Many activists use protest banners, campaigns and pressure groups to promote sustainable practices. But one couple in Bali believe that the path to sustainable living starts from the kitchen. By Anita Syafitri Arif.

Buleleng, Bali. June 2021. Working out of Rumah Intaran (the House of the Neem Tree), architect Gede Kresna has transformed the northern Bali village of Bengkala into a learning mecca for students and farmers – and it all centres around the kitchen.

The design of their centre optimises natural resources, with windows and ventilation that allow natural light through the bamboo-based wall. The roof has no ceiling; instead wood slats allow fresh air from outside while leaving enough sunlight for plants. Kresna explains the design also assists rainwater absorption, and leaves  space for neem trees to grow inside the house. “Is the [intaran] tree damaging?” he asks. “No. The trees are hugging our house,” he smiles.

As the house was being built, Kresna’s team realised one of the key aspects to its design was the accent on food, the kitchen, and the role of cooks. “If we … restore the true essence of (our) kitchens, we can solve life's most basic problems,” he explains. “Starting from the problems of water, garbage, to employment. All the problems of our life can be said to come from the kitchen.”

Gede and Ayu’s centre uses traditional open-air building methods.

Initially, Kresna and his wife Ayu Gayatri intended to build Rumah Intaran as an architecture studio, with a few rooms for interns. But they rapidly realised that a key aspect was food and its preparation.

“Our predecessors created traditional kitchens … that are useful for everyday life. In fact, traditional community kitchens are used as tools for the healing and meditation process,” he says.

“Balinese people believe every space has a certain energy and the kitchen is a room that balances the energy that is outside and inside the house,” he asserts.

He adds that a meditative atmosphere in the kitchen can help focus when producing food, “…so that we can give harmony to the heart, mind and body and give a balance of emotion, mind and body that makes food delicious.” He is convinced that a sustainable kitchen can be a healthy, positive place.

“I often wonder why rich people can afford to pay for a private doctor or a private architect but never think of paying a private farmer to produce their own healthy food?” he asks. “Food can be called healthy if it has a balanced cycle that comes from local farmers who grow from local seeds; only then can we actually solve our food problems, including many economic problems facing the country.”

So as part of their kitchen-based philosophy, Kresna and Gayatri are now offering traditional training for Bengkala villagers who have almost abandoned the old ways in favour of modern, industrialised approaches.

“Our work made me realise that we need to take things further for our food security, at a minimum for everyday consumption, using grown things such as chilly, lemongrass, and others. In addition to financial saving, it also improves the quality of our environment,” said one intern. Kresna and Gayatri pass on other green initiatives, such as bamboo weaving for baskets, tempeh making from local ingredients, producing palm sugar and tuak (palm wine) and setting up beehives and harvesting honey.

The centre helps keep traditional crafts alive too - like basket making for food collection.

Interns also learn to cook using traditionally filtered and boiled water using cangkem paon (Balinese traditional stoves) and woods, plant herbs, and lerak or soapberry as natural soaps. The idea is to implant the ability to run a sustainable kitchen after they return home. More, local farmers use Rumah Intaran’s sustainable techniques to improve their harvests.

“I can farm and plant without chemical fertiliser or pesticide now, and the result is good, from clove, coffee, taro, cassava, banana through to durian,” said one local farmer who has adopted a traditional technique called kascing. This uses compost from worm manure and is especially suitable for dry soils. Kresna and Gayatri even filter their clean water, from Tukad Daya river, using eco-friendly materials and traditional stove. But it takes skill and effort.

“Happy is not simple. We are happy if our drinking water is healthy and that takes a bit of effort, to produce safe water to consume,” says Kresna.

“Indeed, many of us have forgotten the essence of the kitchen itself,” he adds. “Our predecessors created traditional kitchens with various purposes that are useful for everyday life. In fact, traditional community kitchens are used as tools for the healing and meditation process. And putting kitchen utensils (on a low shelf) also has its own purpose, namely to make us move a lot.”

Culture, meditation and yoga - all in the kitchen!

This, says Kresna brings the benefit of exercise. “Traditional kitchens provide us with facilities to do yoga movements such as tiptoes, squats, and half squats. These movements are found in the practice of Karma Yoga. So indirectly the (traditional) kitchen can provide a very meditative atmosphere for the self-healing process.”

All this means that the time interns spend at Rumah Intaran can build awareness of the value of a sustainable kitchen. And one that spreads to other kitchens too. “I just hope all interns at Rumah Intaran can try and implement self-sustaining practices – especially food security – in their own house and family,” adds Gayatri.

Anita Syafitri Arif is an architect from Makassar, South Sulawesi. She has researched traditions of Bengkala village, North Bali, Indonesia.