Dear Supporter,

Distances can change relationships and sharing patterns. But existence is so powerful and togetherness is so important to our needs that life generates patterns to overcome distance.

A big tree, which we see as a lonely individual standing alone, does its daily shopping through the mushroom network in the soil and its roots. The fungus gives food to the tree, in return it takes the sugar that its system cannot produce due to its structure. Trees are connected to this fungal network and thus share their resources. So much so that they have habits such as providing additional sugar support to their developing offspring, and distributing all their organic matter capital to their neighbors when they are sick or die. Plants use the same web, alerting their neighbors to insect attacking them to increase their defense system.

Some of us were physically away from our functional forests over the past Eid break. Our functional network continued to work above and below the ground, just like mushrooms. Some of us made short visits to practice sites to manage basic needs, and shared resources over the internet for collective decisions. While those of us in different geographies devoured the wild plums and apples they encountered during their walks, they first added the fruit minerals and then the seeds to the Functional Forest resources. When nurturing life was the goal, resource sharing networks were also woven spontaneously.

With the wish to stay in far or near but always functional networks.