Members
Comm
unity has been a passion and home for Biko since the year 1998. He has lived in a variety of communities, from Shivalila – a small very communal group, to Breitenbush – a larger less communal one in Oregon. Biko has gained many relationship and communication skills from involvement in Peer counseling, non-violent communication, vipassana meditation, process psychology, men’s groups etc. He has an ease with children. He loves to juggle and is a part time teacher for the Hiccup circus which is a local circus, teaching skills to the children in the area. Biko spends much of his time in the gardens or orchards or making trails here on the land. He has a deep passion for sustainability and growing food.
Dona Willoughby spent 31 years in allopathic medicine specializing in women’s health care. She has taught high school, community college, and university students, as well as family practice residents. Her interests lie in how culture affects relationships and how to shift our current patterns to more sustainable, healthier ones. For two years she lived in and toured eco-villages around the world. Since 2005 she has lived and worked at La’akea.
Judy Dolmatch, a native New Yorker, lived 20 years in Ashland, OR, before becoming a member of La’akea. A Gemini, born in June, 1952, she has a passion for innovative ideas, enlightened communication, and dynamic co-creativity. Judy is a licensed clinical social worker with specialties in psychodrama, group facilitation and EMDR for trauma resolution. She is a teacher and practitioner of Playback Theatre, comedy improv, and a founder of the ARTrageous Camps, co-created gatherings that employ the arts and ceremony for leadership skills, rites of passage and personal growth. (www.artrageouscamp.com) For Judy, La’akea is “the road not taken,” an opportunity to thrive in conscious community, connect deeply with the land, and provide a haven for those seeking healing, awareness, and beauty.
Tracy Matfin grew up in the bay area, including living on a sailboat for some years. She studied enviromental science at U.C. Berkely, and went on to be a high school science teacher for a decade, instigating as many progressive projects into her curriculum as allowed, her love of nature coming out in her leading the hiking club on many weekend hikes and restoration projects. Tracy became interested in community and tried starting an urban one in Portland called the Cully Collective, which is now the Portland Permaculture Institute and may be found athttp://www.portlandpermaculture.com . With many lessons learned from that adventure she set about creating community here at La’akea. She brings with her skills in non-violent communication, vipassana meditation and group facilitation. Tracy continues her love of involvement with children by continuing to teach as a home school teacher to children in the area. She is Ai’ala‘s loving mom.
Amara Karuna has been studying alternative healing since 1978. Amara has been studying, practicing and teaching various forms of peer counseling since 1983. She developed her own approach to peer counseling, called Wholistic Peer Support, integrating many ideas from RC with spiritual meditation practices, psychic healing and body centered techniques. She was trained in psychic reading, healing and meditation for two years at the Berkeley Psychic Institute. She created, edited and published Heartsong Review, a resource guide for New Age spiritual music, for nine years. She studies and teaches Tantra work, and sexual healing. She is a minister, Sheikha (teacher) and initiator on the Sufi path, and has been studying that path, which encourages honoring of all religions, since 1983. She has created and staffed many weekend Dance Workshops as well as led and participated in many rituals since 1980, being attracted to the honoring of Nature, women and the natural cycles. She has been a graphic artist and scrimshander since 1980. She currently is producing reproductions of her art as banners and prayer flags, which can be seen at www.karunaarts.com. Recently she has become passionate about creating and recording music, and has published several CD’s of original music, and books, which can be seen at www.KarunaPublishing.com. Her YouTube channel offers many inspirational videos. She identifies as polyamorous (many loves). One of her primary goals is to empower as many people as possible to be effective, supportive allies for each other, and to encourage people to grow emotionally and spiritually, to be free and have fun. Being at La’akea is the fulfillment of a lifelong commitment to community.
Berni (Bernd Riechelmann) grew up on a farm in Germany, became an engineer and emigrated to the US. After years of working as an inventor, he became depressed. He felt that his life, although materially successful, was meaningless. So he began to look beyond the world as he knew it, beyond what he had been taught about the world so far. He studied at Esalen Institute, explored Eastern philosophies, researched intentional communities and alternative lifestyles. Now his focus is on living a simple life, living in harmony with himself and with the world around him, being supportive, kind, honest, loving, tolerant, nonjudgmental. His other focus is on sustainability. He is very concerned about Peak oil, global warming, and overpopulation. La’akea fortunately, with its subtropical climate, is one place that may be able to sustain itself when fossil fuels, and thereby food, become unaffordable. Berni loves to fix things, finding perfect solutions to problems of repair. Above all, Berni is grateful to be alive and healthy.
Randy Frieson comes to us from Canada, and is a passionate gardener, a nurse, and enjoys being part of the family atmosphere and nurturing the children at La’akea. He loves to help on the land, with the animals and with people, and his warm presence provides a steady shoulder to lean on. He is a skillful builder and has made a small cabin for himself recently.
Aniko (Dona’s daughter) Aniko Willoughby has lived and loved life in Hawaii since 1994. Aniko spent her teenage years in Japan enjoying that culture and acquired a love for traveling, which she has pursued with delight in her adult years. More recently she experienced the joy in having a baby boy, named Kaiea, who was born here at La’akea in 1997. They both feel incredibly blessed to live in such an amazing family. Aniko loves nature, she is passionate for the ocean as a surfer, snorkeler and has worked with stranded sea turtles on Maui. Her connection to the plants and trees is also healing and grounding for her. Aniko is a certified yoga instructor, has studied and taught Non Violent Communication, and Co-Counseling. Continuing to grow and learn, consciously every day.
Also we have one more adult male member who prefers web privacy.
Teachers
John Schinnerer lives mostly in a rainforest on Hawai’i island and seasonally in the Cascadia bioregion of North America. He has a Master’s degree in Whole Systems Design with a focus on cultural and ecological designing. His work integrates permaculture and keyline design, appropriate technologies, and human relating and governance systems. He is a practitioner, teacher and consultant who works with public, private and non-profit clients, with a mission to demonstrate, teach and inspire abundance and peace. http://eco-living.net
Douglas Bullock, has, along with his brothers, designed and developed what has been described as the best example of Permaculture in North America. His family homestead is on Orcas Island (permaculture-portal.com) Douglas has extensive experience in all aspects of Permaculture design and installation, as well as an “encyclopedic” knowledge of plants from around the world.
Jude Hobbs. As a horticulturist, permaculture designer, and instructor, Jude’s focus is on environmental design solutions for urban and rural settings. Since 1982, her firm, Cascadia Landscape Design, has specialized in soil building, water harvesting, and appropriate plant selection. Jude is also an associate with Agro-Ecology Northwest, a research and consultancy group working with small-scale farmers. She has written A Guide to Multi-Functional Hedgerows for Oregon State University Extension Service. Jude has presented permaculture workshops and courses throughout the West for 12 years, developing curricula that encompass diverse learning styles. She tends a forest garden in Eugene, Oregon.
Toby Hemenway is the author of the first major book on permaculture for North America,Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture (Chelsea Green, 2001; www.chelseagreen.com/Garden/GaiasGarden.htm), and associate editor of Permaculture Activist, a journal of ecological design and sustainable culture. His writing has appeared in magazines such as Whole Earth Review, Natural Home, and Fine Gardening. He consults on many aspects of ecological design, and teaches permaculture throughout the country. A former geneticist, Toby lives with his wife in an evolving permaculture garden in southern Oregon.