sustainable or not sustainable

Vanessa Farquharson went to an Anti-Styrofoam party Toronto. The goal of the supporters is to get rid of polystyrene and replace it with something biodegradable like NaturoPack. It’s made out of corn, sugar cane and potatoes. That’s a little controversial to me because we have seen the consequences from ethanol where farmers suddenly produce more corn for fuel than for human consumption and market prizes go through the roof so that people who depend on that food can’t actually afford it any more. This can’t be it.  

Colin Beavan, aka No Impact Man, writes instead in his blog “To hell with sustainability”. He then makes the point that we can not actually sustain our current life style without destroying our planet and we therefore have to seek a life style that is better for us and the environment. This change includes that we shouldn’t try to make the packaging for junk food, or any take away as for that, more sustainable as in bio-degradable. The goal should be to make our kids, and ourselves I would say, eat food that is biodegradable to start with such as an apple. Since that is very idealistic and against the odds I suggest we should consider a bring-your-own-container-policy for take-away restaurants. At least for the transition period to healthier eating habits for everyone.             

Inspiration and Experience

I just got an email from a friend telling me I was a great role-model for my child. Thanks! I want to be able to tell Ruby one day I tried to change things, I did not ignore the destruction of nature and climate change warnings. As Vanessa Farquharson put it, it's better to pollute and do good deeds instead of polluting and doing nothing about it. So for a little inspiration it’s helpful to read her book or blog (Green as a thistle) as well as any of the stuff from Colin Beavan aka No Impact Man. What it comes down to is the trying. "Probieren geht ueber Studieren" we say in German, meaning trying is better then studying. It's about being creative too and how many of you would admit to not being creative now? 

C.B. and V.F do try a lot of things, they find out what works best for them, they realize it’s not all that hard and bad to go green and hey, they keep plenty of the things up even after their one year trial is over! Colin's wife is a hard core city person living off take away and Starbucks coffees, she shops until she drops, she is totally disconnect from nature, has no idea where her food comes from and can't cook. She did it, too!       

A little story from home: Last night I told Dave that V. F. had a really great idea: She cut up an old bed sheet into handkerchiefs because she had given up on Kleenex and did not want to buy new handkerchiefs. - Somebody stared at me blankly, not showing any understanding for my excitement. Then he said he has never had handkerchiefs; I grew up with them but without Kleenex (Tempo in Germany). Next came the conclusion: he grew up in a throw-away society, I grew up in a country of permanent shortage of just about anything. Yup, not everything was bad in the GDR. I think we should fake a nation-wide supply shortage to keep people from shopping and wasting so much. I think we all value and take care of our stuff more if we know it can’t be easily replaced.  Also, when I was a kid, things got repaired not thrown out. And yes, I do use handkerchiefs again, still the ones from my childhood days.

Why people can't go green

I am currently reading "Sleeping naked is green" by Vanessa Farquharson, a Toronto-based journalist who took on the challenge of doing one more green thing everyday for a year. It's not quite as radical as Colin Beavan, aka No Impact Man, but it gives me a good insight why some people have a hard time to act in a greener way.


I was wondering if I could get a list together like hers but lots of the things on her list already do not apply to me. Changing to recycled paper towels - there are no paper towels in my household. Switching to eco-friendly make up - I don't do make-up. Using tote bag - done that for many years, in fact the first thing I say to every cashier is 'I don't need your plastic bag'. The list goes on but let's stick to the tote bag. Apparently for lots of people that's like a big fashion faux pas, does not look cool, all tote bags are generally ugly, they don't show off the expensive label I just bought - that's a few of the issues Vanessa and her sister have with tote bags. Get over it, is all I can say. I don't care what's written on my tote bag, what its colour is or what other people think about it. That's just one of the problems that society has created for itself, we care too much about what other people think about us, that we have to maintain a certain image of ourselves, the latest advertisement campaign just told us we have to get this not that and so on. We are not going to safe this planet if we concentrate so much on ourselves! Any tote bag will do but do skip the plastic. I can't believe there's still supermarkets in Canada that do not charge for the plastic. 

Of course, the tote bag is only an example of where people have trouble to go green but in my opinion it's not a huge sacrifice. Now image these people had to get rid of their car. Let's face it cars in Canada are a bigger addiction to many than alcohol or other drugs. It's going to be a loooong therapy.