John Button, an Australian, has been working with Permaculture for over twenty five years, first in Australia, and for the last fifteen years in India, South East Asia, continental Europe and the Canary Islands.

He has worked in the role of designer, implementer, teacher, consultant and project co-ordinator, in climates zones including dry tropics, rainforest sub-tropics, Mediterranean, temperate and alpine. He has broad, practical experience, having built several houses, planted many gardens and orchards, and many thousands of trees. He is an active campaigner for environmental and social justice.

I had just arrived (1989) in Tiruvannamalai to help initiate a project to reforest the sacred mountain Arunachala. Specifically I was there to plant trees and to make a forest on a little mountain that was little more than rocks and stubbles of grass. A tall order to be sure, and lots of work! I wasn’t there to sit around contemplating my navel, or to indulge in philosophy, much less esoteric ramblings.

The project had been initiated by Apeetha Arunagiri, a fellow Australian who had lived in Tiruvannamalai for many years however, it was in the context of a Deep Ecology workshop conducted on my land by one of the founders of RIC, John Seed, that my own involvement began.

I had first met John during demonstrations to save forests from the chainsaws of the logging industry. I had planted many thousands of trees in regenerating our degraded cattle farm, and had a profound love for India forged in the course of various visits there. More significantly, my best friend had introduced me to his long-dead guru through a book which had touched my cynical soul to the core. The book was, 'A Search in Secret India' (Paul Brunton) and his guru was Ramana Maharishi. I had been strongly affected by Brunton's tale and the credibility of his direct experience of a divine perfection, which I had always sceptically dismissed and denied.

I had been working with Permaculture for nearly 10 years in Australia and had a passionate relationship with India, but none of this adequately prepared me for the reality of the task. I was a total novice to project work, and my relationship with India had been as a free wanderer totally unconstrained by any specific focus other than spontaneous experience.

Apart from a tiny band of people, the general impression was of total scepticism. Incredulity that anybody could be so foolish as to contemplate greening the barren Arunachala. All photos from the earliest period of Ramana's residence on the mountain showed not the slightest existence of forest so who could believe it was possible? And even hostility: lemongrass was harvested each year by a handful of grasscutters who then fired the Fire Mountain to encourage the grasses and incinerate any other competing species; others deliberately lit the mountain with the belief that Siva in the form of Light would manifest their desires if they set it on fire.

A plantation effort by the Forestry Department years before had born little encouragement for success, and one possessed Swami-tree planter had been reduced to bitter cynicism by the constant vandalising of all his efforts to green the mountain. My own parents declared me to be quite crazy when they realised I was actually paying for the privilege of reforesting a sacred mountain in south India. I responded that I was convinced that I would receive infinitely more than I could ever give.

The first two plantings on the mountain seemed to confirm the pessimism of the majority. Almost 100%, burnt to char by the fires, or devoured by the goats, or plucked out to be used as kindling. Determination finally succeeded though, as all who know Arunachala would well understand. Watchmen were posted to guard every seedling. Somebody initiated creating stone cages around every planting, a strategy which I resisted as absurd energy loss better used in the form of more watchmen. In hindsight though, the symbolic significance of demonstrating that we would stop at nothing to ensure the mountain was forested probably convinced many people of our credibility.

A huge step forward came with the approach to the Temple authorities to create our main nursery in the great Temple itself, since the Temple is sited on a number of abundant natural springs. In the process of growing our seedlings, we would regenerate the gardens which had once shaded the Temple, including recreating the sacred plantings that had traditionally been associated with worship. We also undertook to provide coconuts and flowers used in daily ritual. It was accepted, and we took a great leap to rebind the ancient association of nature and the Divine being inseparable. We also raised up to 300,000 seedlings each year, and the largest Temple garden in the country.

One day, a fire broke out on the mountain. Without anybody cajoling, villagers closest to the ARS planting rushed up and beat out the fires. It was the most significant public gesture I could have hoped for; that the local people clearly perceived more benefit to themselves in a mountain covered with trees than with rocks and grass. At last we had our volunteers, en masse. These days, one sign of smoke on the mountain inspires a rash of phone-calls and a small army of workers and student volunteers invade the slopes with water and fire-beaters to extinguish the blaze.

Gradually the exposed path up to Skandashram has become covered in a shady canopy of trees as the barren rockscape is transformed to forest. High on the mountain, the vast bamboo glades which one dominated some areas, are naturally regrowing, having lain dormant for literally generations. Vestiges of huge old trees long ago felled are respouting, responding to the simple presence of time to grow, without fire or blade or teeth to hinder them. Of course a big blaze can still seriously damage all the good work, but now there is a host of independent groups all working in their own right to regreen Arunachala.

As for my retort to my parents, I have indeed received infinitely more than I ever 'gave '. Constantly confronted with my own limits and expectations of success or failure, I was forced to observe my reactions and response more profoundly than ever before. The teachings of Arunachala are relentless, irresistible. I received two exquisite daughters too, delectable fruits of a relationship born in the shadow of the mountain. And the success of my professional work has come as a direct result of association with the blessed Arunachala. Giving myself up to the mountain.