The woman saving Palestinian heirloom seeds
The Travelling Kitchen lets people come together to share and preserve stories. Elders who come along to share a meal often bring up the names of plants Sansour has never heard of.
By Tessa Fox
BBC
9th September 2021
Excerpt:
These terraces are rock-walled agricultural plots that have grown olives and vegetables since antiquity. Such farm designs, along with the ancient spring-fed irrigation system, secured Battir a place on the Unesco World Heritage List in 2014. This ancient landscape couldn’t be a more perfect home for an initiative, led by Vivien Sansour, that saves Palestinian heirloom seeds and in turn preserves cultural roots.
Sansour didn’t start out intending to create The Palestine Heirloom Seed Library. Born out of a longing to find the traditionally grown Palestinian food she grew up eating, the seed library took root in 2014 when Sansour started asking people in her community for seeds to grow baladi bandora (“my country’s tomatoes”), a drought-resistant heirloom tomato perfectly adapted to the region. Baladi, the term for heirloom seeds, translates directly as “my country”.
