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Tuesday, May 26th
PAPER, PLASTIC OR?
Paper or plastic? Cloth bags made in China? How do you want to contain your groceries?
Producing paper is energy intensive and toxic. Plastic is dangerous to the oceans, our health and the rest of the planet. Cloth is good, yes, but was it made sustainably?
I'm writing in a quiet moment created because the ferry from Juneau with two people from a non-profit called Turning the Tides is late. They want to brainstorm about making a film focused on disposable plastics in the marine environment. They like the balance of humor and seriousness in Eating Alaska. As I think about plastics and organize more screenings of Eating Alaska, the complexities of our choices and the way we all consume and create a footprint, reverberate and ricochet.
Last week we showed Eating Alaska in Wrangell Alaska, a community of about 2000 people near the mouth of the Stikine River. The river starts in British Columbia, is noted for its prolific salmon runs, serving as migratory bird habitat, as well as being an ancient and historic trade route. We showed the first half of Eating Alaska and stopped both to put more on our plates from the local foods potluck and to talk. After almost two months on the East Coast, I was happy to eat wild salmon again and some herring eggs and venison too. I'd paused the film right after a scene about contaminants in the wild. What did we talk about? Well, what stood out I think for all of us, was the proposed mining for minerals and coal at the headwaters of the river and a recent visit from representatives of Talhltan Tribe to talk about what the mines mean to the health of the river, the fish and eating locally.
Meanwhile, screenings of the film and discussions of everything from what makes sense to eat, to making food maps to climate change continue.
This summer that includes:
• Mendocino Film Festival, Mendocino, CA,
May 31 2009 11 A.M. Matheson Performing Arts Center
Director attending.
• The 8th Annual UC, CSU, CCC Sustainability Conference
Share Innovative and Best Practices in Campus Sustainability for the University of California, California State University, and California Community College systems.
UCSB.
Monday June 22 9 PM
Anacapa Recreation Room, UC Santa Barbara
• Appalachian Summer Festival
Appalachian State Museum
Boone, North Carolina6
July 10, 2009 8 PM
• Screening, Alaskan Pot Luck,
and Salmon Smoking Class.
The Maxine & Jesse Whitney Museum.
Valdez, Alaska
August 12, 2009, starting at noon
• Screening and local Foods Potluck
Wrangell Mountains Center
McCarthy, Alaska,
The Wrangell Mountains Center is a private non-profit institute dedicated to environmental education, research, and the arts in Alaska's Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve.
August 21, 2009
Filmmaker attending!
An Ohio Chapter of the Sierra Club is organizing an Eating Alaska event too and more screenings are welcome, be it schools, community groups or families, Slow Fooders, campus sustainability groups, churches or anyone who wants to think about what they eat and how it connects them to where they live, with an Alaskan twist!
Ellen Frankenstein, on 05.26.09 @ 11:10AKT [link]
Sunday, May 3rd
The Eating Continues
Ethics, environmental impact, nutrition? There are a lot of issues when it comes to what we put into our mouths, explained Willow Blish, the organizer of the Slow Food in Boston screening of Eating Alaska.
I arrived at the screening just in time for a question and answer session and to the start of a panel including Willow, who has a background in fitness training that she's working to link to the way we eat, a young butcher/meat cutter and a local writer, named Andrew Rimus, co-author of Beef: The Untold Story of How Milk, Meat and Muscle Shaped the World.
Meanwhile, screenings continue with local food potlucks, bee keepers and farmers, salmon smoking classes and more:
• Redstone, Colorado
Final Winters Series Event, May 3, 2009 at 7 pm
Church at Redstone (966-6355)
Screening to be followed with local farmers, bee-keepers, grass fed local meat ranchers
and talk of starting a community garden.
• Lexington, Kentucky
May 6, 2009
6:30 pm Reception featuring local foods
Sponsored by Good Foods Co-op
7:00 p.m Screening & discussion with the filmmaker
Lexington Public Library, Main Street
• 2009 Alaska Dietetic Association Spring Conference
The Power of Nutrition in Alaska
Friday May 15, 2009
6:30-8:30 pm University of Alaska, Anchorage, Cuddy Center
Presented by Jennifer Johnson, nutritionist with the Anchorage Native Medical Center
and advisor to Eating Alaska.
• Wrangell, AK Community & School Screenings
May 18, 2009
Director attending.
• Mendocino Film Festival, Mendocino, CA,
May 29 -31 2009
Director attending.
• Appalachian Summer Festival
Appalachian State Museum
Boone, North Carolina
July 10, 2009 8 PM
• Screening, Alaskan Pot Luck, and Salmon Smoking Class.
The Maxine & Jesse Whitney Museum.
Valdez, Alaska
August 12, 2009, starting at noon
• Screening and local Foods Potluck
Wrangell Mountains Center
McCarthy, Alaska
The Wrangell Mountains Center is a private non-profit institute dedicated to environmental education, research, and the arts in Alaska's Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve.
August 21, 2009
Filmmaker attending!
Ellen Frankenstein, on 05.03.09 @ 06:57AKT [link]
