‘We can free ourselves:’ Why a refugee mom in Phoenix became an urban farmer
Drinking Gourd is made up mostly of African Muslim women who came to the United States as refugees.
By Priscilla Totiyapungprasert
Arizona Republic
Nov 17, 2021
Near the wagon sat a crate of freshly harvested eggplants, both the long, slender Japanese variety and the squatter, more common kind. Kevin Peart used a wheelbarrow to roll in more crates of food from other farms: fat yellow lemons and vivid oranges, burgundy potatoes lightly mottled with dirt, yellow onions and bags of spinach leaves.
On this sunny and brisk autumn morning, they’ll divide this rainbow of fruits, vegetables and roots into paper sacks and deliver them to families around the Valley.
Mahmud, one of the founders of Drinking Gourd Farms, has a homestead farm in her backyard in Phoenix, and every Saturday she and other volunteers meet up to harvest and distribute food. For her, this is what it looks like to reclaim a part of the food system.
“We harvest and we give to the community,” Mahmud said. “We do not sell them. We do not do for making money. We do this to give our community healthy food.”
