A guerilla gardener in South Central LA
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0:00 - 0:04I live in South Central.
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0:04 - 0:06This is South Central:
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0:06 - 0:09liquor stores,
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0:09 - 0:11fast food,
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0:11 - 0:13vacant lots.
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0:13 - 0:15So the city planners, they get together and they figure
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0:15 - 0:18they're going to change the name South Central to make it represent something else,
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0:18 - 0:21so they change it to South Los Angeles,
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0:21 - 0:25like this is going to fix what's really going wrong in the city.
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0:25 - 0:29This is South Los Angeles. (Laughter)
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0:29 - 0:31Liquor stores,
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0:31 - 0:34fast food,
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0:34 - 0:36vacant lots.
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0:36 - 0:40Just like 26.5 million other Americans,
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0:40 - 0:42I live in a food desert,
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0:42 - 0:44South Central Los Angeles,
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0:44 - 0:49home of the drive-thru and the drive-by.
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0:49 - 0:54Funny thing is, the drive-thrus are killing more people than the drive-bys.
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0:54 - 0:56People are dying from curable diseases
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0:56 - 0:59in South Central Los Angeles.
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0:59 - 1:02For instance, the obesity rate in my neighborhood
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1:02 - 1:05is five times higher than, say, Beverly Hills,
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1:05 - 1:09which is probably eight, 10 miles away.
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1:09 - 1:12I got tired of seeing this happening.
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1:12 - 1:14And I was wondering, how would you feel
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1:14 - 1:18if you had no access to healthy food,
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1:18 - 1:20if every time you walk out your door you see the ill effects
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1:20 - 1:24that the present food system has on your neighborhood?
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1:24 - 1:27I see wheelchairs bought and sold
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1:27 - 1:29like used cars.
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1:29 - 1:33I see dialysis centers popping up like Starbucks.
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1:33 - 1:36And I figured, this has to stop.
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1:36 - 1:42So I figured that the problem is the solution.
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1:42 - 1:46Food is the problem and food is the solution.
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1:46 - 1:49Plus I got tired of driving 45 minutes round trip
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1:49 - 1:53to get an apple that wasn't impregnated with pesticides.
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1:53 - 1:58So what I did, I planted a food forest in front of my house.
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1:58 - 2:00It was on a strip of land that we call a parkway.
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2:00 - 2:03It's 150 feet by 10 feet.
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2:03 - 2:06Thing is, it's owned by the city.
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2:06 - 2:08But you have to maintain it.
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2:08 - 2:13So I'm like, "Cool. I can do whatever the hell I want,
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2:13 - 2:17since it's my responsibility and I gotta maintain it."
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2:17 - 2:20And this is how I decided to maintain it.
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2:20 - 2:23So me and my group, L.A. Green Grounds, we got together
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2:23 - 2:25and we started planting my food forest, fruit trees,
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2:25 - 2:27you know, the whole nine, vegetables.
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2:27 - 2:30What we do, we're a pay-it-forward kind of group,
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2:30 - 2:35where it's composed of gardeners from all walks of life,
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2:35 - 2:37from all over the city, and it's completely volunteer,
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2:37 - 2:39and everything we do is free.
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2:39 - 2:42And the garden, it was beautiful.
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2:42 - 2:45And then somebody complained.
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2:45 - 2:47The city came down on me,
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2:47 - 2:51and basically gave me a citation saying that I had to remove my garden,
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2:51 - 2:54which this citation was turning into a warrant.
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2:54 - 2:56And I'm like, "Come on, really?
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2:56 - 2:59A warrant for planting food on a piece of land
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2:59 - 3:03that you could care less about?" (Laughter)
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3:03 - 3:05And I was like, "Cool. Bring it."
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3:05 - 3:08Because this time it wasn't coming up.
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3:08 - 3:13So L.A. Times got ahold of it. Steve Lopez did a story on it
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3:13 - 3:16and talked to the councilman,
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3:16 - 3:18and one of the Green Grounds members,
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3:18 - 3:21they put up a petition on Change.org,
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3:21 - 3:23and with 900 signatures, we were a success.
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3:23 - 3:26We had a victory on our hands.
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3:26 - 3:29My councilman even called in and said how they endorse
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3:29 - 3:32and love what we're doing.
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3:32 - 3:34I mean, come on, why wouldn't they?
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3:34 - 3:39L.A. leads the United States in vacant lots that the city actually owns.
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3:39 - 3:44They own 26 square miles of vacant lots.
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3:44 - 3:47That's 20 Central Parks.
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3:47 - 3:55That's enough space to plant 725 million tomato plants.
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3:55 - 4:00Why in the hell would they not okay this?
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4:00 - 4:04Growing one plant will give you 1,000, 10,000 seeds.
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4:04 - 4:07When one dollar's worth of green beans
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4:07 - 4:10will give you 75 dollars' worth of produce.
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4:10 - 4:14It's my gospel, when I'm telling people, grow your own food.
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4:14 - 4:17Growing your own food is like printing your own money.
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4:17 - 4:24(Applause)
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4:24 - 4:27See, I have a legacy in South Central.
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4:27 - 4:32I grew up there. I raised my sons there.
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4:32 - 4:36And I refuse to be a part of this manufactured reality
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4:36 - 4:39that was manufactured for me by some other people,
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4:39 - 4:41and I'm manufacturing my own reality.
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4:41 - 4:44See, I'm an artist.
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4:44 - 4:48Gardening is my graffiti. I grow my art.
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4:48 - 4:52Just like a graffiti artist, where they beautify walls,
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4:52 - 4:56me, I beautify lawns, parkways.
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4:56 - 5:00I use the garden, the soil, like it's a piece of cloth,
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5:00 - 5:02and the plants and the trees,
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5:02 - 5:06that's my embellishment for that cloth.
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5:06 - 5:12You'd be surprised what the soil could do
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5:12 - 5:13if you let it be your canvas.
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5:13 - 5:17You just couldn't imagine how amazing a sunflower is
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5:17 - 5:20and how it affects people.
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5:20 - 5:22So what happened?
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5:22 - 5:28I have witnessed my garden become a tool for the education,
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5:28 - 5:31a tool for the transformation of my neighborhood.
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5:31 - 5:35To change the community, you have to change the composition of the soil.
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5:35 - 5:40We are the soil.
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5:40 - 5:46You'd be surprised how kids are affected by this.
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5:46 - 5:50Gardening is the most therapeutic
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5:50 - 5:53and defiant act you can do,
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5:53 - 5:55especially in the inner city.
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5:55 - 5:58Plus you get strawberries.
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5:58 - 6:01(Laughter)
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6:01 - 6:04I remember this time,
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6:04 - 6:06there was this mother and a daughter came,
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6:06 - 6:10it was, like, 10:30 at night, and they were in my yard,
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6:10 - 6:13and I came out and they looked so ashamed.
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6:13 - 6:17So I'm like, man, it made me feel bad that they were there,
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6:17 - 6:19and I told them, you know, you don't have to do this like this.
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6:19 - 6:21This is on the street for a reason.
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6:21 - 6:25It made me feel ashamed to see people
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6:25 - 6:28that were this close to me that were hungry,
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6:28 - 6:31and this only reinforced why I do this,
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6:31 - 6:34and people asked me, "Fin, aren't you afraid
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6:34 - 6:35people are going to steal your food?"
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6:35 - 6:37And I'm like, "Hell no, I ain't afraid they're gonna steal it.
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6:37 - 6:40That's why it's on the street.
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6:40 - 6:43That's the whole idea.
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6:43 - 6:44I want them to take it, but at the same time,
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6:44 - 6:48I want them to take back their health."
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6:48 - 6:51There's another time when I put
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6:51 - 6:56a garden in this homeless shelter in downtown Los Angeles.
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6:56 - 6:59These are the guys, they helped me unload the truck.
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6:59 - 7:02It was cool, and they just shared the stories
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7:02 - 7:05about how this affected them and how
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7:05 - 7:08they used to plant with their mother and their grandmother,
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7:08 - 7:11and it was just cool to see how this changed them,
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7:11 - 7:17if it was only for that one moment.
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7:17 - 7:20So Green Grounds has gone on to plant
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7:20 - 7:21maybe 20 gardens.
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7:21 - 7:26We've had, like, 50 people come to our dig-ins
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7:26 - 7:28and participate, and it's all volunteers.
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7:28 - 7:32If kids grow kale, kids eat kale.
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7:32 - 7:33(Laughter)
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7:33 - 7:38If they grow tomatoes, they eat tomatoes. (Applause)
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7:38 - 7:42But when none of this is presented to them,
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7:42 - 7:45if they're not shown how food affects the mind and the body,
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7:45 - 7:50they blindly eat whatever the hell you put in front of them.
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7:50 - 7:52I see young people
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7:52 - 7:55and they want to work,
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7:55 - 7:57but they're in this thing where they're caught up --
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7:57 - 8:01I see kids of color and they're just on this track
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8:01 - 8:03that's designed for them,
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8:03 - 8:05that leads them to nowhere.
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8:05 - 8:08So with gardening, I see an opportunity
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8:08 - 8:10where we can train these kids
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8:10 - 8:13to take over their communities,
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8:13 - 8:17to have a sustainable life.
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8:17 - 8:19And when we do this, who knows?
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8:19 - 8:22We might produce the next George Washington Carver.
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8:22 - 8:25but if we don't change the composition of the soil,
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8:25 - 8:26we will never do this.
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8:26 - 8:29Now this is one of my plans. This is what I want to do.
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8:29 - 8:33I want to plant a whole block of gardens
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8:33 - 8:37where people can share in the food in the same block.
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8:37 - 8:39I want to take shipping containers
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8:39 - 8:42and turn them into healthy cafes.
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8:42 - 8:44Now don't get me wrong.
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8:44 - 8:46I'm not talking about no free shit,
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8:46 - 8:50because free is not sustainable.
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8:50 - 8:52The funny thing about sustainability,
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8:52 - 8:53you have to sustain it.
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8:53 - 8:58(Laughter) (Applause)
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8:58 - 9:00What I'm talking about is putting people to work,
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9:00 - 9:03and getting kids off the street, and letting them know
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9:03 - 9:08the joy, the pride and the honor in growing your own food,
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9:08 - 9:10opening farmer's markets.
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9:10 - 9:12So what I want to do here,
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9:12 - 9:15we gotta make this sexy.
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9:15 - 9:19So I want us all to become ecolutionary renegades,
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9:19 - 9:21gangstas, gangsta gardeners.
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9:21 - 9:25We gotta flip the script on what a gangsta is.
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9:25 - 9:27If you ain't a gardener, you ain't gangsta.
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9:27 - 9:32Get gangsta with your shovel, okay?
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9:32 - 9:35And let that be your weapon of choice.
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9:35 - 9:42(Applause)
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9:42 - 9:47So basically, if you want to meet with me,
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9:47 - 9:50you know, if you want to meet,
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9:50 - 9:54don't call me if you want to sit around in cushy chairs
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9:54 - 9:58and have meetings where you talk about doing some shit --
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9:58 - 10:01where you talk about doing some shit.
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10:01 - 10:04If you want to meet with me, come to the garden
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10:04 - 10:08with your shovel so we can plant some shit.
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10:08 - 10:11Peace. Thank you.
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10:11 - 10:15(Applause)
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10:15 - 10:19Thank you. (Applause)
- Title:
- A guerilla gardener in South Central LA
- Speaker:
- Ron Finley
- Description:
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Ron Finley plants vegetable gardens in South Central LA -- in abandoned lots, traffic medians, along the curbs. Why? For fun, for defiance, for beauty and to offer some alternative to fast food in a community where "the drive-thrus are killing more people than the drive-bys."
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 10:45
Helene Batt edited English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast approved English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast accepted English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for A guerrilla gardener in South Central LA | ||
Joseph Geni added a translation |