How Much Thrash Do We Produce?

The statistics are staggering; thank you, 'Otter-Man' Siva (of the National University of Singapore) for this. It seems that I am responsible for 1,330kg of thrash per year! I am now thinking about reducing my carbon footprint, carelessness, inconsideration, and lackadaisical attitude to our Earth. Going digital is one way, yet I love my books and magazines. Perhaps, it is timely to do book-pooling, the way we squat in somebody's car with permission and chip in the toll-fees and fuel cost. I can re-use the plastic bags given in rack-packs. I can make conscious decisions to thrash it, or hoard it (now, that's a debilitating thought). What do you think?

There Is Art in Rubbish

Here are beautiful pieces of creative art. This sculpture is fashioned from used toilet rolls. Cut and insert is the method, however the beauty of it!

Art can be created from almost all disused material. Paper is a medium with wide applications from origami, making greeting cards, puppets, or building blocks for larger pieces (think Lego bricks and apply the simple but reliable SCAMMPERR formula).

Before you carelessly and clueless discard that hollow cylinder of hard cardboard, perhaps you may be inspired to toy with a pair of scissors and exacto-blade.

Recycling Done Right

My recent trip to Berlin, Germany was a revealing one. Not only for participating in its world-class annual marathon across amazing historical scenery, but also for its brilliant Recycling Movement.


Beyond mere separation of plastics from glass from paper, Berlin prides itself for keeping its streets responsibly clean, with a reward system. At supermarkets, patrons can return used PET bottles through sorting machines that return credit coupons (exchangeable for cash at the checkout lines) for the amount of 0.15-0.25 Euros per bottle.


We had great fun feeding the bottles through the cutout hole in the receiving machine. The bottle travels through a small conveyor belt that then goes through an internal sorter. Surely you pay more for a PET bottle with its filled contents, but you do get back like a trolley-cart at the supermarket after you return it.

Celebrating Earth Day Everyday

Here are interventions for initiating Earth Day.


As a summary, the staff at INC. proposed the following approaches:


1) Determine your energy consumption
2)  Use less paper
3) Take a look at your windows
4) Turn of the lights
5) Plant a green roof
6) Use Organic Paint and Other Green Design Materials
7) Purchase Energy Efficient Equipment
8) Encourage Carpooling or Alternatives to Driving 
9) Allow Employees to Telecommute
10) Cash in on Government Incentives

Going Green Global Challenge 2010

Going green may be the way - the only way!

If we are to save our planet, and extend its lifespan for our children we will need to begin immediately. There is little time to hesitate. it is time to take action, however small you think your attempts are.

The traditional way to go green is using the 3 R's: Re-use, Reduce and Recycle. Which other ways are there?

Creative ways may include: Reflect, Review, Re-solve, Remind, Reward, and Remake. Uncreative ways will be Remorse and Regret.

Break out of the scarcity mindset, and focus on a mindset of abundance. How do we create more with less?

Can going digital reduce our reliance for hard copies? Or, is this a pipe-dream? Is old school still relevant? If I use a diary to take notes, is it still useful compared to a PDA device? How can we actively un-support an industry or business? Is passivity a powerful approach? Is militant and passionate the way to go with fast-vanishing flora and fauna?

Here is an article I wrote that focuses on another blogger's annual eco-friendly challenge.

I dare you to take up this personal challenge. Improve OUR world by influence: one person at a time.

GREEN, GREEN GRASS OF HOME

Green is such an interesting colour, receiving more attention than it should. In a Clean and Green Garden City we live in, green is an abundant colour. Whether Mother Nature has a stronger affinity for green remains to be seen, for I suspect that she has a vociferous wardrobe of colours that she chooses from, depending on which season is in fashion. Personally, I like autumn brown but I may be mistakenly colour-blind in a pile of wilted and withered leaves.

Green is the new black; I am influenced to be fashionably analogous. It describes the emotion of envy. It describes how we feel when our stomach does not agree with the food we ate. I could be still ignorant and naïve about many things, thus tinting my world with a different palette of pigments.

Are women greener than men?

I expect that this may arouse a healthy competitiveness amongst the committed populace. Meanwhile, how can we go beyond Recycle, Re-use and Reduce?

I print on the other side of my used A4 sheet of paper (grown on plantations that breed and grow fast-growing trees for paper pulp only). I scrawl my ideas on these same dissected sheets, phone numbers, URLs, Note-to-Self, and new English and Mandarin phrases.

I switch off lights that are not in use. My life-partner harps me constantly for having the hall-lights on after midnight. Sounds like music to me, at times.

I pay attention to over-charged cell-phones and notebooks. These energy-packs seem to suspiciously diminish in potential the moment you charge them.

I am reminded to carry my own non-plastic bag when I shop for groceries. My triathlon back-pack is my backup for heavy stuff.

I cringe (in strange places of my ectomorphic body) when I watch ice-cubes melt – what a waste of electricity in freezing it in the first place!

Perhaps, we can over-complicate the Energy Equation to include the energy-limiting process of Reflection and Re-engineering?

Reflect on what we have done well, and not? What can we constantly do to improve on how we consume energy (in all sense of the word)? This extends to excessive calories, which may be converted to excess bodyweight, which may entice you to feel comfortable with the trappings of a house that can cool itself with a compressor filled with Freon or other environmentally safe gas. This is Systems Thinking projected forward.

How else can we apply the 3 ‘R’ of Saving the Planet?

Re-engineering is about a conscious effort to review and re-ignite our thinking about how we treat our environment.

My take is simple, for I have a simple mind and act like a simpleton. Treat our immediate environment with human values. Respect our environment. Recognise that we share it with others. Reassure others around us that we are actively doing our part in saving it. If you responded to director/writer M. Night Shyamalan’s plea-film The Happening and Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, we have to care for ourselves through our environment.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T our environment!

And, that’s that for now.

Mirror, Mirror, On the Wall!

Hello Readers!

Lest this blog is squandered into literary oblivion, I commit to resuscitating it. However, it may be ornate and flowery in its new incarnation. Rest assured, it will be environmentally friendly; I am not too sure if it will be politically-correct. Spare me some artistic licence, please! In November, I hacked (no, whacked) out 50,000 words in 30 days (actually less, since I was on a self-imposed vacation) for a literary challenge. Plus, I have been devouring another Tom Robbins's novel...I won't know how this blog will end...

This is my mirror blog for 'Leadership Lessons From Triathlons'. It will be an ancillary and auxiliary blog; an eager appendage to an already complex hand.

I decided to put in my more creative writing, including Film/DVD Reviews, Book Reviews, Quotations, Tweets, and Humorous Writing.

I will also, on occasions, as my whim and fancies dictate, write on controversial topics. This is not meant to be malicious in intent, but rather to provoke more open-minded, divergent and progressive thinking. If we do not think differently at times, we may not be capable of innovation and tangential thinking.

My friend, Reeves expands and expounds on diversity of ideas in his blog. I will, deliberately, connect the dots, however will not promise compliance (not all the time, that is). We may need to seriously rethink the way we do things if we are to enhance our potential in our products, services, brands and corporate culture.

Have a bountiful splendid and memorable 2010! Happy New year!