My apologies for the major delay since my last posting , ramifications of the global recession manifesting themselves in the termination of my internet connection.
Creative juices to follow , watch this space.

Plastic bottles put to good use...

School built from recycled newspaper!

Couple builds school with paper
2010-01-06 14:10
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Taipei - An eco-conscious couple in Taiwan has opened a small schoolhouse built with donated newspapers fed through a homemade blender, the chief architect said on Wednesday.Canadian-born John Lamorie and his Taiwanese wife, Shelly Wu, used more than 1 000 kg of newspapers, many collected from students who would turn them over for points in class, to build the 75 square metre schoolhouse."I'm very much into the way I feel about the environment, especially reusing things," said Lamorie, 59, a former building inspector. "It's something that's always been in me, a hangover from my hippie days."The project took about a year, with school now set to open ahead of schedule as news of the unusual construction method spreads in the rural area of Pingtung county in southern Taiwan where Lamorie and Wu live.After getting the idea from visiting friends, Lamorie said he built a blender using a truck bed and a lawnmower blade. Into it he fed newspapers, water and cement to form what he calls "Papercrete", the backbone of his six-inch thick school walls."Basically it's like a giant blender," he said.Students contributed about half the used newspapers for the project in exchange for "reward cards", Lamorie said.Papercrete, though patented in 1928, remains far outside the mainstream of construction materials. It can be labour-intensive and tough to use despite its environmental friendliness.The schoolhouse's walls are coated with a silicone coating to guard against rain damage. The school can accommodate about 16 students.Lamorie and Wu are now building a paper-based restaurant where they plan to cook pizzas.

When is enough... enough !

Losing the planet's biological treasures at a rate of knots , the planet's surface of which 14% was once covered by rainforest and has now diminished to a mere 6 percent and estimated to be virtually depleted in the next 50 years.

Losing an acre and a half per SECOND , (roughly a football pitch) for the purpose of logging and in the process losing over 100 species of plants, animals and insects per DAY , how many vaccines do we insist on wasting?

Since the early 1900's European colonialist's have manged to eradicate in the range of 90 indigenous tribes in and around the Amazon basin , and with them medicine men and Shaman , thousands of years of accumulated knowledge of traditional healing purely for the sake of the green back dollar.

A pseudo sense of wealth we so vehemently rely on , a system based not on truth or integrity , brotherhood or a sense of community, but rather on greed , consumerism and waste. Is the current global economic meltdown not a big enough warning sign? Is it not a clear description of how this current monetry system is flawed?

I fear the day when the average man in the emerging economies of China and India trade in their bicycles for cars, their horse and cart for motorbikes , their factories and urban sprawl eating up the countryside to sustain this illusion of wealth and social status whilst regurgitating carbon by by the truck load , fuck it who needs glaciers anyway..

If we as a society are so hell bent on accumulating wealth ( cash ) is it not possible to create a low carbon economy based on the idea of sustaining the planet , reconfiguiring business as we know it to be pro green , still to turn your anual profit ( if you so must ) but under the umbrella of a global economy that is as driven enviromentally as it is financially.

Which brings us to sustainable development which I feel is a term very loosely thrown around but until the day that our socio-economic policies have a COMPLETELY SYMBIOTIC relationship with our environmental resources we do NOT have sustainable development.

Well on that note , I thinks it's time for some Fair Trade coffee... ciao for now.
,

facing facts...

US, China, India and South Africa reach deal - COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009

US, China, India and South Africa reach deal - COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009: "NEWS
US, China, India and South Africa reach dealAccording to a senior Obama administration official the United States, China, India and South Africa have reached a 'meaningful agreement' on climate change Friday evening.
Associated Press
18/12/2009 22:25
A senior Obama administration official says the US, China, India and South Africa have reached a 'meaningful agreement' on climate change.

The official characterized the deal as a first step, but said it was not enough to combat the threat of a warming planet.

Details of the deal with these emerging economies were not immediately clear.

The agreement was reached Friday at the UN climate conference in Copenhagen after a meeting among President Barack Obama and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and South African President Jacob Zuma.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the agreement had not yet been officially announced. (Photo: Scanpix/New York Times)Read more"

Saturday's quote..

"He is richest who is content with the least , for content is the wealth of nature."

Socrates.

Thursday's Quote...

" forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair."

Kahlil Gibran.

Solo...

polarity , solidarity

i stay sane through choice

i rejoice in clarity

totality bothers me sometimes

these rhymes help clear the mind...

Quote for the day...

" And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom."

Anais Nin.

slow the train....

the urge , the need

to sew the seed

industrial valley's we breed



recline , decline from thought

land is bought , sort after

laughter rings sings a wicked song

write wrongs



the spoken word too seldom heard

the dark stark naked truth

ruthless facts weight intact

we dont react till pennies drop

we cease to shop

shoplift the earth

recessions birth



hurt , we revert to older way's

the good old days

acknowledge signs

of broken glass and fractured minds



slow down this train

we must refrain...

wednesday's quote

"If you not living on the edge , you taking up too much space.."

Kayden Kleinhans

Tuesday's quote....

" To cherish what remains of the earth and to foster it's renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival"

Wendell Bery.

Quote for the day...

"Reality is not a shared state of consciousness"

Daniel Ried

My quest through Borneo to find the elusive Rafflesia flower..( Amoldi )

In 2007 a magnetic force took hold of me with such intention and purpose it was impossible to ignore , that force was Borneo and it's elusive, seductive Rafflesia flower ( Amoldi ) this particular flower , the largest in the world , only grows in a very select few locations on the planet , in Borneo , The Malay Peninsula and Sumatra .

I was lucky enough to "stumble" upon my first Rafflesia flower on my Sumatran adventure a few years prior , completely mesmarised by the intense beauty and contrast in colour it has to it's jungle surrounds, I felt it's natural invisible claws inbed themselves within me , quite aware of the fact these claws would once again beckon my return to this beautiful part of the world.

Determined to discover new varieties of the Rafflesia I turned my attention to the mountain of Kota Kinabalu on the island of Borneo. Now the Rafflesia flower only grows at extreme altitude so this particular adventure would require my bicycle to be packed as light as possible in order to achieve the altitudes required to reach the habitat of the Amoldi.

At roughly 2000m above sea level and 4 days of non-stop climbing , I reached an area on the side of Kota Kinabalu mountain , perfect habitat for the Amoldi , another 2 days of leech infested mud and trekking through the jungle I am finally rewarded with what I can only descibe as a visual orgasm , one of the most insanely gorgeous sights I have been lucky enough to see.

There she was ... the Amoldi in all her perfect glory lighting up the jungle floor like a ball of fire , one of those little moments in life where you take that extra long breath , goose bumps engulf your skin like a swarm of butterflies. hmmm...

This gorgeous gift from nature is being threatened by logging and deforestation in the region , I think of that moment I shared with that flower , how hard I worked to see it , how much value it added not only in the moment but still today and feel this moment should be there for others to enjoy on their quests.

Where do we draw the line? Do we really need to loose more species to gain timber ?

EARTHQUAKE DESTROYS PADANG ( SUMATRA )

Sometimes it's just not fair ......

Whilst cycling through Sumatra , Indonesia ( northern most island in the archipelago) in 2006 I was pick pocketed in a market in Pariaman unbeknown to me until 2 days later when rolling into Padang the fishing port on the west coast of Sumatra, the only town with an ATM I'd seen for weeks , I realised my missing bank cards and a few other odd's and ends were gone.

With about R80 ( $10 ) to my name I found myself in a bit of a pickle....
So off to the local police station to try and forge the way forward , about 45 minutes of sign language , gesturing , broken Bahasa and a touch of English I manage to get directions to the local Western Union money transfer office ,which also happens to be the local post office, internet cafe and convenience store...lucky me.

A bottle of water for the parched cyclist and a few minutes on the net to let the family know the score and I was spent. Julius , a gentleman that had overheard me waffling about my plight wonders over and in his broken English says to me " If honest I help" I continue to sign and babble across my situation for a few minutes... Then out of the blue Julius takes my hand and beckons me toward the ATM where he proceeds to draw all his savings to give to me to rectify my problem.

Completely humbled and taken aback by this beautiful soul and his sincere gesture I swiftly jump into action with my newly acquired funds ( $15) making calls , cancelling cards , sending emails , all the relevant bullshit one needs to endure in such a scenario.
So now both myslef and Julius are tapped out , there's a 3 day wait for a money transfer so Julius invites me back to his home to sit it out.

We meander through walkways and side roads, over small bridges and through tiny tunnels till we arrive in his Kampung ( village ) where I am introduced to the "family" consisting of 6 men and 4 woman all of us will share the 1 roomed dwelling for the next 3 days and nights ."Kubu" in the red t-shirt in the photo above had also fallen on hard times and been adopted into this warm welcoming sanctuary that seemed to provide refuge for the needy. "Sniper" on my immediate right another of the adoptee's ,out of the bunch Julius , Kubu and Sniper had the most profound effect on me over the following three days.

Over the remaining days and nights we would laugh , cry ,sleep and eat together in this most humble of spaces all chipping in what we could for the daily meal and odd beer here and there.
Moments passed I still think of regularly today , a true,pure example of the beauty of people and human nature , being taken in and looked after during my time of need by complete strangers.

Padang was recently crushed by an earthquake and thousands have died , I have lost contact with my "family"

I start to wonder if mother earth is getting just a little bit pissed off , this incessant quest for bigger houses , more money and faster cars , our destruction of forests and raping of the oceans...taking us further and further from the natural pure beauties that once surrounded us in our most simple and most humble form .

192 nations converge for the planet

United Nations Climate Change Conference


December 7–18, 2009
Location:
Bella Center, Copenhagen, Denmark

The most important gathering of the powers that be since Kyoto.
Watch this space...

today's quote

" where ever you go , no matter what the weather, always bring your own sunshine"

Anthony J. D'Angelo

selfish like shellfish...

rough , tough be the skin
jelly within
move without thought ,conviction ,intent
translucent repent
selfish like shellfish


no predator in sight
no daily fight
governed by the tides
in numbers they hide
selfish like shellfish


consume , deplume this space
the perfumed trace you leave
mother earth grieves
selfish like shellfish


oceans rise , imminent demise
squandered resource , belated recourse
fear not , she'll play by your rules
your belly is full
selfish like shellfish

QUOTE FOR THE DAY

"Ah , summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it."

Russell Baker