Moederaarde - Travelogue

                           Moederaarde

After wandering in the deep temperate forest reading a crumpled old map, and hours of studying the despondent thing vigorously and repetitively, in a hopeful desperation to find the hidden city of Moederaarde; the disappointed traveller lay down on the humid grass, in despondency, facing the tall trees whilst in the presence of a soft buzz of sound from the insects and the smell of fresh air. You hear laughter and angelic choruses up in the trees which you adhere to by attempting to climb the muddy thick barks and the rough trunk. Succeeding, you reach for the branches in a sudden realisation that you had grabbed a camouflage ladder. With raised spirits, you climb further and further up the extensive ladder until the City of Moederaarde is in view; it is purely a city of beautifully handcrafted by the talented people.

You are still struck by the obscurity of such a thing as a hidden city in the trees. Looking around you are in a city and filled with awe as you see the complex structure of what seems to be houses made completely from wood nicely cut off trees and smoothened by a Quang-sheng, you never get tired of looking at the unique patterns carved into the woods and the dull, fading paint on the houses. The wood is finely cut by ripping strips continuously and mending them together with sap from the trees beneath them making the curves surrounding the building. The city has an authentic look that adds to its extraordinary look. The floors are covered in brown crispy leaves and smooth wood which disappears into the crown of a tree and connecting with another long piece of wood where you find yourself in another well--sculptured fascinating house; the wood, therefore, takes the place of a concave bridge or path. One house is quite transparent as it is made from large pieces of glass (like windows) but supported by average pieces of moldy green wood. Through the glass, you can see healthy flowers and mud covering the ground. You could say that the city has an advantage in the growing of healthy food because it is above the trees where it is closer to the sun and therefore warmer. Now you are inside the house and gazing through another glass window looking at a line of houses, you can see wood cut into a fine path that is convex and concave as a fun way to get across to each building. There are a lot of bridges covered by leaves and the bridges seem to express the people’s creativity. They believe in keeping nature healthy and clean encouraging citizens to use bicycles to travel in the Moederaarde.

Moederaarde is a city believed to have been created by Mother-nature herself designed for people who are willing to keep the earth healthy. For this belief, the Moederians follow the golden rule to treat each other as equals even, vulnerable insects and animals. The people here are vegans. They make sure they are always happy and keep their pessimistic character deep down within them. To show equality and no discrimination, they all wear a uniform which is chic clean rags. They grow their food themselves by planting seeds given by Mother Nature in a special building which is made out of glass and supported by flexible wood that is regularly taken care of by the workers in the building. Inside this glass, there are corns, apple, oranges, wheat and anything you could ever think of that can be grown by seeds.

Following the bridge, that is connected to the special building going downwards and disappearing into the crown of the tree and going back upwards, you finally reach the heart of Moederaarde. When you walk to the end of the bridge and remove the branches and leaves obstructing your view of a tall structure, you realise you have walked into the town’s temple of Mother Nature where you see everyone worshiping a different statue. The wood is magnificently constructed and flexible as if it is dancing joyfully.

Looking to the right of the temple building, you can see waterfalls and little stones punching the surface of the water and little waves battling each other. Next, to this, you see a big symmetrical building covered in fine, bulging curved wood where the dictator lives. On the left-hand-side of the waterfall there is a farm created by the Moederians made especially for the dictator. When you look closely at the waterfall you can see polished gold stones in the water, however, staring at the gold for too long would “anger the king and the villagers.” So, looking at the left side of the temple.

There is a tower also made from wood surrounding a tower however clean waterfalls down the tower, like a waterfall, into largely curved bowls. This bowl has a tube at the bottom which connects to wooden pipes where the villagers can drink clean water from. Next to this tower was a beautiful wooden bridge known as “De Eerste Brug.” This bridge had a wooden path which is a shorter way of leaving the town. Around this path were wooden circles patterned and positioned in order from tallest to smallest and then back again where the middle point has the smallest circle.

After letting yourself get distracted, you look ahead and see people worshiping a beautiful woman covered in leaves and bushes. This woman was beautifully sculptured with knives and smoothened with a Quang-sheng. The wooden floor covered with ivy is connected to the woman lying down on the floor looking towards you. As you come closer you encounter little stairs on the wooden floor. There is an ongoing amount of leaves falling from the skies. The closer you walk in the closer you feel connected to the woman lying on the floor. Walking silently round the woman you see a tall building behind her covered by tall trees that escaped the village above them trying to reach for the sun. This tall wooden building was covered in moss. At the top of the building, the wood was clean and there were two globes. To enter this building, you had to get on a long bridge which was constructed in an ‘x’ shape. Surrounding this building are pieces of wood bulging from different angles. They say the protuberant woods “leads you to different parts of the world.”

You enter the building and choose one path that will lead you to another city you are going to explore.