by Lauren Bailey, Director of Garden Programs
It’s a hot afternoon at the Community Farm at Mill Ridge, and as I’m starting to pack up from our communal garden produce pick up, Lu Lu arrives. She’s wearing her straw hat and a smile. She seems to have a lot on her heart as she tells me about her previous engagements of the day. She tells me how she and other leaders have been meeting to find ways to support refugees in Malaysia. Over the course of the next hour, she tells me about the experiences that led her to help others. And what is so clear for me as I listen to her is her courage, bravery and generous spirit. And on a hot day like today, her words land as a challenge and inspiration to exercise a spirit of abundance.
Lulu Nhkum’s leadership has been critical to the development of the garden programs since they first began. I think back to a shared dinner that she, I and two other colleagues had. It was LuLu who said that she had dreams of becoming a farmer and in that very moment, the momentum for applying for the Refugee Agricultural Partnership Program grant was sparked (which eventually became Growing Together and initial programming for some of the community gardens). Her leadership, insight and advocacy have been essential to the success of our work. She has been a champion of this work, even as she’s been fully employed elsewhere. If you know her, then, maybe you’ve seen the way she delights in learning about and growing food. Her enthusiasm is contagious.
It has come as no surprise that during this crisis, her leadership and enthusiasm continue to shape our programming in important ways .In a time of crisis, a scarcity mindset is easy to embrace. One of the things that I've learned from Lu Lu’s leadership during this time is that abundance manifests in many ways. It looks like folks showing up to support one another. It can look like a circle of leaders and organizers hearing need and mobilizing resources.
This year, as the effects of COVID began to be felt in our city, Lu Lu seeing and hearing the need of those in her community, advocated for TNFP to support these families in some way. She had intimate knowledge of the Growing Together program and the food grown there and knowledge of the communities' needs. Because of her advocacy and with the help of other leaders, over 100 families impacted by the virus received fresh vegetables from the Growing Together farm.
At TNFP, we often talk about our value of Stewardship and the belief we believe that there is enough. I’ll say it again, there is enough. One of Adriennne Maree Brown’s Principles of Emergent Strategy is that there’s always enough time for the right work. There is enough time; there are enough resources; there is enough food. And the leadership of women like Lu Lu Nkhum show that there are ways to make sure that people have what they need, even in times of crisis, if we can all get better at exercising this spirit of abundance.
