Profile of a community: Courage

Auroville Today: Give me a brief history of the construction of Courage.

Swadha: Dominic was the architect for the first phase. Prospective residents started looking at drawings with him in mid 1999, construction started around July and it was completed by June 2001, when I moved in. There were 12 apartments in five blocks in the first phase.

The second phase – three blocks of six apartments each – was constructed in 2003-4. The third phase, also comprising three blocks of six units each, was only completed last year.

The first phases were projects of the Development Group who raised the finance and heavily subsidised the cost of the apartments. In 2001, these apartments were available for less than four lakhs, including the water and electricity infrastructure, which was very good value.

Yet Courage did not have such a great reputation in the early days…

Swadha: During the early days of construction, there were major communication conflicts between the project holders and the construction team as well as with the architect which affected the prospective residents. At one point, the person supervising the construction stepped out and Pierre Elouard had to come in to finish it.

Also, the architect’s idea of a nice apartment was something very Japanese-style, with an open kitchen, windows at different levels etc. At first I was very happy to have my own place but after one monsoon I felt the design would not work and I completely changed the interior design of my apartment. Many others did the same.

Eugen: Courage was originally called ‘Rêve’ but later it was changed to Courage because in those days you needed courage to stay here.

Swadha: That wasn’t the reason we changed the name! We wanted to have our own identity and not be linked with the existing Rêve guest house.

Most communities only expand with a few people at a time. In Courage, there has twice been a big increase in residents when phases two and three were completed. How did the existing residents cope with this?

Lalit: I think when an influx is happening in other communities the experience is not always being positive, but I’ve never felt that somebody in Courage opposed this idea of development, which is remarkable. We have always welcomed new people here, and it is a very diverse mix of incomers as we have single apartments, family apartments and apartments for Newcomers and Youth.

Ayesha: I joined after phase one and two were built. Actually, I didn’t know phase three was coming when I purchased my apartment. When I found out, I was horrified because I didn’t want more people. I felt we were such a dense community already and I didn’t come from Bombay to live in a jammed space! But my fears were not fulfilled: the influx did not upset the existing balance. The noise level didn’t change and much needed improvements in our parking and wastewater infrastructure helped us absorb the new residents.

Swadha: The fact that we are so many now means we have a bit less of a community life. Us ‘first phasers’ were doing much more together. We were going to each other’s houses, spending time outside with each other’s kids, having regular pot-lucks and watching movies together. And, of course, it is a bit overpowering when you get a sudden addition of 18 apartments. On the other hand, most of us first residents were young – my parents were the oldest people – and this definitely affected our mind-set. I remember being excited about getting new people in because it would mean more energy.

How are new residents of Courage chosen?

Lalit: When somebody moves into a new youth or Newcomer place, we don’t have any say in the process. However, when a new apartment becomes available or an existing apartment falls vacant we have a rather elaborate process to choose who comes in.

Swadha: Housing sends us a list of prospective people, the whole community votes on who they would like, and then the top three names are presented to the direct neighbours who are given the final choice.

How do you take other community decisions?

Ayesha: We have regular community meetings but they are not well attended. We are lucky if we get 14 from the 74 adults who live here.

Swadha: Fourteen is our quorum. We had been struggling with implementing a decision because sometimes people who were not at the meeting would object to any decision taken and then we would have to redo the whole process. So, in our last meeting we decided that if we had a quorum in the meeting and a decision was taken, there would have to be a quorum again to reverse it.

Ayesha: We send everyone a meeting agenda with a list of topics, so if something is going to impact someone, they need to make the effort to come. We have some regular attendees but not all are willing to take up community responsibilities. That’s why, at times, it gets a bit frustrating.

This is where many communities that wanted a community process failed in the past : too much responsibility fell on too few people.

Ayesha: Yes, we are facing this.

Swadha: But we are lucky that we have some people who are willing to help if you get too much on your plate. So with about ten-twelve active members we are managing to get things done.

Lalit: For me, Courage is a mixture of inspiration and organisation. A natural system of organisation has come up organically in which individuals take up different responsibilities. As of now, it more or less works.

We also have a special situation here, and that is that we have someone like Eugen. In situations where major community facilities were needed – like new parking facilities or a water treatment plant – but we have lacked the financial means to carry them out, he has come forward and offered to pay for them almost unconditionally. This has helped Courage a lot. It has also made decision-making easier because if the rest of us are not in a position to pay and he is coming up with a proposal and is willing to fund it, what is there to discuss?

Eugen: I do it because I like to go in this direction. After all, my next parking is the burial place and I cannot take the money with me. People ask me why I like to stay here. It is one of the nicest things in my life to see the small children running around and the older ones looking after them.

Ayesha: Courage also has a fund that helps us make further development. Individuals make a Rs 50 monthly contribution that we set aside if we need to do things like fencing or installing water meters. The fairly substantial income from our cashews also goes into this.

What are the issues that keep coming up in your community meetings?

Ayesha: People driving right into the community rather than parking in the allocated area; wasting water. In some ways, we are spoiled here. We do not have to pay for our water or electricity and we have a very good wastewater system. But there are issues around our well drying up, and broken taps, broken pipes.

Mita: The other issue that was very challenging was that as families grow they needed more space and wanted to extend their apartments. We discussed this extensively but, in the end, we decided as a community against allowing extensions because it would bring up too many issues.

Ayesha: However, because the topic came up so strongly, we are trying to be more accommodating to families with larger needs. One family asked if they could make the necessary arrangements with Housing so that they could have the vacant apartment next door in addition to their own because their family had larger needs and people supported this.

Lalit: I think this is an example of how our understanding of what a community needs keeps developing. Whatever Courage has learned is good for now but in the future we may have to find other solutions.

Ayesha: We have guidelines that have evolved over the years. They are commonsense suggestions that help towards a more harmonious community life, like avoiding playing loud music after 9.30 at night, separating waste, asking everybody to use their assigned parking space and ensuring that guests contribute to community expenses.

There are many types of community in Auroville, from virtual dormitories where people only come at night and live very individual lives to intentional communities where everybody is very involved in collective decision-making. What kind of community is Courage?

Swadha: We have such a mix of people, generations and lifestyles here that it’s difficult to define us.

Lalit: We are not a super-intentional community like some other communities in Auroville. On the other hand, we do not live completely separate lives. I think one of the key characteristics of Courage is its friendly environment. And a possible reason for this could be the many children we have here because we are all very concerned to make the children feel safe and secure.

Swadha: I think all the parents here are super happy because we have a very safe environment.

Inge: But it’s not just the children. I have been living here for two and half years in a youth apartment and, from a youth perspective, I have found it a very welcoming community and one of the only communities in Auroville where those in youth apartments are fully integrated in the larger life of the community.

If you were designing Courage from scratch with your experience today, would you do it differently? Would you try to define certain things from the beginning or let it evolve organically?

Swadha: As a general thing, and again it has something to do with the fact that we are still a young community, I think we are much more oriented towards an organic model, which is the way Courage evolved, rather than rigid planning. I wouldn’t have changed the way it has happened.

Inge: I think the people who join Courage already have something of that organic mindset. They would not be looking to live in a place like Citadines.

Lalit: Our model is different from Citadines, which has quite strict conditions for living there. We have guidelines but they are common sense, and we are not forcing anybody to behave in a certain way.

Rather, you come here, you find your place, and if you are a responsible type you pick up something for the community. It’s true that some of us do get frustrated at times by the lack of people coming forward, or by poor waste management: some people don’t follow even a basic discipline. So, perhaps, after a time it is not a bad idea to have a more disciplined form of organisation.

Eugen: In my view, the people who come have first to feel good here and then they can start taking up community responsibilities. If they have something over them from the beginning, if they have to conform to some kind of rigid order, it won’t work. People need a certain freedom. Many communities have failed because they ignored this.

One thing Courage doesn’t have that was once considered essential to building community is a common eating place. Was this a conscious decision?

Swadha: The original plan of Courage had a community kitchen but we never got it. When I first came I missed it because I grew up in Aspiration which had a common kitchen, and I really enjoyed cooking for everyone once a week. When I came to Courage I was looking forward to eating together for at least one meal a day. But once you have a family and children you have different needs. So as most of us eventually got into a family rhythm, I don’t think the community kitchen would have worked out.

I think it is more sustainable to have a community space available for pot-lucks but still have your own kitchen at home.

Ayesha: I don’t cook, I come from a very nuclear family and I’m not really interested in food, so it would terrify me to have to cook a community dinner once a week.

Lalit: My parents lived in an officers’ colony so we had a good community life. What I miss here is some simple seats, benches, where we can all sit around and chat. We would get a chance to know what is happening in each other’s lives which, for me, is the foundation of collectivity. Otherwise, we end up meeting in community meetings where the agenda is overloaded and we don’t have time to express ourselves properly. This may be good for organisation, but not for life.

The good news is that we have a new dedicated space for community meetings. Courage had a beautiful history of collective pot-lucks, movies etc. in the early days. Perhaps now we are ready for the next phase of collective living.

What can other communities learn from the Courage experience?

Swadha: Start with a young community.

Ayesha: And children. Offer a safe space for children within the community, because then the parents can relax.

Suresh: The cultural exchange we have here is very healthy. We celebrate, or used to celebrate, all the festivals, Deepavali, Christmas etc. and our children were always in and out of each other’s houses. In this sense, culturally this is a very enriching community.

Ayesha: The children break the ice. Otherwise, we would all be adults hiding away from each other.

Mita: I think that Courage has a good balance between individual and community spaces and needs. Every apartment is designed by the person living in it, so you have your individual space and this helps you to be comfortable with the more social aspects of the community.

The Courage wastewater recycling system

The Courage waste water recycling project, which recycles the entire waste water of the community so it can be used for irrigation, has been running successfully for a year now. It is estimated that that this system results in fresh water consumption being cut by 40%.

The treatment process for the water is based on the low rate trickling filter technology. This has been known about for a century, but this is the first time it has been used in Auroville. It is simple and efficient and with basic maintenance and care this system should run well for many years.

In brief, a small pump pumps pretreated waste water up to a sprinkler. The water is sprinkled evenly over the filter media and slowly trickles down through layers of granite rocks. The filter media is covered with algae, bacteria and other microorganisms. These develop naturally if they are sprayed with water at regulars intervals and kept moist. The microorganisms feed on the pollutants and remove them from the water. In the process of trickling through the filter, the water is aerated. This removes the odors that it carries. The water runs out at the base of the trickling filter and is channeled into a secondary clarifier. Here suspended particles are removed. Then the recycled water flows into a storage pond with water lilies and fish. From here it can be used for gardening. Specially marked taps from which the water can be drawn are located throughout the community. The recycled water has been tested and the