Theresa Okia

Farmer: Theresa Okia

Interviewing team: Lillian, Sabir, and Kidayer

Interviewer: Who taught you how to farm?

Farmer: I know how to farm from my country.

Interviewer: Was it your parents who taught you?

Farmer: Yeah, I learned from them. We used to go together to the farm and they tell me, “Do this, and do it like this,” and so I learn from my parents.

Interviewer: How old were you when you were in Sudan?

Farmer: I came here when I was already big. I have four kids with me. I came here in 2003, but I started farming in 2007, with Maine American Sustainable Agriculture [NASAP-New American Sustainable Agriculture Project]. They really teach us a lot of stuff. They took us to conferences and they took us to farm meetings and we learn a lot of things about farming.

Interviewer: Did you farm with your parents or do you farm with your husband?

Farmer: Right now here I don’t farm with anybody; my husband is working, I farm by myself, with co- groups of mine in separate fields, and everyone has different parts.

Interviewer: Do you farm for your family’s health?

Farmer: Yeah, three quarters of my vegetables go to the market for selling and a quarter of it I take for home use, and it really helps me during summers like this. I don’t buy vegetables from markets. I have to buy some things like meat, beef, bread; but the vegetables I take from my farm, which is a part of my earning, and we eat the fresh food form the field and we eat it natural, it’s not chemical.

Interviewer: Do you think it’s important that you know how to farm?

Farmer: Actually, I can say I know a lot but not everything, because what we’ve been learning in America is different from our country. Like irrigation systems…we need water for irrigation, but we don’t have it in our country. In Sudan, we use the rain water. Also here we learn how to plant in rows so that we could get more easily to weed. Farming in my country we don’t make rows, we just plant anywhere, we just spread seeds everywhere.

Interviewer: Has [farming] made you strong and healthy?

Farmer: Yeah, that’s really true. During this season the food I eat is different, when wintertime comes, when I buy from the store, it’s not the same, like what I’m taking from here, and my kids can tell: “Mom, this doesn’t taste like what you bring from farm!” (She laughs.) This one tastes nice, I don’t know why, maybe because they don’t use a lot of chemicals? And also we have the ethnic crops: the ones we don’t buy from the market [and instead] we get it from the farm, like the black eye peas, mulakeya, and the other ones I don’t know the names for in English. We have a lot of seeds…we just send money to Sudan and they post it to us, we plant them and we eat them, and sometimes we sell to our fellow Sudanese.

Interviewer: What’s your favorite vegetable?

Farmer: My favorite vegetable is black eyed peas. I can cook it bitter and I like eating it.

Interviewer: Do you eat it with vinegar, or how do you eat it?

Farmer: (She laughs.) No, I don’t eat it with vinegar, I just cook it. Sometimes I cook with peanut butter, sometime I cook it like fried onions with a little bit of oil…it’s really nice…and some beef.

Interviewer: What foods do you grow for you and your family?

Farmer: Mulakeya, black eyed pea. We have also sukuma, my family like it, collard greens, we grow them here.

Interviewer: What’s the best part about farming in Maine?

Farmer: In Maine, actually, it’s good, but sometimes when the weather is dry like this, which is the hard time, we need to spray water all the way down there (indicates down a long field), this is the worst part, and I don’t like it.

Interviewer: Too much work!

Farmer: Yeah, but when it rains, it’s okay.

Interviewer: How would you design a better irrigation system?

Farmer: It depends, because we depend on organizations that help us. Mostly we talk with them and they have a lot of help coming through them, so when everything changes through them maybe we can get better irrigation for farming.

Interviewer: Would that be something they just run in pipes?

Farmer: Yeah, like the one we have now at the small farm in Falmouth: right now they’ve already put the pipes around like this (she shows with her hand) with water, and we only need to take the hose for the water, which is good.

Interviewer: How do you get water to your plants and stuff?

Farmer: Right now we have, they call it barrels (see that blue one? yeah)…we have one each in front of the farm, they bring the water with the trailer and put the water there, so we have to carry with the small bucket to the crops. It’s not easy.

Interviewer: What time do you get up for work?

Farmer: Sometimes like today, we leave home at 8:00, and we come here almost 9:00…

Interviewer: What time do you guys leave?

Farmer: Sometimes we go home at 8:30…

Interviewer: Wow! Well, what’s the first thing you think about when you’re done with work?

Farmer: We have a lot of stuff to do…like tomorrow, Saturday, we have market at Deering Oaks [in Portland], so after weeding we have to pick up the vegetables, take them down there into the greenhouse (the washing station is there), and we have to wash everything, tie them in bunches…get ready for tomorrow. It’s going to take us long.

Interviewer: Do your family, children, help you farm?

Farmer: Kids? I don’t think so! (She laughs.) These kids, they don’t like farming.

Interviewer: Do you drink a lot of water?

Farmer: Maybe eight bottles a day.

Interviewer: What do you think about when you farm?

Farmer: When I’m here, actually, I don’t know how the day passes by, because I’m busy. When I work hard I’m tired at the end of the day…I find out it’s already a late hour…maybe 8. I go home and just do a little bit of work and go to bed. The days go by fast, but when I stay home I feel like I’m sick. My body gets used to work (she laughs).

Interviewer: Do you think that as your kids get older they might come try to learn some of the farming skills from you?

Farmer: I don’t think so. I tell them, please, come, I need help. They say, “We told you, ‘Don’t go farming,’ you don’t listen, so don’t complain or anything.” But I really like this job. They don’t know how I feel about it.

Interviewer: How does that make you feel as far as how you view the food supply and having your kids not having that skill? Does that worry you at all?

Farmer: Actually, I say everyone has his or her own choice. Maybe they don’t choose to be a farmer.

Interviewer: Can you tell me a secret about how you farm?

Farmer: This is nothing like a secret, but over here we get too dirty. When we got home, my youngest one, three years now, said, “Mom! Ewwww!!!” All my nails, my hands, were rough, while I was putting lotion on his face, and he was saying not to touch him. I don’t care because it’s part of my work.

Interviewer: Is there anything else you want to tell us?

Farmer: Actually, today I’m glad because you guys are here, witnessing with your own eyes what we’re doing here. This is a big encouragement to us. We know what you guys are thinking about us, but when we’re here by ourselves we think maybe we’re lost with what we’re doing. But we see people supporting us like this…we really appreciate that, and we feel that we’re really blessed on what we’re doing, and that people do care about us.

Interviewer: Do you have any advice for the young farmers like us?

Farmer: This year I think Cultivating Community, I don’t know about that program very good, but [another farmer named] John is a part of them…he is telling the youth, you guys need to come learn about what we’re doing. He actually brings his family every weekend here, so that’s a good example.

Interviewer: How are you feeling about farming?

Farmer: I feel good, and I feel like my body is motivated, and that I have strength. I sometimes feel tired at the end of the day. I say, ‘Can I really come tomorrow?’ I have to walk on my knees upstairs. But in the morning, the first thing I think about is the farm.