Kelly Simond on Growing Up Farming

Kelly Simond grows the bitter melon, callaloo, eggplants, and so much more that we sell at the farm stand on Saturdays.

Kelly Simond is one of the farm stand founders. He immigrated to this country as a young man from Grenada, and worked in security for 30 years before retiring.

You grew up on a farm in Grenada. What was that like?
I grew up with my dad, and that’s how we made a living—by working the land. Planting crops to sell: banana, nutmeg, cacao. Things like that. We would grow on a big scale. That’s how we lived. I see my dad. He had a green thumb. I was always there with him. Transplanting other plants. Grafting other plants.

What do you mean by ‘big scale?’
I mean in terms of exporting it. We would harvest our crops and load it up in a truck and take it down to the city, where the boat is waiting there to collect it.

And were most of your neighbors living the same way?
Yes. Some grew on a small scale, to sell in the market on Saturday. Those that grew on a big scale had to go far up in the mountain area.

In the U.S., there’s a lot of concern about the disappearance of small family farms. Black-owned farms have disappeared at an even faster rate. But you have that direct experience of growing up within a Black farming community.  What kind of influences did that have on you that’s different from a child growing up today in New York City?
Well, it was a part of surviving. Part of what we had to do. We did not have a choice. That’s my experience being a farmer in my country. In the United States for me, it is a privilege that I get the opportunity to grow food  and provide food for my community. But at home, everyone had their own land. But here, not everyone has a garden.

It was like going to school. Getting an education. It was something that I learned to do and was able to do on my own. So it gave me self confidence. And I think it helped me to appreciate nature. I was in nature all my life growing up. It was a lot of rain. A lot of sun. Storms. Hurricanes. I saw how things grow. How a plant starts from a seed or a branch.

In 2017, Marcia Denson, a fellow garden member, approached you about starting a farm stand and you agreed. Why did you think that was a good idea?
Because we are providing food for the community that’s badly needed. That’s what I’m about most. I feel privileged to do that. We have customers that come and look for me because of certain crops or vegetables that I’m more familiar with from the Caribbean. Every year I look forward to planting certain vegetables because I know there are customers from the community who will come in and ask just for that vegetable.

And now we have the Food Box program that I’m a part of also. Again, it’s providing healthy food for the community. The feedback that I get is always positive. It makes me feel that I’m doing something useful. Because I’m retired, otherwise I might be sitting at home, not doing nothing. Being part of this garden, the workshops we go to, the people I meet—I love it.

Maria Elsbeth Polzin on Food and Intimate Partner Violence

Phoenix Community Garden is thrilled to be collaborating with VIV Nourish on a year-long healing group for survivors of intimate partner violence. The program will incorporate both gardening and film-making. It is open to people of all gender expressions. Above, Adeija Jones, filmmaking coordinator, and Maria Elsbeth Polzin, program coordinator, dare to share the frame with a pug.

How do you define intimate partner violence?
Intimate partner violence stems from the term ‘domestic violence.’ Domestic violence implies that it’s happening in the home, but violence can happen anywhere. In recent legal cases, it’s been expanded to include violence that happens in families and in non-sexual relationships, or in any relationship in which the victim feels they were close to the individual and harmed in a way that’s similar to traditional domestic violence. As we move towards a more survivor-centered narrative, we move towards the autonomy of the victim to lay claim over what intimacy and intimate partner means to them. 

I’d like to discuss the word ‘victim.’ As a gay man who lived through the AIDS crisis, our movement  worked to curtail the use of the label for people living with HIV because it can be disempowering. What are your thoughts on the use of that term?
Personally, I gravitate towards the word ‘survivor’ for that same reason. That’s why three years ago I started Survivors Magazine.  I found it so valuable to my own healing process to be able to claim an identity outside of victimhood and explore what survivorship means to me. But I haven’t completely expelled ‘victim’ from my vocabulary because I’ve gotten feedback from other survivors that they don’t always feel that survivor is the best label for them and their trauma. So, I make clear that it’s an option. 

What is the connection between intimate partner violence and food?
I first saw this connection when I was doing research in Cape Town, South Africa on food gardening. I was creating a documentary and conducting a lot of long form interviews. I became close with the participants in my research. Some of them began to disclose to me violence in their home and by intimate partners. Specifically, the ways that the partner might use food as a tool of violence. For instance, expecting dinner to be on the table when they come home. Or dictating what they can or cannot cook or buy at the grocery store. Or not giving them money for food.

At the same time, every participant found that food was a vital part of their healing and their growth. I began to see the nuances of food—how talking about it made some of the participants so much more open to talking about their relationships because it was a palatable, if you will, entry into the topic.

What is your personal stake in the issue?
I originally entered the world of combatting gender-based violence, to use a broader umbrella of violence, as a survivor of sexual violence. I realized that the term intimate partner violence applied to me because I had relationships with both men that harmed me. I’ve begun to accept the nuanced ways that violence has affected my intimate relationships, not just my sexual relationships. My experiences affected my own relationship with food. I’ve looked at the ways that I nourished my body during peaks of my mental health and how I used food in my lowest points of mental health. Moving forward, I’m able to more consciously use food as a tool to empower myself. 

What is the goal of the program?
The goal the VIV Nourish team is two-fold. It is through and through a community engagement and capacity building program. We want people to leave the program with the tools to empower and nourish themselves through food and also be able to tell their stories through film. We will cultivate the community that already exists in the area and understand the needs so that as individuals with resources we can better meet them. And we hope to influence policy and funding towards the intersection between food gardening and intimate partner violence. There’s very little research on this topic. So we have to create our own research, and who better to do that than the community members themselves.

What will be happening in the program?
Each program will  include a short film making lesson, a short gardening lesson, then an opportunity to work in the garden and apply those tools that they’re learning and whatever interests they may have in the physical land. In the winter months, when it’s too cold to work in the garden, we will meet indoors and conduct workshops on things like cooking, fabric dyeing, medicinal herbs and oils—all the other fun stuff that you can do inside. At the end, we’ll have a public event where we can screen the short documentaries that participants make and share our favorite recipes with the public. We are prioritizing accessibility, so should individuals need single-ride Metrocards or childcare we are prepared to provide that.

Bernadette on Growing Up Healthy in Brooklyn

Bernadette Mitchell painting a child's face at our annual Childrens Harvest Festival.

Bernadette grew up in Brooklyn, with strong family roots in New Orleans, where she spent the first five years of her life. She has a passionate commitment to eating well and exercising. Here’s what she has to say about her formative experiences, and why she’s a passionate neighborhood activist for food justice.

Why is staying healthy important to you?
Health is the true wealth. I feel good, and by taking care of myself, I’m able to take care of my family and friends.

What were your influences?
I grew up in a time when there weren't computers. So we had to go outside and play every day. We lived on a family block, there were a lot of kids. We roller-skated, jumped rope, skelly, hide and go seek—there were games, all the time. I always wanted to be active.

As far as food, when I was 14 or 15, I started my own baby-sitting business. I had a lot of wealthy clients. They lived in these big houses, and they always had fresh vegetables and fruit in their refrigerator.  Just seeing a different way of living, I’m sure subconsciously had an effect on how I wanted to eat and live.

My family, we ate everything out of the can. Fruits, vegetables, canned ravioli, franks and beans, sweet potatoes, and Vienna sausages, just to name a few. I got my first apartment when I was 26,  and that’s when I started cooking fresh produce. I’ll never forget when I cooked my first sweet potato. I was like, I’ll be damned —it was so easy!

What does food justice mean to you?
When I think about food justice, I think about people in disenfranchised communities that don’t have access to fresh vegetables and fruits. It’s always poor people. When you go to the grocery store, everything is packaged. A lot of plastic. A lot of it is brown. It’s easier for people to just buy the Honey Buns and the Arizona teas. I also think that food justice means a lack of education. People aren’t being taught a different way to eat, a different way to cook.

What role does the garden play in your life?
The garden is my happy place! It’s relaxing, the energy is great and I’m always happy to see and talk with other gardeners. It’s where I can grow things. It’s where I can share food, share ideas, and I can learn from people. At the same time, there’s a green space. There’s flowers, butterflies, bees. I feel so fortunate that we even have such a big space right in Ocean Hill-Brownsville, Brooklyn.

Anything else you would like to say?
Our farm stand helps protect the environment. By sourcing hyper-locally and regionally, we’re cutting back on transportation resources—especially fossil fuels. And we’re cutting back on plastic, especially when people bring their own bags. It feels good to know that when I’m eating a zucchini, eating a tomato, eating some basil, I know exactly it comes from.

Getting to Know Marcia Denson, Food Justice Warrior

Marcia in 2006, on the site that would become the Phoenix Community Garden

Visitors to the garden know Marcia Denson as always ready with a joke and a piece of fruit in her hand for children. Marcia was the community chef at Neighbors Together for 16 years. It was there that her commitment to food justice solidified. "By working in the soup kitchen, you see that everybody is not getting the same nutritious food all over the city, particularly senior citizens and small children. "

In 2006, the Green Guerillas, a citywide support and advocacy group for community gardens, approached Marcia to be a founding member of what was to be Phoenix Community Garden. The city had made our land available, and the Green Guerillas had been charged with the community organizing  to pull a membership together. Marcia says, "It's funny—I grew up growing vegetables, and when I left the farm in North Carolina, I vowed never to do it again. But after that first meeting, I was raring to go." All along, she fantasized about starting a farm stand. "I wanted to do a farm stand for a while, but I kept it to myself. But when I retired, I had the time. So I approached a couple other garden members—Kelly and Mark. Ocean Hill is a food desert, and we were in a position to bring fresh, nutritious food to the neighborhood."

She is happy with how it turned out. "The experience has been fantastic. When we first started, there were stumbling blocks. But especially now with the Phoenix Fresh Food Box program, we’ve been able to bring fresh produce year-round. It’s been an opportunity to meet our neighbors, and for them to get to know who we are. And it’s been getting better all the time."