I Need to Wake Up
Hey guys,
Here comes a post that has been so different from what you have seen from my desk. The GDs have paused since most of you are busy with your GD/PI schedules. I also have a GD to analyse that has been pending for sometime and I will try and do it by tomorrow.
Since we have been discussing issues of national and international importance over so many GDs and proposing ways of doing things better, I thought I shud put in the Lyrics of the song that won the Oscar this year - "I Need to Wake Up". This is from a documentary "An inconvinient truth" that also won the best documentary oscar and starred Al Gore. It talks about the Global warming and the effects humans are having on the environment.
After it was released in US last year, many in US repented on having chosen Bush over Gore. And the country felt sad on having been ignorant and casual about the environmental impact it is having on mother earth. Well, I feel it is not just for the Presidents to work on it. Let us see what we can also do as individuals. If not anything else, just the conciousness itself will be good to begin with.
Please use the comments section freely on what we can do at an individual level for a better environment. When we were discussing the 'infrastructure issues' in a GD I had put in a point saying that "We shud try and leave our car behind to office atleast one day in a week" as a small individual contribution. And I have personally tried to implement it and I have been doing good so far. Let us see more things coming in. I promise I will rake my brains to come up with one additional idea for every three you give.
Couple of points on the idea you give
1. It shud not tell the Govt what to do. It has to be at individual level.
2. It shud be implementable and not grandiose. E.g., If you say let us walk to work, no one will implement it and hence the idea will go waste.
3. You shud be committed to do it yourself.
4. We shud be able to implement it starting NOW.
Here goes the lyrics. Enjoy reading it.
Have I been sleeping?
I’ve been so still
Afraid of crumbling
Have I been careless?
Dismissing all the distant rumblings
Take me where I am supposed to be
To comprehend the things that I can’t see
Cause I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
And as a child
I danced like it was 1999
My dreams were wild
The promise of this new world
Would be mine
Now I am throwing off the carelessness of youth
To listen to an inconvenient truth
That I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
I am not an island
I am not alone
I am my intentions
Trapped here in this flesh and bone
And I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
I want to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Oh, Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
Here comes a post that has been so different from what you have seen from my desk. The GDs have paused since most of you are busy with your GD/PI schedules. I also have a GD to analyse that has been pending for sometime and I will try and do it by tomorrow.
Since we have been discussing issues of national and international importance over so many GDs and proposing ways of doing things better, I thought I shud put in the Lyrics of the song that won the Oscar this year - "I Need to Wake Up". This is from a documentary "An inconvinient truth" that also won the best documentary oscar and starred Al Gore. It talks about the Global warming and the effects humans are having on the environment.
After it was released in US last year, many in US repented on having chosen Bush over Gore. And the country felt sad on having been ignorant and casual about the environmental impact it is having on mother earth. Well, I feel it is not just for the Presidents to work on it. Let us see what we can also do as individuals. If not anything else, just the conciousness itself will be good to begin with.
Please use the comments section freely on what we can do at an individual level for a better environment. When we were discussing the 'infrastructure issues' in a GD I had put in a point saying that "We shud try and leave our car behind to office atleast one day in a week" as a small individual contribution. And I have personally tried to implement it and I have been doing good so far. Let us see more things coming in. I promise I will rake my brains to come up with one additional idea for every three you give.
Couple of points on the idea you give
1. It shud not tell the Govt what to do. It has to be at individual level.
2. It shud be implementable and not grandiose. E.g., If you say let us walk to work, no one will implement it and hence the idea will go waste.
3. You shud be committed to do it yourself.
4. We shud be able to implement it starting NOW.
Here goes the lyrics. Enjoy reading it.
Have I been sleeping?
I’ve been so still
Afraid of crumbling
Have I been careless?
Dismissing all the distant rumblings
Take me where I am supposed to be
To comprehend the things that I can’t see
Cause I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
And as a child
I danced like it was 1999
My dreams were wild
The promise of this new world
Would be mine
Now I am throwing off the carelessness of youth
To listen to an inconvenient truth
That I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
I am not an island
I am not alone
I am my intentions
Trapped here in this flesh and bone
And I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
I want to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Oh, Something’s got to break up
I’ve been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now
Labels: Interesting Articles
Gyan-ee 3:41 AM
16 Comments:
Very beautiful initiative..
I would start with one small bit I follow, and waitign to hear more ideas from others.
One common idea is carrying a bag of your own while going to market. What can be done over and above this is to talk to shopkeepers and discourage them from giving plastic bags for every small thing they sell.
Earlier I have asked several shopkeepers to start keeping paper bags, and today I resolve to do it more often.
2b
Hi,
Great idea.
I've been doing the platic bag thing for some time too, & its plain irritating that they dont understand the reason for it!
I have a small suggestion that concerns littering. If you have any plastic cups, wrappers, peels
to dispose off, please hold on till you come across the nearest dustbin, or walk across to one, instead of dropping it on the spot.
Even on trains, please carry a small bag, & dump your stuff into it.
Agreed, the job is not made easy by the lack of dustbins, but we have to try :)
I too agree to follow this, & preach it to unwilling friends as well :)
Aparna
Hi,
I really appreciate the initiative and by no means want to interrupt the flow, but one question is nagging me. Is this the right forum to start this discussion?
nee
A fair question nee. My thots when I posted,
1. It will help us think and analyse an issue (with the limitation being it has to be at individual level) - Afterall thats what we do in a GD
2. Help us think on action apart from theory. Helps us when we are sugggesting something to others to implement :)
3. And afterall, we are the managers of tomorrow. We need to lead the change for better - be it organisation, be it anything else
And if it is still not the right forum, so be it :)
Hi,
definately v need to lead the change for better.
one communicate this to kids (v definately hav them around)i had really found that not only they implement these gd habits(not littering)but ask the unwilling elders too their wit +innocence compel elders to.
Second thing,leather most of us knows the cruelty behind,but rarelystops using it.For,this I ,at my personal level had stopped buying it.
One gd thing i had observd is ,now the no. of persons carrying their own hand bags to mkt has increasd.
Hello,
Lovely initiative, My points r
1. Encourage car pooling and office transport. I myself travel by my office bus
2. "Own a tree", wherein every1 plants a tree and takes the complete ownership of the same. This is 1 good use of large population ;)
3. Cleaning of our own plates (this will reduce food wastage)...I m really imaginative on this ;)
Want to come up with some more points
-PS
Very nice initiative ..
Loved ur thoughts of being organized in everything what we do :). Thats GREAT.
Do you know that in US, Canada, Australia, if you give your latitude and longitude, the building council can recommend you
a) orientation and layout of your home (where should your kitchen, bedroom be)
b) materials you should use
c) location of your windows: and the material (kind of glass) for them
d) the inclination, height and length of sunshades.
e) What kind of shrubs to plant at what areas?
just so that you minimize the energy utilization your home needs. They take various factors such as Sun’s azimuth, Solar Path, prevailing wind direction etc into account to recommend this.
They do this on the basis of the climatic region your home falls under. Their designs are effective that they account for climatic variations: homes use minimum energy both in harsh winters as well as scorching summers.
What do we do? We just build concrete jungles. The pathetic designs and copious concrete result in hot homes, and we use AC to cool it.
I am trying to build a home for my parents (in Kerala). The key feature I was interested in was that it should be energy friendly so that I do not have to install an AC. Do you know that achieving this is actually easy?
Solution? Use the "Rat trap bond" mode when laying bricks. Have air columns in ceiling that act like a thermal insulation. Have funnel like structures which allow the warm air in the home to rise up which causes cool air to rush in from the surroundings..
Note: “Rat trap bond” is a pattern of laying out bricks with an air column in between. This saves the total number of bricks required by about 30%. The air column acts as a thermal barrier.
:= j2ee web services
Another idea that I read recently, since many of us use computers frequently:-
Switching off the monitor when you leave your desk after the Lock Screen routine , can cut down 20% electricity consumption per PC.
Dont wait for the Auto Power off, do it yourself.
Aparna
Hey guys,
I am really feeling pretty good about the whole thing. The response was great. It now puts pressure on me to come up with an idea (since I had promised one for every three). And it is difficult since you guys have covered a whole gambit.
Anyway, here is another idea from my side.
Get all my bills and bank statements online. Since most of us are IT guys, it shud not be a pain. This reduces usage of so much paper. Very small idea. So be it.
I will try and pitch in some more over time. In the meanwhile, let us keep them coming.
What has come in so far
1. Kick plastic bags. Embrace paper/cloth bags. Paper bags are also harmful since we need trees for that, but are far better than plastic. Something is better than nothing, so let us start on that. My vote and pledge on this
2. Anti-littering. My vote and my best effort on that.
3. Educating kids. From my side I will give a lot of time to my kid teaching her the best things. Shud be easier for me since I have always been the family person :)
4. Say no to leather. There are few animals 'killed for leather' in India. But tanneries are one of the serious environmental hazards. So I second 'no to leather'
5. No wastage of food. Agreed and abided
6. Car pooling - great idea, but have somehow felt that it has not worked. Personally I have not felt comfortable doing that. Probably I am more introvert than I come across as :). Anyway, let me give another try. But no promise on this from my side
7. Own a tree. I have a couple of acres of plantations in the western ghats. So i am automatically qualified I guess :)). Born and brought up in the evergreen forests of western ghats, I think it is a fairly elitist idea. I have mixed thoughts on this. So will hold my opinion on this for now.
8. j2ee, amazing inputs. I shall do everything at my disposal to build a house that is environmental friendly when I build one. Simple, yet great input. I think this is the trophy idea till now :)
9. Computer power off - Used to do it earlier. Had forgotten. So there it goes again starting NOW.
Hi gyanee,
nice initiative. Another effort that can be added is stopping wastage of water. Since water is heavily subsidized commodity, we tend to waste it. It is a pity that we in Metros get water to waste that overflows for more than half hour after all our water tanks are full from the water supply and on the other hand, farmers in maharashtra have to do suicides due to poor irrigation facilities which ruin their crops.
Hi gyanee,
Here's story of one of your IIMB alumnus who's shown a brilliant effort at fighting for his rights.
Here's a short
introduction
I suggest all of the readers to read through his blog and comments regarding the story fighting for your rights from the start to the end (It hasn't finished yet). Here's the link Please understand i'm not trying to redirect traffic here. I seriously felt that someone like gyanee would certainly adore an initiatives like this.
Thanks gyanee.. I feel that you've started a nice initiative. There are many things in life that we never realize that we can do unless we actually start doing them :)
Water usage - My vote for it. Anyway, we at bangalore have to do it with no new water projects coming up because of the cauvery verdict.
Also, more dams means more destruction of nature
My Point 3 - Alaways switch off the engine at a red light if the time is more than 40 secs. 40 secs worth of idle time petrol consumption is used during ignition is what I came to know. If anyone has a more reliable number, give it
Another point for those of us using printers in office.
Please dont take huge printouts just because they're free. Try & avoid it, or if need be, take only those pages that are necessary.
1)If its not very inconvinient, try to scale down the print view to 2 per page. It helps a lot.
If possible, print on both sides of the sheet.
2)Save these printouts in your cabinet, so that the blank sides can be used for rough work.
Staple these together, & you have a great rough notebook!
Am a staunch advocate, & a follower of these ideas. I believe they really help.
Aparna
i am a bit late to read this post but the things that i dislike most are-
1)people wasting the papers in office printer.
2) people leaving their monitors on while not working.
i try to religiously turn the monitors off and taking the printouts on both sides..also to use the non claimed printouts for some rough work.
But its a good initiative..will try to think of more and adept many things that are suggested.
The starting is from not wasting any food.
A poem by Kurt Vonnegut who died yesterday
When the last living thing
has died on account of us,
how poetical it would be
if Earth could say,
in a voice floating up
perhaps
from the floor
of the Grand Canyon,
“It is done.”
People did not like it here.
Hope all of us are sticking to our promises of saving energy to avoiding plastic to everything else
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