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A hands-on, mud between your toes, approach to education in
Bali
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This is the
Green School
in Bali. It was founded by John and Cynthia Hardy. It's a place
where kids are taught about their relationship with the earth that
they depend on. The school is built from bamboo. One of the keys
to the Green School's construction was the earlier work of Linda Garland,
founder of the
Environmental Bamboo Foundation, an Indonesian non-profit
organization that protects tropical forests by promoting bamboo. |
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The foundation did the all important research in
to
finding a way to protect the bamboo from the destructive
Powderpost Beetle. Bamboo has a high silica content which
makes it difficult to digest by beetles but by soaking the bamboo in
borax salts (guideline) it becomes a reliable building material.
Now add designer Elora Hardy, John and Cynthia
daughter, and some wonderful imaginative spaces start to take
shape. Elora founded the bamboo construction design company
Ibuku, meaning 'mother mine' or mother earth. Here Elora talks
about her story and the homes she designs with bamboo.
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Elora Hardy talks about bamboo |
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Green School is home to some wonderfully organic
shapes all made from bamboo, stone, clay and grass. Select from one to six
below.
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Classroom pod |
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Bathroom |
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Guesthouse |
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Library study space |
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Bridge over the Ayung River |
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Main school with off-grid power |
The Green School is now 100% off-grid, powered by
solar panels and a
vortex generator that borrows water from the river creating a
vortex to generate 50,000KWh of power over a shallow fall of about
80-100cm.
Below is the school's bamboo ATM. Normally these
would be powered on-grid but this one has its own solar panels
and is bolted to a large stone rather than the conventional
concrete block which the school would not allow.
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In keeping with the school's environmental mission
it was the venue for the release of four breeding pairs of
the endangered
Bali Starling (right). The Bali Starling became the rarest bird in the
world because of its value, around $1,000 each, for the pet industry.
Despite the release of the starling it is still critically
endangered because it has an extremely small range and a tiny
population, which is still suffering from illegal poaching for the
cage-bird trade.
The Green School partnered with
The Begawan
Foundation and the community to release four breeding pairs [release
pictures] of the
Bali Starling.
Listen to Bayu Wirayudha's story (below) of his efforts to
protect the beautiful bird.
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