Little darling It’s been a long, cold, lonely winter Little darling It feels like years since it's been here Little darling The smile's returning to the faces Little darling It seems like years since it's been here
Here comes the sun Here comes the sun And I say, "It's alright"
Sun, sun, sun, here it comes Sun, sun, sun, here it comes Sun, sun, sun, here it comes Sun, sun, sun, here it comes Sun, sun, sun, here it comes
BTW: This mail can be forwarded to interested people
Hello, dear all, it's time to report on the project again. We'll be back in Portugal in just over two weeks' time. Lola will arrive more or less at the same time. And Stéphane and his girlfriend have also said that they want to help us. We will discuss and realise some initial work with them. As you may know, we had the bulldozer push out a water basin in the upper area of the upper platform.
We have heard from Jenny that this basin on the upper plateau is now full. It is at least 2 metres deep and has a diameter of about 10 metres. The walls are no less than 45°. Perhaps one of you with an interest in maths can work out the approximate volume and therefore the amount of water we will have available this year. We look forward to your feedback! For showers and washing facilities we will set up a pipe system from the water basin. Maybe we can also encase one or two of the springs that run the whole year and use them for drinking water. 
The next step is to build the first mud houses to provide our helpers with a roof over their heads. Stéphane already has a lot of experience in building mud houses and we hope that we will soon be able to start building the first huts. A number of woofers and workawayers have already enquired and we will keep in touch with them to ensure that we have sufficient support at all times.
As soon as we are back in Portugal, we will also plant the first citrus trees that we bought in December. We will also have to set up irrigation for the plants. This will all be done in consultation with those who have been waiting for a long time to become part of our little community. We will also have electricity. However, the connection may take a while: it will probably last around 4 months for the electricity suppliers to clear the preliminary work, and our electrician passed this on at the beginning of December. So we don't expect it to happen before April. And there are already some friends who want to visit us in April and May. We're looking forward to being able to show them the initial work. We just can't accommodate anyone yet. But that will change.
We send you a lot of love, Sabine and Tom
Again our visions about „community“: We will be different in a certain way from other groups that call themselves a community. In principle, anyone can become a member. However, it is important that every potential member joins the "community building process" so that we can become a "true community". A true community consists of members being able to drop their masks and communicate from soul to soul. The goals of the community must come first for everyone and then comes the individual. Everyone will have their own place where they can withdraw and do their own thing, but when it comes to moving the community forward, it must be ensured that everyone is pulling in the direction of the goal of the community. There are now a lot of groups in the Alentejo that call themselves a community. However, we hear of a lot of disputes between them and a high level of fluctuation. We want to improve this with the "community-building work", the „We Prozess“ (this is the name that the "Schloss Tempelhof" community has given to their way to form a community). We want every member to commit to taking part in it. It's about being able to be open and vulnerable, to bare your soul, so to speak, and communicate in an open way. It’s all about „epigenetics“: We all have traumatic experiences in our DNA, which we have either experienced ourselves or inherited from our parents or grandparents. In Europe for instance, we have had to experience two world wars and people have experienced a lot of negative things during this time. These injuries manifest themselves in fears, projections and other psychological changes that only allow some people to show themselves with a mask. The mask is how they want to see themselves or be seen. They only show an ideal image of themselves that does not correspond to them. This mask prevents others from communicating with the person's real self. However, this must be guaranteed in a community. We will actively work to ensure that all members can show themselves in their undisguised form and that the goals of the community are always at the forefront of our thinking. This needs to be the first priority for all of us.
