Where we get our food from, part II

Remember my post about my drive from Berkeley down to Santa Barbara? Well, the drive up from Idyllwild back to Berkeley was even more instructive in the 'where we get food' department.

First, my image of the San Fernando Valley, as this lush, garden of eden like place where all our vegetables come from has been utterly shattered. I don't know where I got that image, but I guess I must have figured if all this great stuff comes from there, then it must be like a garden of eden.

I was travelling through during probably what is the driest part of the year, but there is no doubt in my mind that at least the landscape that route 5 goes through is naturally very dry. Brown scrub grass and little desert plants were on both sides of the highway, and on the west side were often these hills that were totally brown. On the east side, were large swaths of green fields, clearly irrigated, surrounded by brown. Where there were trees (citrus, I think), the ground was mostly brown (some green grass) in between. There were large patches of burned grass next to the highway (I suspect the result of someone's flicked cigarette.)  Where there were brown fields, they were growing hay, which seemed like a very natural crop for the climate.

As I drove further north, these huge aquaducts came into view. Miles and miles and miles of aqueduct - concrete rivers bringing water to the valley.

Now I fully, completely understand the price we pay to have grapes and lemons and lettuce and strawberries and tomatoes in November and January. It was actually kinda scary - understanding how much these fields depended on that water, and how much we depend on that food.

The second part was that like my drive down to Santa Barbara, in my drive up the valley, it was really clear who was working the fields. And, in my scanning of the radio stations, the majority of the stations I found were actually spanish language stations, which surprised the heck out of me.

I feel like the drive peeled away another layer of understanding of the way we've chosen to construct our society, and both the precariousness of it, as well as the way we hide from ourselves it's true nature.