go through this exercise of figuring out the cost of owning something. Remember that for most material things in life, the cost of owning it is not just the sticker price. There is more to owning it. After running through the exercise objectively if I still feel the need to buy something, I sleep over it. Gives a bit more clarity on the subjective aspects. Some things are an absolute necessity and I am not talking about those ones. Moreover, what is a necessity for me may be a discretionary spend for someone else. Finally, there is no point doing this exercise if the cost of the thing you want is cheap and doesn’t affect sustainability too much. Again, for some sustainability may be important, for others it is not.
...continue reading -
DIY Projects
In an earlier post I talked about how we try to do repairs where possible and upkeep things to extend the life of some products. As an extension of that post, we also wondered how we could possibly cut costs by doing some things ourselves instead of buying stuff. This again while it seems like a frugal activity (which it is) also reduces the environmental impact. I know I am talking a lot about environment without even having a degree in it. Well, my life partner has a Masters degree in it (literally).
...continue reading -
How To Make Homemade Compost
Most of us can manage our wet wastes at home instead of disposing them at the landfills. Have you ever passed by one of those waste disposal centers that make us close our nose and car doors? Almost all of us are responsible for that. I am not aware of how many developed countries actually do manage their wastes (I am not good with statistics or numbers as such), but I firmly believe India is definitely not one of them. Our stinking drains and over-spilling garbage on roads is almost an integral part of our lives. I can't tell exactly when this realization hit me that I too am a contributor of the same and have to do something about it.
...continue reading -
The Start of a New Series: Sustainable Living
In the last two meet-ups I had with my readers, I understood that a few people are interested in sustainable living. For those readers I am planning to start another series called the sustainable living. Since I don't know much about the topic and it is mostly run by my better half, I will hand over the reins to her when talking about sustainable living or organic gardening. To kick things off, I asked her to write a guest post as an intro to sustainable living and how she got started. So here is that one from her. Take it over mrs reynd.
...continue reading