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About fungal.kin_

Hi, Iā€™m Bogdana, a fungi kinšŸ¤“, entangled with the mycelium through stories of symbiotic flourishing, contamination and kiniship!šŸŖ¢šŸ•øI offer guided walks as joyous occasions for frolicking around local woods and parks, and getting to know fungi as important allies within our (natural-cultural) ecologies! More walks to come throughout October & November!


Bio:


Every time Iā€™m asked when or how exactly ā€˜I got into mushroomsā€™, Iā€™m stumpedā€¦.sometime around 2019? I have no recollection of a definitive moment that drew me in, that exceptional experience that pushed me into the world of fungiā€¦and I like that.
 
It reminds me of the ā€˜rhizomeā€™ that philosophers Deleuze & Guattari often refer to, with its multiple entryways and exits. I joined in through one of the many mycelial openings and have since been intimately entangling with hyphae, branching in different directions.šŸ•ø

I cannot get that date in 2019 or trace back my journey, but I recall its different paces and intensities, and the lessons that actively guide me to this day.

Fungi are great teachers for learning *and* for unlearning. What began with the basics of identifying mushrooms as individual objects, made out of key parts and featuresšŸ”morphed into a recognition of symbiotic flourishing, and a questioning of the colonial legacies nested within biological classifications. My reliance on visual observations, which made sure I stayed objective and separate šŸ«” slowly turned into a full immersion that engaged all my senses in continuous processesšŸŒ€ā€¦suddenly the languages I knew couldnā€™t encompass our entangled lifeā€¦

Fungi taught me ā€˜the grammar of animacyā€™, as Robin Wall Kimmerer calls it, and the value of language that acknowledges our worldā€™s irregular, unexpected and queer eruptions and becomings. They taught me that the kind of language we use matters for the sort of relations and kinships we nurture within our world, and that welcoming ā€˜contaminationā€™ and fostering interdependencies are ways that we can care for each other & for forgotten kin in the ruins of capitalismā€¦ā€™collaborative survivalā€™ Anna Tsing says.

We might not be used to reading stories without (traditional) human heroes, but fungi make us turn to these alternative accounts. How entangled are you within the mycelium?šŸ‘€šŸŒ€
 

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