“My name is Renata, I’m native of Poland and I’ve happily settled in India since 2013. I met Sridhar – my husband and lifelong partner – in the same year. That time we were both focused on climbing the career ladders in corporate companies. We hit it off right from the start, tied the knot shortly after and decided to go through life together. Sridhar had always fed this idea of living a self-sustaining farm life that would be far removed from the buzz of the urban cities.

After a few years of city life, we moved into our land close to the Gingee Fort near Thiruvannamalai. Little by little, we started to build the life of our dreams here. What started off as a passion project has now grown into a full fledged lifestyle that we are proud to own and live by.

One important underlying feature of our reunion was our shared values. We wanted to ensure that we bring up our children in an atmosphere that was far removed from the everyday hustle and bustle and promised much more restorativeness. We are blessed with a family of three children who are currently being farm schooled with a child led educational approach that helps them take up lessons on the go. Our farm is also filled with domestic animals like dogs, turkeys, chickens, guinea fowls, cows and also rabbits as we have set up a small rabbit colony too.

We have planted a food forest that helps us pick up food right from the farm just hours before consumption. This lifestyle is carefully structured to live a life that feels more restorative and is kinder on the planet. But we faced and continue to face our own set of challenges. When we first moved here, everything from water and electricity had to be figured out. Week by week, we’re reducing buying things straight from the shops other than certain unavoidable stuff, we have learnt the virtue of patience, DIY projects and slow cooking.

But when we look back on the life we built and how much of an impact we are creating on the minds of our children, we know that it has all been well worth it. To everyone asking us how we did it, we just want to let you know that it has been a continuous and arduous journey of learning and evolving. We are continuing to build on this and with time, we hope to leave this learning with the larger crowd.”