Now this tōtara. It's going to be planted by my grave. Hopefully it'll be a lot bigger by the time I need it planted. It's completing the cycle. Natural burial – my body will decompose and feed the tree and it's all part of nature's cycle. [Music] That's good. Oh that's nice, look at that. If we depend on everything coming
from the supermarket for our food that's a huge carbon footprint and we're in charge of that,
we're in charge of what we eat and where we get it from. There's a concerted effort by multinationals to control the seed supply – Monsanto and others buying up all the seed companies and seed growers and so on – because if they can control
the seed supply they control our lives. I want to encourage people to grow some of their own food or be very conscious consumers when they do go buying their food. We do need to change individual behavior but
that's not enough on its own. Big systems have to change also. We need local government
and central government to do the right thing but they don't have the courage to do that if
they don't feel the support from beneath. So that individual change and
pressure is really important. That's, oh yeah it's a good weight. That's great. I moved here at the beginning of 2018.
It's just a tiny 400 square metres. But it provides me with everything I need
in terms of fruit and veg. – Is there any grass on the property?
– No, not a blade of grass. I had a quarter acre further south, in town.
We bought that property – it was just a bare paddock – the idea was that for two years
we cropped the whole section and we sold those and that helped to pay the rates for the two years
before we built the house. We lived there for 62 years,
before my husband passed away in 2014. And so there's a lot of memories. But guess what?
I've still got those memories, even though I've moved. So this is a book about me
and it's called 'Good For You, Helen Dew'. Because what's my name?
– Helen!
– Helen Dew. And now what does that look like?
– Sun!
– The sun, that's right. I've seen lots of sun coming and going.
How old do you think I am? – 100!
– Nearly nearly 100.
I'm 85, so that's pretty old. I am by Nature very frugal. I am a child of a
post depression time. I was born in 37. And I just abhor waste of any kind. And I'm catching my water, the
shower water, in a bucket, in a big basin. And I take that out and water flowers.
It saves water. Good, so that was nice wasn't it? When I emptied the ashes out earlier
I prepared the next batch of biochar. So this is basically two cans with stuff
full of this kind of material... So there's dried-up – they have to
be perfectly dry – so that's pumpkin seeds and orange peel all broken up, any dry material like that,
you can use little chips of wood too. I'll just uncap this with care and you
can see what I've got in in there. Bits and pieces there. Put two of those in at the end of day
and then by morning I've got biochar. So this is just all the spent seeds and you can
even see the shape of them there. Biochar is a sort of a soil amendment. It's good for
aerating the soil because it's very porous. It's a bit like a sponge and so it holds a
lot of nutrient. I put mine through my compost. Right, so, slugs, here we come. Here's one. See the little critter? I'm just going to ring my neighbor. We
have a neighborhood support system in the area and so she's my buddy and
and we just do a quick call to each other in the mornings to make sure
we're still upright! – Good morning, Helen.
–Oh good morning, how are you today?
– Oh look, I'm fine and you are too? I think the money system could prove
to be a problem. We have booms and bust, boom and bust. We seem to do the same thing over
again and expect a different result. It needs to be redesigned, and that's a big ask,
and it's also not going to be easily achieved. – So you all ready for your meeting tonight?
– Pretty well, pretty well. We've got about, I don't know, about 10 people
coming I think, yeah it's quite a nice little group. In 2003 I was introduced to a
German woman called Margrit Kennedy and she was touring New Zealand talking
about this very issue. She really inspired me. And I thought, "Now I know what I want to do with my life." I was part of a group that formed Living Economies. And so that's a body that researches
and promotes local currency systems. Systems that work for the community, designed by the community and managed by the community. You've got to have good relationships, where we have trust and confidence in one another.
So let's let's have a look then at what a savings pool is. Half your payment goes
into paying back your loan and the other half... [Music] I had covid and a heart attack both at the same time and the medical people don't really know which
came first but anyway I was pretty sick and so I was in hospital and obviously I survived. Covid affects different people in different ways.
For me I went into the deepest depression imaginable. I just wanted to leave this world
and I really was planning to do that. Fortune stepped in and I had a visitor and another
visitor and so forth and and I ended up with family taking care of me
for a couple of weeks. And also got on medication – antidepressants –
so that really worked. Just towards the end of that fortnight
of rest and recreation, I woke one night with a poem that
I had to write down, I simply had to. The poem was just demanding that it be written. And I addressed it to a lovely friend that I have in Germany. Matilde, my friend and soulmate, to you I reach from hell's deep, dark well. Make haste to my aid, bring your spade. Together, we'll build castles on summer's warm beach. And I just imagined us as two carefree
little kids, and not a care in the world. And it was from that point that I found myself
on the way out of the depression. [Music] I'm going to have a natural burial. We have a natural burial park in Carterton,
because I lobbied Council, persistently, until we got one. I'm ready to go when I get called. If I fall over in the garden, or whatever, you know, then that's... You know, I don't get too worried about
protecting myself against, you know, the possibility I might die. Actually, I might die one of these
days and I'm ready to go when I need to. And yet, I think I'll be saying to that guy upstairs,
just a minute, I've got this to finish and that to finish! I've had a very very happy and satisfying
life – especially in my later years. Yeah. Thanks so much for watching this film.
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