Krishna McKenzie is a “Zen” farmer who is creating a unique concept in Auroville that is relevant everywhere in the world
At the impressionable age of sixteen, young Krishna Mckenzie was enrolled in the J Krishnamoorthy academy in the U.K. A year later, a wealthy philanthropist sponsored some of the students to visit all the four J Krishnamoorthy institutions in India—Chennai, Bengaluru, Benares, and Rishi Valley, and Krishna signed up for the trip.
The young Krishna, who considered himself a misfit in the English school, found himself fitting right in when he was in India. “I knew this country was my destination,” he recalls. After he went back to England, he met up with a gardener on the school grounds, who introduced him to the art of cultivation and producing food in a microcosm. “This gentleman had been to Auroville in the Seventies, and introduced me to the Mother, Shri Aurobindo, and the concept of Auroville, and to the concept of Yoga—where you can do something to discover yourself.”
It taught Krishna that this was a super sustainable lifestyle that didn’t need expensive art degrees, and would keep him connected to the real world—the community, culture, and cultivation pillars gave him the microcosm he was looking to belong…
