Farmer Post II

In the second half of the book Growing a Farmer, Kunt continues to discuss his experience with different kinds of live stocks on his farm. He gradually becomes an expert in raising cows, chickens, and pigs and learned ways to process raw products like eggs and milk. Among all his discussions, I found the chapters on slaughtering and butching the most intriguing. Just like Kunt, I have been live in the city for my whole life and I am used to purchasing ready-to-cook meat from the grocery store. Slaughtering and butching live stocks that you raised seems to be a cruel thing to me. However, Kunt is able to interpret the process of slaughtering farm animals from a whole new angle. He mentions in the book that one of his neighbors, who is a professional butcher, would always bring his two-year-old daughter to the scene whenever he got a job because he thinks that this is the best gift to his children. Kunt believes that it is important to learn the process of raising livestock and how they are transformed into our food. The idea of embracing the connection between food and animals is certainly an important one to remember in life, but I am not sure if this approach is the best way to teach your children. Compared to the bloody scene of ending animal's lives, wouldn't cartoons and storybooks be a better method?

As the book approaching the end, Kurt engages in a deeper topic on the relationship between human and nature. Kunt expressed his unique connection to his farmland in Chapter 15 when he writes, "As I began to work on the land,... I started to feel a responsibility towards it. I am protective of this parcel, possessive of it, but I am aware that I do not own it. No one can own land. We are all mere steward of the land." From his words, I feel his revere and love to the land because he believes that human beings are servants who have responsibilities to take care of the land. This leads me to think about Kunt's view of human and nature. Throughout the book, Kunt presents himself as an adventurous explorer and a diligent worker that put hard efforts on his farmland, rather than a powerful owner who can do anything according to his desire. From my perspective, what Kunt trying to express from writing this book is more than sharing transforming experience of becoming an urban farmer, but also show the beauty of harmonious relationships between human and nature. Today, with the development of technology, we often find ourselves trapped in a concrete jungle and coping with a lot of stress. But Kunt shows us a whole different way of living that embraces human's oldest traditions. After reading his book, I am convinced that it is a wonderful thing to live and work in nature.