Karma Kitchen, A Taste of the New Counter-Culture
Richard Whittaker
It was my first time at Karma Kitchen's new place, A Taste of the Himalayas in Berkeley. I was ready for the upbeat atmosphere, the heady energy set free by a group of strangers experiencing a small holiday from business as usual. The holiday comes thanks to an unusual inversion. The key moment comes after all the courses have been served, after seconds even, after the smiles, the good cheer and all the attentiveness of the waiters. That's when the bill is presented-amount due $0.00. There's a note with this bill: your meal has been paid for by someone who came before you. We invite you to pay-it-forward in any way you wish. Well, it's an interesting moment. Those thinking "at last, a free lunch!" are free see it that way and even come back and score again. But a funny thing tends to happen. The blue sky of 0.0 in place of dollars owed works on a person. The empty pleasure of getting something for nothing starts to have an odd, disarranging effect and, after awhile, that same person will come back asking, how can I be part of this? A free lunch is nothing compared to that other thing which is set in motion with the appearance of a new currency of exchange. And what happens when dollars are no longer calling the shots? In that improbable space, gratitude, the inclination to relate, to say hello, to test out the sudden impulse of trust is set in motion. It can work that way.
So a few Sundays ago, when I stepped through the door, I was prepared for the upbeat energy. But there was also the slight uneasiness of the unknown, because a visit to Karma Kitchen is always a visit to the unknown. One never knows what to expect other than that something unexpected is bound to happen. There's risk involved. Under the influence of dollar inversion, the usual boundaries between strangers weakens and gives way without warning.
What I remember most from my first visit to the place was the atmosphere, the good cheer that spilled out onto the sidewalk even. And I remember the man who waited on our table. What makes a good waiter? We all know when we're in the presence of one. And that was the case. After his third visit to our table I could not help wondering, who was this man? It was a subtle thing, but each time we had an interaction, the impression grew stronger of someone with a quiet substance hard to find words for. No doubt the fact that he was African American added another layer. Before leaving, I had to ask my friend, one of the founders, "Who was that man?"
"Oh, he's a CEO of a software firm in Silicon Valley," was his answer. "He's one of our volunteers."
A Revolutionary Story
On my second visit to Karma Kitchen I met Susan Schaller.
The stranger who sat down directly across from me introduced herself with some restraint: Susan. Not an extrovert, I could see. We made our way along, two people testing the waters of cautious exchange. I was not alone at the table. Two friends were with me and they joined in, too. As we warmed up, the four of us touched on several subjects and I couldn't help being aware of our new acquaintance's intelligence. I learned that she worked with the deaf. Given a tendency to get into philosophical discussions, it wasn't long before we were talking about language. Soon I was apologizing for the sketchiness of my knowledge. "I'm not an academic," I said. It struck a resonant chord.
Schaller had suffered the problems familiar to all too many who have tried to travel the paths of graduate school and Ph. D. programs. "But fortunately," she said, "I decided to go my own way, outside of the academy." She mentioned that she'd written a book [A Man Without Words, University of California Press, 1995, forward by Oliver Sacks]. She went on to explain that if she'd succeeded in getting into a graduate program, likely she would never have made the remarkable discoveries that were to come. No scholarly indoctrinations were in place to block her ability to trust her own intuitions and convictions. She would have been assured that "language cannot be acquired if the groundwork isn't laid down somehow in childhood."
As I sat and listened, I suddenly began to wonder-is it possible that I was sitting across the table from someone who had something really profound to say?
One of the things I remember about Ivan Illich when he was in Oakland eight years ago, was the strong views he held on the importance of independent scholarship. Illich lamented the lack of respect in our culture for those who take the path of learning on their own. And here was one, an independent scholar sitting across from me. Not only that, but perhaps someone extraordinary. In response to my growing interest, Susan told a little story.
"I was standing in line at a restaurant in Berkeley when a well-known linguist walked in and stood behind me. I recognized him." She struck up a conversation because she wanted to tell him something remarkable: "I've been working with an adult deaf man who never learned language as a child. There's been an amazing breakthrough and he has acquired language."
"That's impossible," the expert pronounced curtly.
As soon as he got his food he made sure to sit as far away from her as he could get, she told us. "All the way over on the other side of the restaurant!" So it was a blessing, she thought, that she didn't find her way into a Ph.D. program. "If I had, I probably would never have dared to imagine such a thing was possible as what I've experienced directly."
Now universities invite Schaller to come and present her findings. And yet, her work remains little known in spite of its revolutionary nature. As she writes, "I wanted to share this inspiration and to explore-with anthropologists, sociologists, educators and linguists-other stories and studies involving adult language acquisition." And she tried. As she writes, "My next surprise came in the form of blank stares, blank pages, blank library index cards, gaps in bibliographies and empty bookshelves." There's just no material available on adult acquisition of language. Makes sense, though, if you think it's not possible.
Even as I sat and listened, I could hardly believe what I was hearing. It was like winning a lottery prize only the prize was new knowledge. What were the chances? And could it really be that something so astonishing as what Schaller was describing was being ignored? This suggests several important questions, which could be opened up to great benefit, I think, but there's no space for that here. However, maybe a few readers will want to learn more. Schaller's work is readily available at www.susanschaller.com.
Beginning is the Thing!
On my third visit to Karma Kitchen I found myself at a table where a celebration was underway. Spirits were high. Binal Shah's vision of gift economy health care had just become a reality. Here's what I learned: Karma Clinic started offering services November 1st out of an 80 sq ft office space. Eighty square feet. That's what struck me most. That's a room that's eight by ten feet. Why wait for some imaginary moment when a wish-list has been met? Beginning is the thing!
And these healers had begun, even before securing the small foothold of an actual clinic space. For six months Karma Clinic's volunteers had been providing consultations via home visits or by inviting patients to meet them at their own houses, or in coffee shops or any place that might serve. It was a real grassroots operation and, as Shah points out, the humble office is sure to remind its volunteer doctors and healers, as well as their patients, that the underlying motivation for it all is not tied to the bottom line. The aim is to provide health and healing services [acupuncture, ayurveda, massage, energy healing, homeopathy, nutrition, and herbal medicine] in the spirit of giving and, as Shah puts it, "with the goal of providing integral health services and education via sustainable partnerships with patients, practitioners, community and environment."
Shah herself is a Naturopathic Doctor. During her training, as she writes, "it was obvious that the time was ripe for medicine to move into a new paradigm. With millions in the US uninsured and millions more under-insured, it's time to help create a paradigm based in service." What an idea! It's an inspired experiment. If you'd like to learn more you can visit www.karmaclinic.org and
For an hour the talk at our big table circled Shah's new gift economy clinic. No one had even ordered food. Each time our volunteer waitress had appeared, she'd been sent away. But Shah had to leave for another commitment, and a shift at the table took place. Some people traded places. Everyone finally ordered, too. This is another thing I've noticed at Karma Kitchen, keeping at one table is not an unwritten law. The friendly energies set free by the generosity in action contribute to something more fluid. Groups merge, separate and new alignments and conversations start up unpredictably.
Soon I found myself sitting next to Sam Bower. As it happened, I'd heard about him a week before. He's the founder of greenmuseum.org, a web site dedicated to environmental art and artists all over the world. In spite of my sympathies and interest in this area of art, I didn't know much about it. But as a subject for the creative focus of art-here is something not only real, but of the most crucial relevance. And increasingly artists are turning their attention to environmental issues. Compared to eight years ago, Bower said, the number of artists working in this area has increased exponentially and the trend seems in no danger of slowing down. But we need as much creativity as we can possibly find as we face increasingly drastic problems in our environment, he added.
Talking with Bower, I was reminded of an inspiring conversation I'd had a couple of years earlier with an environmental artist, Dan McCormick. McCormick specializes in riparian restoration and has worked mostly in West Marin County. McCormick has a grounding in several fields-geology, botany, engineering and farming to name a few. He is a sculptor, a teacher and a community organizer, too. All of these things come into play in his projects. And McCormick's projects are always collaborations. He works with schools, enlisting students and engaging them with hands-on learning. Bringing a ruined stream back to health involves so many things starting with an overall understanding of the ecology of a local watershed. Engineering and aesthetics are combined in, for example, the making of silt traps to handle the runoff from damaged hillsides. That includes learning how to plait willow branches, braid ropes and tie knots. Then there's the work of planting trees and native plants. Listening to McCormick explain what went into his projects was inspiring. Here was an art integrated on so many levels: aesthetics combined with teaching, community involvement, service and undeniably real results. And here's an art that's not forgotten after one viewing. A year later, students revisit projects to see how a severely damaged stream is already recovering. Such environmental art projects have other benefits impossible to quantify. In McCormick's example, each student becomes an author of an actual social good. What follows from that isn't so easy to pinpoint, but who could doubt it isn't something terribly important?
The meal was delicious. All around us other conversations were in full swing. At times one conversation penetrated another. Three or four would be involved and it all kept shifting. Thinking again of Illich, a book title came to mind, his Tools For Conviviality. The whole place was in a state of conviviality.
The more Sam and I talked, the more excited I got. We even discovered we'd both graduated from the same school. "How did you get to where you are now, publishing the magazine?" he asked. As Bower is a good listener, soon I was deep into my own story. Twenty years ago I'd come to a turning point, I told him. I'd just completed a Masters degree in Clinical Psychology. Was I going become a psychotherapist? Or what about this other thing in my life, art? It had never quite been able to take center stage. At that point, though, I told Sam, I decided finally to make a real commitment to the creative side of my life, to art.
Not more than a minute later, a young man from the far end of the table came over to interrupt us. He had to leave, he told us, but could he talk with me for a minute? "I used to be an artist," he said, "but I became a psychotherapist." Sam and I had to laugh at the serendipitous appearance of this mirror image. "I'm interested in the gift economy," he said and handed me his card. It read, "Ira Israel 510-845-4056 Integral Therapy-for artists, writers, musicians, yogis, students and friends of Bill W." Ira wanted to know if he could run an ad in my magazine. He was moved by what was going on at Karma Kitchen and wanted to find a way to shift his therapy practice in the same direction. "I don't carry ads," I said. "But we should talk. I'd like to hear more."
At Karma Kitchen, the chances are, you will.
--by Richard; Nov 25, 2008
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