Tropical Permaculture in the Philippines: Update 1

My wife and I are currently in Borongan, Eastern Samar, Philippines.  We're staying in my dad's house, which was otherwise being unused.  We'll be here for the foreseeable future, and my primary goal during our stay is to turn the unused lot behind the house into a small organic farm/large organic garden.  I'm going to be posting updates on here to track my own progress and also to contribute to the vast online permaculture community.

I should note that I have no idea what I'm doing.  Aside from being forced to slave away in my mother's vegetable garden as a child, I have no experience growing anything, so organic tropical permaculture is new to me.  But I'm a firm believer that you can become an expert on anything with the help of the internet.  Plus, I have tons of local knowledge to help me out (though it might take a bit to get the permaculture idea across here, since the typical practice is slash-and-burn, plow up large plots, and plant monoculture crops).  I expect a lot of trial and error.  A lot of error.  But I'm going to learn a ton in the process, and hopefully end up with some yummy fruit and veg for my kitchen table.

Here are some 'before' pictures:

 There are already some banana tree clusters, a few coconut trees, and some other fruit trees spread randomly across the lot.

 

The first step is to cut the 4-foot tall Jurassic Park grass.  A machete is way more labor intensive, but less hassle, since the weed eater constantly bogs down in the heavy, damp grass.  I'm sure plenty of permaculturists will cry foul at the burning, but in my defense, they started burning before I got there.  From things I've read, it seems that the primary problem with burning is the loss of all that organic matter which could return nutrients to the soil.  But tropical weeds don't f*** around, and they gots to go.  Plus, I've still got tons of Jurassic Park grass on the lot, and I'm going to turn it into compost. 

 

Planted some test run seeds in pots a few days ago.  Most of them have sprouted and broke surface already.  Not all of them can be transplanted, but I was bored and wanted to start somewhere, so I planted them.  I've got ampalaya, sweet corn, cucumber, chili pepper, pechay (like bok choi), kangkong, sitao (green beans), and green onion.

 

Leia is stoked that the house has an oven, and she's getting a puppy too.

 

I made a worm bin, so I can feed them our fruit and veg scraps and they can give me worm poop to use as fertilizer.  Just started it yesterday, but the worms seem lively and happy, so I'll start adding food in about a week.

That's the first update.  Next up in the project is finish cutting the grass, till the soil as necessary, start a mandala garden with raised beds, build a compost bin and start composting, and go from there.