Hello Dear Gardeners!

Can you believe, it’s been a whole week since the festival? It seems a bit surreal but a lot of things have happened since then! Rita returned to the rainy and miserable UK, Mal has been editing a lots of pictures for future reports and our old cat Athabasca has been eating and sleeping. Everything’s back to normal and we have so many cool pictures to show you.

First of all, thank you kindly for the most amazing time we have had! We have seen familiar faces, met new friends, listened to some coolest tunes on the island and we are already planning to come back. It is too early to say if The Cat Shop will be 100% back next year, but we are ecstatic and we ‘d love to participate again.

We will start our annual reports with a something truly wonderful – Going Green Project. As you know Earth Garden has always put the biggest emphasis on ecology, recycling and saving energy and water. The artists on Ethnic Market are encouraged to create their artworks from materials and fabrics that normally end up in a garbage bin. Out cats are no exceptions. This year however, the organizers went even further. Teaming up with Gayle Murphy of Global Green Events, Earth Garden became truly the greenest and most ecological friendly event in the Mediterranean.

As usual we have been right at the heart of the action. We have followed Gayle (who served as the Director of Sustainability for the festival) and a professional photographer Mike Caffrey in their quest to capture the green side of Earth Garden. You have no idea how many people jumped on the green wagon showing their enthusiasm and love for our dear Mother Earth. Everybody wanted to photograph themselves with “We are in” or “I’m in” signs that Gayle has given away. Mike had to even climb the stage to photograph a large crowd of festival goers. It was a fantastic experience.

We have to say it was a pure poetry watching Gayle turning all the ecological ideas into reality. Large containers were delivered to each site of the festival, the labels were in the right places and if any bin started overflowing, the assigned eco-team quickly emptied it. After the festival, the entire National Park was spotless. If you remember the previous editions you will know that there was a bit of rubbish left. This year, even the dust from the roads was gone – this is how you do it. Few governments could learn from this girl. She is amazing!

Gayle can be contacted here:
https://www.facebook.com/globalgreenevents
https://www.facebook.com/gayle.murphy.718

Mike Caffrey is the owned of Imagocentric:
https://www.facebook.com/ImagoC
www.imagocentric.com

Now let the pictures do the talking, they are worth more then an essay or even an entire book about ecology! All pictures have been taken by Mike Caffrey and are copyrighted. Please do not re-post them without asking for a permission first. Contact Mike if you’d like to hire him for your event, thank you!

We are in campaign was very successful. We havd Valetta 2018 crew joining us, as well as Earth Garden Sponsors and the security guards!

Valetta 2018 European Capital of culture website can be visited here: http://valletta2018.org/

Twistees were the main sponsors of the festival. Please support them by visiting: http://twistees.com.mt/

Italian company Bavichi are the owners of Geo Range – bean sprouts and organic sprouting seeds. Their website can be accessed here: http://www.bavicchi.it/

Some visitors wanted the stage for themselves and posed for Mike solo. Here are our favourites shot for “I’m in” campaign:

You can learn more about Bahrija Oasis  by clicking on: http://permaculturemalta.org/bahrija-oasis/

Who says large groups don’t fit the frame? We have some great shots of them too:

And the best for the last – some great shots we absolutely love!

Vanadian Avenue team would like to thank Mike Caffrey (for allowing us to carry your Canons for you!), Earth Garden team (for everything) and to Gayle for taking us on this crazy yet very educational trip.

Please come back soon and tag yourself if you recognize yourselves on the pictures.

Mal and Rita Dabrowicz
xxxx