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Achieving peace through a garden

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UPDATE: ‘Youth, peace bloom in botanical garden’ ran in the Nov. 23 edition of Vida en el Valle.

Meet Manuel Jiménez. He received The California Wellness Foundation’s 2011 California Peace Prize Nov. 17ay, in recognition of the youth engagement work he and his wife, Olga, do through the non-profit organization, Woodlake Pride.

Manuel and Olga – with the assistance of Woodlake youth and other community volunteers – maintain a 13-acre garden in the Tulare County community. It is truly the most amazing garden I’ve ever seen. They have 150 varieties of roses, 70 varieties of grapes, 12 varieties of blueberries, peach, plum and nectarine orchards and, maybe most shocking, rows of tropical and exotic plants like bananas, mangoes, pineapples and guavas.

As I walked through the one-mile-long garden yesterday, it was at first hard for me to understand how such an amazing garden could also double as a youth violence prevention program. But once I saw Manuel interacting with local youth – and opening their eyes to the wonders of agriculture, and the world – I glimpsed the power of the program.

 

I watched as Manuel unpeeled ears of heirloom corn and showed their beautiful colors – mix-matched purple, yellow, and red kernels – to 10-year-old Roman Ramírez and 8-year-old Estevan Saucedo.

“It’s the same kind of corn, but it varies from color to color,” explained Manuel, a former farmworker turned agriculture expert. “It’s all the same seeds – just like kids!”

As we walked through the garden, Manuel encouraged the kids (and lucky me!) to smell and taste everything – from apples and grapes, to pomegranates and jujubes.

“These are some of the smallest tangerines in the world, kids,” he said, as he unpeeled the fruit, and doled out mini slices.

Manuel appears so comfortable in his garden – but looked uneasy when asked about winning the Peace Prize, which comes with a cash award of $25,000. Finally, he said he was glad the kids would earn recognition for their hard work in the garden.

“The manpower behind this is actually kid power,” he said.

Read more about Manuel and Olga Jiménez in next week’s edition of Vida en el Valle. To learn more about Woodlake Pride, check out this video:


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