Magic, Time, and New Ideas

Posted on August 7, 2010 by Leah

DSCN0702I gave those ingredients as presents for Christmas a few years back.

Now that I think back on it, it might have been one of those gifts I wanted to give to myself.

For the past few months I have been living on a homestead in Northern California cooking with those very ingredients. I have had the gift to live without constant access to cell phone, Internet, or television. I have had the opportunity to listen~ deeply, to the natural world, and to the natural rhythm of noise that bangs around in my head.

I have also had the time and space to read, research, and write a novel I have been wanting to write for years. I have had to look at my fear of failure in the eye, shake hands with it, dance with it, and write about it on Facebook and Twitter.

I have mastered the art of snacking.

And I have read the news, stared at the ocean, weeded in the garden, and contemplated the world we live in.

I have been able to watch, listen, observe, and laugh with Jane, steward(ess) of the land I am living on.

I have contemplated the essence of time from every angle.

I have watched as the feather of a Turkey Vulture fell at my feet.

And I have sat in awe and wonder at the BP spill, and how we have and haven’t galvanized and organized, and wondered what we will say ten years from now, and who we will blame.

I have thought many thoughts, and thought about how I shouldn’t be thinking so much, and wondered the inevitable question in today’s new media world~ If a thought is had, and not shared on Twitter, is is relevant?

While at times my parents have thought me mad, and I am sure have wondered if I am in some state of shock or arrested development, I have found myself deeply satiated by  living a life whose rhythms are motivated by the weather, where everyone waves to each other as they pass, and where there is time and space to think through and idea, around an idea, and out of an idea.

I have found that I am obsessed with the broken mythology of our time, that humans are destructive beings destroying the earth. What a story! It is the one I have been taught nearly my entire life~ and I wonder how on earth we are going to reorient toward a sustainable future if there is the paths of possibility and hope, and vision, and action in our modern day mythology are hard to find and follow.

So…you guessed it. As the readers of the first draft of my novel read and shred away, I hope to be out in the world producing the first few segments for a new initiative called People and the Planet.

People and the Planet tells the stories about the emergence of connection, communication, and healing occurring between people, the planet and wild animals. My first story is soooo incredible I can’t wait to share it~ and am in the process of seeking sponsorship for the travel to the Kingdom of Tonga so I can bring this awe inspiring story about a healing modality in the open ocean performed in the company of whales to the surface.

“Those who do not have power over the story that dominates their lives, the power to retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, joke about it, and change it as times change, truly are powerless, because they cannot think new thoughts.”
—Salman Rushdie

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Peggy Liu: Making Every Day Eco Heroes Out of All of Us. Sustainable Shanghai Day 8 part 2

Posted on July 15, 2010 by Leah

IMG_1808Speaking of onward, everyone describes Peggy Liu in the same way, she is a mover and a shaker. Case in point, our conversation begins with her speaking about JUCCCE’s new collaboration with the famous Chinese singer Chen Lin. (The Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy (JUCCCE) is the non-profit organization Peggy co-founded in 2007 to change the way China creates and uses energy).

JUCCCE is training Cheng Lin to be a green champion, arming her with knowledge, about energy issues, bringing her to Al Gore’s first China-based Climate Project training this June, remixing Lin’s environmental anthem “Only One Earth,” and showcasing her at their recent JUCCCE China Energy Forum. JUCCCE has built similar relationships with top actress Li Bingbing and China’s first top supermodel Du Juan.

JUCCCE is focused on changing China’s consumption patterns. Liu quotes the Vice Minister of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development who has recently given a 3 hour lecture at their energy smart cities training for Mayors of China, “China today is setting the habits of an entirely new culture. Our new habits must save energy.” Having wiped the slate clean in the 70’s, China has started to rebuild itself over the last 30 years and will continue to build at a frenzied rate over the next 20 years.

On marketing Green to consumers

IMG_1761Peggy observes that 2010 is China’s year for a green consumer tipping point. Case in point- this is the first year that China has seen a slate of green covers on fashion magazines. JUCCCE is working celebrities and consumer companies to catalyze action among young students and consumer press. Peggy herself is featured this year as a green champion in Elle, Psychologies, Good Housekeeping, Officiel, and other Chinese consumer magazines.

On JUCCCE’s impact, Peggy notes that “In the last 3 years, we’ve worked with Philips Lighting, Loreal, GE, and Citibank to give away 130,000 energy efficient lightbulbs to students and communities across 7 cities in China.”

Given that most of China is still in “developing country” status, Peggy explains that JUCCCE focuses less on the climate change issue and more on being “healthy, wealthy, and green”. As JUCCCE frames it, the problem: 40% of deaths world-wide are by pollution (according to a Cornell report in 2007). The opportunity: the new energy revolution is an enormous wealth creating opportunity, bigger than the Internet. Their strategy is clear and focused: “Everyday, everyone can be a green hero” by getting your circle of friends involved.

On recognition of impact

Peggy explains, “Being able to articulate clear incentives and develop the right kinds of asks of different groups is what has drawn people to work on JUCCCE programs.” In 3 years, Peggy has not only amassed a vast network influential people to help make a cleaner, greener China, but she has created an organization that brings them together in diverse ways to make real, measurable impact. Peggy says her” magic sauce” is to combine other people’s power, and applying them in effective ways.

In the last 3 years, JUCCCE has:

  • Trained over 150  mayors representing 350 million people and 56 state owned enterprise executives across different sectors on how to build energy smart cities.
  • Accelerated the development of smart grid in China, leading the State Grid to announce in May 2009 a road map for implementation across China by 2020.
  • Catalyzed the launch of Yangzhou’s Smart Grid Valley in April 2010, the first smart grid business hub in China.
  • Investigated alternative heating solutions for 100 rural schools chopping down over 500 tons of live wood per school, per season.

Nobel Laureate Rajendra Pachauri, in awarding Liu the Hillary Institute Laureate of 2010 (named for the climber Edmund Hillary), said that climate change was an enormous world challenge, and that “what we need is perhaps 100 Peggy Lius all over the world, and I think if that were to happen, then clearly we would be on the path that human society will find sustainable. Not only for this generation, but for generations to come in the future. But for now I’m not looking for those 100 or 500 Peggy Lius, I’m very happy that I have this opportunity to felicitate the one that I think is the only Hillary Laureate of the year (for climate change leadership).”

The group is especially strong at convening worldwide resources in a way that solutions can deployed easily and quickly in China. “Our biggest success over the last 3 years is actually in building a core team that can be flexible and cross many sector boundaries and bridge language gaps to find the intersection of common interests,” Peggy says. “Making energy solutions simple to understand is not easy, nor is localizing them in way that makes sense to use in China.”

On misconceptions of China

Peggy discussed her concerns about the misconceptions by the West about China’s attitudes towards the affect of its growth on the world climate. “As an American-born Chinese, what really pains me is the size of the gap between what people think of China, and what is actually happening in China.

“There is a fear of outsourcing, but most people in China aren’t allowed visas out of the country. There is a fear of competition, but most Chinese companies are focused on competing within the China market. There is a fear of unfettered pollution coming from China, but it’s the Chinese people themselves who are most concerned about their health.  What most people don’t understand is that the Chinese government leaders have very clearly accepted the climate change challenge and are rising up to it with new policies and energy efficiency programs as fast as they can given the state of their capabilities today.

“I’m hoping that as more Chinese travel outside of the China, they can be cultural ambassadors to the West. This generation is completely different: every Chinese child starts to learn English in the 3rd grade and must pass English to enter college. This generation is being raised on Starbucks and MTV. As Chinese begin to have less apprehension about mingling with westerners, hopefully people can begin to understand China more and fear it less.”

The pace at which people have to accept change.

“I think if people understood the commitment China has towards balancing economic growth and environment, and how fast it was pushing towards improvements, they would give China more of a break. China is moving forward as fast as it physically can to go green.

“Like the Internet boom in Silicon Valley, 1 yr here is a dog year. Except that in Silicon Valley, there was a boom of new money, new people, new business models, new technologies. In China you have all that, plus the ground beneath you, the buildings around you, and the grid surrounding you is also changing. And at a much, much larger scale. The Shanghai Urban Planning department estimated that their population would be at 20 million by 2020 but instead it’s already reached that number ten years earlier.

On top of this, the culture is redefining itself. Parents that grew up in the Cultural Revolution being sent to rural areas to plant rice, now have children who have purple hair.  According to Isaac Mao, the first blogger in China, there are now 70 million weekly blogs and 30 million active bloggers in China.

Opportunity to join exploration and innovation

“I think the view of the cleantech race as Sputnik is really misguided. People are focused on mainly wind and solar. But the energy world is a much broader than that, and is much more symbiotic. To change the trajectory of energy use we are on is going to take a much more coordinated effort. We need to move from a ‘who is bigger and faster’ to a ‘you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’ view.”

Right now China is thirsty for foreign technology and operational best practices, but as it develops homegrown technologies and management capabilities that won’t always be the case. Given the size of China’s markets, it makes sense that other nations are investing heavily in building relationships here. US companies seem much more reluctant than Europeans though in embracing China’s growth as their opportunity. The US needs to throw itself more actively into partnership with China, and really get to appreciate how China works instead of fit China into an American mold, or it will find itself losing a huge market opportunity to other countries.

In the next 10 years, you’ll see China changing from the factory of the world to the cleantech laboratory of the world. Partnerships with China will produce low cost solutions for clean and efficient energy, that are deployable at scale anywhere in the world.”

Our meeting ended with Peggy walking me to the metro which would supposedly let me out in front of my next meeting. I will say the transit system is as good as it gets and more~ it’s clean and pleasant, and an additional thrill of the day~ this IMG_1810pretty little ticket that is reusable (I have a pet peeve that the Bay Area’s BART system doesn’t make recyclable tickets (why so many throw away paper tickets??)

Anyhoo, I exited the train in what turned out to be the mother of all super malls and it took me 20 minutes to figure out how to escape. All I can say is…it’s all fun and games until you get lost in a super mall. And that my friends, concludes the Sustainable Shaghai Virtual Tour. Click here for a full listing of all of posts written about Shanghai’s Sustainability scene.

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Posted in Uncategorized, china, climate change messaging, environment, green, sustainability, sustainable shanghai | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Sustainable Shanghai Final Round Up

Posted on July 14, 2010 by Leah

“I don’t look both ways, just forward.” –Adam Minter

It’s not the butterfly affect,

it’s the sledgehammer affect -Peggy Liu

“We have lost our dreams…our imagination…in our efforts to work so hard to achieve the Western way of living” –Flora Lan

Anything is possible in China. And nothing is easy. –Shanghai Saying

“I won’t stay in Shanghai forever, but I know I am in a place where history is in the making. In 20 years, I want to say, ‘I was there.’” –Chitra Hepburn

“This is China’s time to shine, and we know it.”

And so the Sustainable Shanghai Virtual Tour comes to a close. If you have been playing along, you may have “toured around” the web to gather the content at Planet Green, What Gives, [re]Think Shanghai, and my little blog…

Let me be frank, I didn’t write this little series for the money (actually, I haven’t even covered the cost of the trip). I did it because I got laid off, had some vacation pay, had an opportunity to tag along with the GOAP crew, and saw an opportunity to tell a story I believed was important. Because some internal knob clicked and I realized that while my attention has been focused solely in one direction re: the environment, one of the most important stories of the planet’s evolution was happening in the other direction. Of course, we don’t have the capacity to look in all directions at once (I think that is a skill of the Gods) but my hope is that this virtual tour will introduce you to enough people and stories for to offer an introduction into the wild world of China’s race to achieve a sustainable way of life.

It wasn’t getting shoved in the airport, or having every space I held in line skipped, it was the train ride that passed one long suburb of falling down sky-rises (and a small town of 7 million), that I finally took in what over population looked like. That is when I understood the desperation caused by water shortage, the need (not want) to innovate, the severed disconnection from the natural world. There was a moment when my throat and nose were sore from air pollution, and I had taken in too many stories of just how broken the supply chain is and grasped just how powerless we are as consumers…and all I really wanted was to go back to my little bubble in Berkeley and never look back. But look in any direction, and the bright blinking lights will attract your attention. They are coming from beautifully decorated boats on the river, complex designs on the buildings, and even from underneath the overpasses, even from within the trees~ this opulent celebration of the creative. It is those moments that I am reminded of a piece written by an old friend, Sam Trice, about how Switzerland, with all of it’s peaceful ways, never produced any art worth looking at; it was the cities in the throes of great adversity, the places that were shoved by society’s limits that produced the greatest creations on our planet.

Gaining an understanding about China’s role in the environmental movement is akin to snorkeling. You’re just following that beautiful colorful and shiny fish, and then all of a sudden you lost track of time and you realize you are eye to eye with…a really big eye, and you can’t quite figure out what it is, so you back up to get a little perspective and that’s when you realize that eye is attached to the alpha male of the sea lion den you wandered into, and he’s really big and he actually rules this kingdom. Well….that’s a little like what my journey into understanding China’s impact on the environmental health of our planet has been like.

Many people point fingers and blame China for many of the problems that are happening, and the most beautiful part of this story, is that the root of the plants that so many of us depend on for our goods are located in the form of factories in China, and no place is better situated to influence the world as we know it.

The opportunity in China to solve the planet’s problems are tremendous~ and the race is on.

So here’s the deal: I am taking you on a virtual tour of Shanghai, the only places I didn’t take you was into the bathroom or under the table~ so pick and choose where you want to go. I’ll provide a brief summary and put stars next to the posts that I believe contain valuable information that everyone should share with their mother. If you’re like me, and can’t f***ing BELIEVE that someone actually expects you to pour over all the links below: Just read Eco Cities: Bridging the Gap Between Fantasy and the Future on Nat Geo News Watch. It has lots of facts, will catch you up to speed.

The Sustainable Shanghai Virtual Tour

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Day 1: Entry (A few random thoughts about China, and a poorly lit and hard to understand video interview with Dr. Zhao Gang (the director of Chinese Academy of Science and Technology for Development and Ministry of Science and Technology).

Day 2: First Lesson in Over Population: Elbows Up: Video Interview with Jill Buck about environmental education in schools, Video from the observation deck of The World Financial Center (tallest observation deck on the planet), and lots of fun facts about Shanghai’s rapid urban development.

You can catch the full profile of Jill Buck and Go Green Initiative on What Gives.

Day 3: The World Expo. Lots of fun video and and a bonus interview with Chitra Hepburn (put out the green tech report) and her very positive view of Shanghai’s sustainability scene. Or you can find individual stories on Planet Green:GM’s insane version of 2030 (a grid system where you don’t need a car, or a brain). The UK Pavilion’s amazing Seed Cathedral

Day 4: Back to back interviews split into four parts:

Part 1: Factories Blowing Up and Public Official Executed: Fact or Fiction?

Part 2: Reclaiming China’s Future Greennovate teaches youth about the environment: VIDEO and insight into what it takes to get environmental education into the classroom. For an additional profile of Greennovate and a deeper discussion into what it takes to run a nonprofit in China check out the post on WhatGives.com.

***Part 3: Send your e-waste to China. No Really. It Might be Good for the Environment. If you own a PDA~ you should read this interview with Adam Minter. He’s been hanging out in the factories (plus there is a VIDEO by Laura Ling that takes you into an e-waste management city in China).

***Part 4: Does One Rotten Apple Ruin the Supply Chain? Yes. Think Suicide When You Look at Your PDA. A fascinating introduction into the realm of the supply chain corporate responsibility expert, Richard Brubaker. It doesn’t sound sexy~ but you don’t know what you’re missing. Meanwhile: to see a full profile on Richard Brubaker you can check out the post on What Gives.

Part 5: You want an Eco City? GIGA thinks you should consider making green building materials first. The title says it all.

Day 5: The Sustainable Shanghai (mini) Shopping tour. Bright colors. Art. Cool VIDEO of crickets from the Flower, Insect, and Fish market.

Day 6: Baring my soul at Naked Retreat, OR Finding the Lost Tribe of Transient Travelers OR Why Internet Stalking Is A Good Thing. While on a train ride to Naked Retreat (the first eco retreat in China), I finally had enough time to reflect on my experiences to date. Full profile on Gabriella Lo, co-founder of Naked Retreats, on WhatGives.

Day 7: Making Biking Sexy and The Eco City Fantasy. Interviews with Green Marketing maven Susan Evans and a meeting with eco city designer James Brearly.

For a full article o Eco Cities check out: Bridging the Gap Between Fantasy and the Future on Nat Geo News Watch.

Day 8: Part 1 The Organic Farm Tour and greening the factories.

Part 2: Peggy Liu: Making Everyday Eco Heroes out of All of Us

On the flight back to the US, I recalled a funny memory from when I worked as a wilderness drug rehab counselor. We knew the kids were going to go back to their lives and keep abusing drugs, but we also knew that we had planted seeds that would always live within them. There is no ignoring what I learned. Only hope that sharing the experience will widen the path of knowledge.

Posted in Uncategorized, china, climate change, environment, global warming, green, sustainability, sustainable shanghai, travel writing | Leave a comment

The Organic Farm Tour and poet laureat of Industial Ecology: Sustainable Shanghai Day 8 Part 1

Posted on July 14, 2010 by Leah

I had high hopes of visiting the ocean and organize a dive for my reclaimin’ the ocean project, atlas, I wasn’t able to make contact with a dive master who was willing to go with me (they only dive in a nearby lake that was filled by a dam). And I was laughed out of the room when I asked if anyone would like to join me for a trip to the ocean. Apparently, people just don’t go to the ocean in Shanghai~ it’s too polluted.

I decided to settle on a trip to the aquarium, which is supposed to be amazing~ but before I knew it the day filled with interviews. And so today I will take you on a tour of The Organic Farm, a visit with Peggy Liu of JUCCCE, a visit to the InterfaceFlor showroom to meet Patrick Riliey to hear all about greening the factory system, and we’ll end with a lovely interview with Chinese youth Flora Lan. (Yes~ this day will be split into 2 blog posts).

IMG_1770First Stop: The Organic Farm. (That’s the official name.) I actually had to be vetted through a special system since the government restricted certain areas to visitors during The World Expo. The farm is Chinese owned and managed by ex pats. The result is a sophisticated marketing system that puts a large emphasis on transparency (huge issue re: food issues in China), thus it is set up to manage tours. They are nationally certified through the OFD system, and grow a range of products, noticeably many foods that will appeal to ex pats.

There are 6 farms in China, and apparently catered to a high-end clientele. While organic produce is becoming popular in China, it is still considered a luxury item and status symbol. They sell their produce to super market chains, and have a VIP organic meal and food home delivery program. I’ve included a few videos, but truth be known, while it was moderately interesting, they didn’t have someone on-site that could answer my 1 billion and 1 questions (although many thanks to Martin who tried his best) so between you and me, I wish I had gone to the aquarium. Good to know it’s there though.

Next visit: Interfaceflor showcase room to explore greening the factories. The full post is on Planet Green, but if you want a little something to wet you whistle…here ya go.

Ray Anderson was named “Hero of the Environment” by Time Magazine. U.S. News and Word Report named him “America’s Greenest CEO.” On the back of Ray Anderson’s book, Confessions of a Radical Industrialist, Paul Hawken went so far to call him the “poet-laureate of industrial ecology”. By now you’ve probably guessed that he isn’t out there saving whales…but wait, maybe he is, by radically changing the supply chain of industry. Meet InterfaceFLOR, they produce carpets with the goal of developing a zero net impact business model by 2020.

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Making Biking Sexy in Shanghai and Eco Cities bridging Gap Between Fantacy and the Future: Day 7 Sustainable Shanghai

Posted on July 14, 2010 by Leah

It would seem I have a sleeping problem in Shanghai. My new motto is, “I’ll sleep when I leave Shanghai since every night I fall asleep at some evening event, then go home and email and deal with things in the US time zone, and then wake a few hours later to the tune of very loud birds when the sun rises. This morning I realized that is the only time I hear the birds~ at that once the day gets going and the streets are taken over my cars and traffic, I don’t here them again until our next 5am meet-up.

IMG_1746 Susan Evan’s is actually trying to bring a bit more quiet to the streets of Shanghai with her bike program. Part of Susan Evans’ story is familiar; she became “hyper sensitive” to the environment when she had children.  What is unique to Susan is that she took that awareness and shifted her career in marketing sustainability issues and developing environmental products. Upon moving to Shanghai in 2008, she founded Kplunk, an organization committed to a sustainable future by creating demand and markets for sustainable living – focused on creating desirability for sustainable behavior and a new social currency.

The Challenge: Marketing green to 1.3 billion people in China.  The added bonus: Many of the urban residents have a disposable income for the first time, and can afford to waste energy and not worry about it for the first time in their lives.  Susan explains, “Many people are turned off from things that are marketed as “green” and are still learning what it means.

Her motto:  People, infrastructure, and products are the three pillars of sustainability.

You can read the entire post on Susan Evans and Kplunk on WhatGives and learn more about how Susan is developing a system to repopularize bike riding (actually rather fascinating given the population woes combines with the new rising middle class)

Next up: ECO CITIES. So of all the things I researched and spoke to people about, this issue was the IMG_1751closest to my heart. The idea of being able to create a new city from scratch: to have the land, the resources, the money, and the knowledge about to build entirely new systems is like…a dream come true! Yeah: to good to be true as it turns out. The piece I wrote for Nat Geo News Watch was all about questioning if the process of building eco cities build the bridge between fantasy and the future.

There are lots of stats and facts about over population and the effect of urban migration. If you care about the planet~ this is a pretty good primer post on some of the basic issues that are motivating China right now.

Meanwhile, if you want to catch architect James Brearly, founder and lead architect at Brearly Architects and Urbanists explaining a mock up of an eco city he designed, well with out further adieu:

That night we went out to dinner on The Bund~ the vision of huge blinking advertisements across the buildings and the brightly lit boats heading down river made me think, holy sheite, it’s like Burning Man meets Blade runner.

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Those buildings you are looking at were all built in the last 10-20 years. Friends told me a funny story about how when she was growing up she was afraid to walk on The Bund at night because there were so many couples making out (everyone lived with their families at the time) and she was afraid to bump into them. In other words…it used to be dark.

Urban development is happening so quickly in Shanghai that they update the map of the city every 3 months, and a common story was shared by another friend who told me how she had left town for a few weeks, and upon returning got into an argument with her taxi driver who she was convinced had taken her to the wrong location. Apparently they had put in a high-rise across the street and she didn’t recognize her own neighborhood. Doh.

Posted in Uncategorized, china, environment, green, sustainability, sustainable shanghai, travel writing | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Baring my soul at Naked Retreat or Finding the kindred lost tribe of transient travelers or why internet stalking is a good thing: Sustainable Shanghai Day 6

Posted on July 14, 2010 by Leah

DSCN0555 I had the amazing opportunity to spend a night at Naked Retreat, the first eco retreat in China.

You can see the full post about Naked Retreat on What Gives, but I’ll give you a few videos at the end for your entertainment. The two hour train ride gave me plenty of time to contemplate for the first time on the trip, and marked the end of the beginning of my love affair with China. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I feel the need to go off topic. Because the next few days were off topic for me.

Lets begin with the back story about how this Sustainable Shanghai tour came to be, shall we?

Two years ago, I was sitting at Current dying a slow death of boredom (this was before The Green Channel, and after Viewpoints: a special initiative for the elections), when I was given the task of online outreach (everyone else calls this online marketing). There I was, wondering how I went from living an adventurous and purpose driven life to asking bloggers to post our video content, when Aric S. Queen started uploading his videos, The Shanghai Diaries.  He was reporting on his experiences in Shanghai and giving his perspective about how China was preparing for the Olympics.  I thought he was a good storyteller (and at that point I was filled to the brim with wanderlust and was living vicariously though his videos) and so reached out to him. Long story short he continued to produce videos until he was eventually kicked out of China. It was a sad day at Current when the Shanghai Diaries stopped coming in, but then we would see an occasional update from some other far flung country, and by that point, Current had decided to do away with my team and I had 6 weeks to figure out what I was going to do next.

And somewhere in there I received a call telling me that my appointment was waiting for me downstairs. Nothing on my calendar…but I went downstairs to see who I might have forgotten, and lo and behold, it was Aric S. Queen in the flesh.  Long story short, Aric introduced me to Christine Lu, the Green Channel was founded, and I started working with Christine and Chris Noble and Marijane Miller on their epic re[think] tours (And most thankfully, WhatGives sponsored the Sustainable Shanghai tour).

All of this to say that while my days were all about exploring how China relates to sustainability, my nights were filled with my tour-de-Aric S Queen a la Aric’s Shanghai pals.

I am struck by how certain communities always make you feel at home. Thanks to Mihela, I was introduced to the green community in Shanghai, which is a tribe in it’s own right. But then thanks to Aric, I was reunited with a long lost tribe, the tribe of transient/travelers/people who consider themselves citizens of the planet and know a piece of each other’s DNA as well as any family member. (Forgive me for forgetting you were out there.) There is a part of me that sees the eternal transient as a broken spirit: the one with no community with roots, and then I see them as an evolved soul: the limitless ability to experience life and take pleasure in openness and connection.

At one point while slipping into the joy of listening to good music a The Cotton Club, one of his friends turned to me and said, “Where ever I am in the world you have a home.” And something happened. I think my heart cracked. Just long enough for me to start to feel the full force of my experience in Shanghai. And within that pure moment of joy/love~ in leaped longing, fear, over population, poor air quality, undrinkable water, all of it…seeped in.

The next morning I woke with a start. Everything felt distant, even my dreams felt far away. They were foreign and I’m not sure what they meant~ even the most intimate act of dreaming became new to me. Today, I am feeling the distance. The distance of life, of reality, of choice, of decision. I was grateful to head into the mountains, and imagined the two hour train ride would take me on a ride through the much needed countryside.

As the train continued into what I imagined to be the “countryside” I was saddened as I saw the smog filled sky filled skies became more hazy and the horizon was filled with one lone line of  sky-rises that just never stopped. I would later be told this was an extended suburb of Shanghai. One of the cities, barely worthy of mention, a town really, had a population of a mere 7 million. I started to understand over population on a whole new level and started to ache for the one thing I always find home in, the natural world. Even as I type it, the term seems ironic~ what is natural? Many would argue the human nature to dominate the planet is “natural”. But you know what I mean. I wanted some woods, some dirt, some clean air. I was over the shock and awe of watching the dirt of the city run off my body and down the drain every day. The place has begun to feel desperate, the pace of which people are forced to operate to create the change necessary exhausting rather than exulting.

One part of me looks at China and thinks, well, the worst has happened. The water is so polluted you can’t drink it, the air is so polluted it hurts to breathe it in, the overpopulation is so intense you stop seeing the person beside you as a person. And yet, people are continuing to find (and seek more ways) to thrive in this environment. The  other part of me claims heart break. The feeling of disconnection from the natural world, trees, plants, birds, is so distant, that I begin to feel less whole and a deep sense of loss.

(Meanwhile~ feel free to enjoy this walk through the bamboo forest…)

I suppose this is what Gabriela Lo meant when she said she created Naked Retreat out of need. The place was revitalizing, but on the day I walked into the bamboo forest in the mountains~ I could see the pollution blowing over from the nearby city. The place is beautiful. But this land does not feel sacred. Of course, all land is sacred, it is about what we bring to the experience of relating to it, so perhaps what my larger truth is, I feel disconnected.

There comes a moment when I see that the land is more my home than any state or country. Across the planet the grass grows toward the sun, leaves move in rhythm with the wind, the sun moves across the horizon at the same pace, the birds all begin their day with the same declaration of still being alive. The crickets still mark the evening, the fish swim in the same circles. They say there was a time when the Chinese had a strong connection and love of land, hence the gardens, and the houses, and the paintings, but you can feel the cost of the Cultural Revolution and the resulting desperate attempt to catch up with the rest of the world. This place has changed.

As I hiked through the bamboo forest another wave of sadness washes over me~ and my best guess is that I  started feeling the connection between the BP spill, the state of China’s environment, and all of our future. And I walked on with a heavy heart.

***

You have endured another day of Sustainable China: next up: Day 7: Marketing Green and Eco Cities.

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The Sustainable Shanghai (mini) Shopping Tour. Day 5.

Posted on July 13, 2010 by Leah

Bah. Yesterday was all talk about supply chains. And based on the amount of RTs on Twitter or the lack of comments on Facebook, (not that I check that kind of thing) I can see how few people are interested in the topic. Lucky for us~ Day 5 brought a more colorful topic.

I went to China with a long list of things people wanted me to bring back. But I really wanted to bring gifts back that were…sustainable. (After all, I’m on the Sustainable Shanghai Virtual Tour). To go even deeper into that idea~ I wanted to bring gifts back that were created in a way that were harmonious to both the person who created the product and the person receiving the object. After all, we live with the energy of that object, and I’m pretty sure that we are influenced by it (you know the idea of cooking your food with love0. So I hate buying things I know were made in factories, it just doesn’t feel the desire for good vibrations (and yes, I love my car smart ass).

Shuchi and I checked out the fabric market, which was cool. You can go in and pick fabric and have your own clothes made. Outside is covered with vendors with people selling cheap jewelry, and after yesterday’s epic meetings about the supply chain, I looked at the jewelry and all I could see were people working for really low wages in less than ideal environments. Onward.

Vivian Wang was up for the Flower, Bird, Fish & Insect Market! I didn’t expect to bring back any birds or bugs, but who knows. Mostly we just oooed and aaahhhed at many strange sites, including this prehistoric beast I never hope to find in my toilet (work with me~ think alligators in NYC).

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Vivian also gifted me a cricket cage. Which I now have on my desk, with a little watering dish in it. Every time my cat walks by it she peaks inside to see if I have put anything in there for her to play with. Not yet. Apparently keeping crickets as pets is coming back in popularity. Remember that there is no space for dogs (and many regulations against having dogs)… so people keep crickets as pets.

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Vivian sent along this link to a piece on Chinese cricket culture (2000 yr. old tradition!). While part of me thinks this is…weird, another part of me thinks it is beautiful, and shows an authentic connection to the natural world. When you get to a place when you respect and endear yourself to a…bug…than something is happening there.

and here are some close ups:

The thrilling find of the day were the fruit seed carvings. YES! I thought, THIS is a sustainable gift.

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I think. At least it is designed to look like it. The one featured in this picture was hand carved by hand, but they had others that were carved with a machine. There was a sign that stated the following:

“Fruit seed carving is a Chinese artistic expression using the seed of various fruit to perform micro carvings on the seed’s hard shell. According to historical records, this art form was originated in China’s late Song Dynasty over a thousand years ago. The raw materials used are seeds of peach, plum, apricot, walnut, and olives…The World Expo’s theme of Better City Better Life, every participating country is trying their best to utilize low carbon technology and design and harmonize with nature. With the rapid explosion of world population and mankind’s choice to exploit nature’s resources without consideration for its long term effect…”

Later in the day Vivian turned me onto Chinese paper cuts which seemed like a low-harm-to-the-planet gift. They were certainly easy on the wallet, the verdict is out in regards to how they are actually made since I don’t know about the inks, paper, or working conditions. Bah. The challenges of shopping with a conscious.

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You want an eco city? GIGA thinks you should consider producing sustainable building materials first. Day 4 Part 5

Posted on July 12, 2010 by Leah

“There is an incredible opportunity to create change.”

Holy day of epic interviews. Rather than torture you with the novel about the day, I have split the interviews into 5 parts…with out further adieu…..

IMG_1437…a trip to GIGA where I caught up to talk to Ryan Dick, who has plans to revolutionize the supply chain. Now. If your eyes just glazed over and you were thinking it was time to check your twitter account~ stop right there, because if you consider yourself “green” or knowledgeable about the environment, but don’t get supply chains, well my friend~ let me just leave you with this quote from Ryan in a piece in for Nat Geo on eco cities “How can you create a sustainable town when you can’t build a sustainable building?” Meanwhile, it’s true, the info below really is for the eco geek into supply chains.

What’s GIGA?

GIGA’s mission is to empower designers with a platform to collaborate, lead the development of innovative ideas and foster design that has a positive impact on the environment. In other words, they place all their information about materials and vendors in one place so every one has access to the data base (this came about because they were getting inundated by requests for more information.

When the government goes green:

Last year the central government banned the distribution of free plastic bags in grocery stores…eliminating 3 billion bags every day, and the consumption of 5 million tons of refined crude oil every year for plastic bags alone. The word for the initiative is Huan Baodai, which  means environmental  protection bag or sustainability bag. It puts the language into the lexicon of the masses. When you need to get a plastic bag: the language is “Your not sustainability.”

“While the central Government is determined to go green we are still missing the tools, platforms, and collaborations. Industry as a whole hasn’t created a standardization.”

Changing the conversation from what we’re doing wrong to what we can do right:

“For manufacturers to make and clean the natural world. We’re realizing that we need to change the conversation: leave the negative impact behind and move into figuring out what creates positive impact. When measuring air quality: noting that when people open the windows; The VOC’s that airborne will (glue, carpet etc) pollute the air, and so air pollution is noticeably higher during the morning when everyone opens their windows.”

“I don’t like living here, but there is a lot of demand to fix the problems here. I’m here to make a difference. China could scale ahead and jump ahead. There are  470 people creating certain products whereas in the states there are only two and have major political influence, that isn’t happening here yet. There is an incredible opportunity to create change.”

“Things move extremely quick here, everyone is looking to get ahead because of the competition. There is a nimbleness here…you can actually make lots of change with a social network.”

Ok… tomorrow onto a more colorful topic…eco shopping at the fish, insect and flower market.

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Does one rotton apple spoil the supply chain? Yes. Think suicide when you look at your PDA. (Sustainabile Shanghai Day 4 Part 4)

Posted on July 12, 2010 by Leah

“I don’t look both ways, just forward”

Day 4 was epic. Too epic for one blog post so if you want to hear about factories being blown up for not complying with environmental standards, check out part 1, if you want to hear about how Mao taught youth to concur nature as a form of environmental ed, check out part 2, if you want the inside scoop on e-waste in China  part 3 is for you. But if you want to hear Richard Brubaker wax on about corporate responsibility you are in luck. Read onward oh mighty blog reader!

So after lunch, Adam (see e-waste) offered to walk me to my meeting with Richard. As we crossed the street, he just walked into a road filled with buses and cars and bikes all moving in different directions at once. “Adam!” I gasped, as some biologically implanted maternal gene reached out to protect him. “Oh, I don’t look both ways, just forward,” he said, and smiled as he and his Taoist-self stepped back into the sea of motion. I would learn that line is the perfect metaphor for how people operate in China. Everyone focuses on getting to their dreams and vision for the future, but there seems to be no time to look back to see what happened.

IMG_1432I turn down the narrow ally to find myself at another coffee shop (apparently you don’t drink tea in China if you hang with the expats), to meet the utterly infamous Richard Brubaker. His blog says all roads lead to China. I say all roads on the track to sustainability lead to Richard. For a profile on his charitable works, check out the post I wrote for WhatGives about HandsOn China.

While I chugged my coffee and tried to pretend that jetlag is just a figment of my imagination, Richard rambled about a ridiculous amount of topics. I’ll highlight a few of the moments worth repeating.

Richard’s been in China for 8.5 years (64 dog years), a term everyone uses to clock their time in China. Apparently the pace of life in China ages you at a different rate.

Like many who came to China, Richard first arrived to seek out career opportunities as China’s economy gathered steam.  In pursuing those goals he developed market entry and distribution strategies for firms who were also looking for China-based opportunities.

I knew I liked Richard when he told me the reason he liked working in China is because you have the ability to get shit done. Then he turned around and starting giving me a hard time for owning an iPhone. “The screens from those things only put 100 people in the hospital, maybe more.” Next thing you know we’re heading down the Foxconn path. (Foxconn’s been in the news since that morning the 11th attempted suicide of workers was announced. The company employs a small army of employees, over 300,000 in its Shenzhen factory alone.)

But then Richard told me something that challenged my entire American activisty way of thinking. “Their supply chain is rotten~ Apple outsources their entire production of iPhones, iPads, iTouch, and other gadgets to Foxconn, so they don’t own it. “It” being the production of the products… the labor hiring, processes, supplier selection .. the fundamentals of the supply chain.

So Apple ultimately doesn’t have control. Foxconn can source and manage all key suppliers~ part of the Taiwanese. HP, Dell, Motorrollo, Nintendo, Sony all use them to make their products. So if you want to solve the problem, all of Foxconn’s buyers need to organize together.  So in other words…I can’t just put pressure on Apple to do the right thing, we need to put pressure on the supply chain manufacturer to do the right thing, and well, Houston, we have a problem. I suddenly feel powerless over the supply chain and the story about consumer power is quickly slipping into the land of mythology.”

Richard explained that at the commodity level, this has been happening for a while actually, but where it is new is that you now have ODMs who are in control of everything from product design to material selection to manufacturing for multiple brands. This has lead to large ODMs, like Foxconn, who have much more say in the products, and much more power over the customers (Nokia, Apple,  etc).

While Richard talked about his work with HandsOn China and organizing volunteers in migrant schools I got confused. Again, I have to pinch myself a remind myself I’m not in Kansas anymore. Migrants in China are considered people from the far provinces who have moved into the cities. 15 years ago people started being able to move freely for the first time around the country (previous to that one had to obtain permission from the government to move to a new location.) The result has been a massive urban migration, causing one of the major modern crisis of our time in regards to addressing overpopulation in cities.

I finally asked the question everyone wanted me to report back on, Whats the deal with China building 5 new coal plants every week? Richard explained, “They are building new plants every few weeks: super critical plants that are efficient and utilizes the resource at a higher level (so you need less coal for the same amount of energy). What you don’t hear is that for every plant they build, they are dismantling five of their older less efficient plants.”

“Remove the people, great stuff is happening in the creation of systems. So the idea is, how do you create systems?  Our current model is: Extract, package, and trash resources.” We are working on changing that: a great success story is that the high speed rail is actually competing with the airlines.”

And then Richard dropped right back into the topic that we were discussing earlier with the Greennovate team. The kicker is that China is both part of the problem and the solution, they are the Petri dish for experimentation. China is just trying to catch up with America’s consumer model. Its not realistic to expect things to stay the same, and you can’t tell people to stop consuming, or to purchase single family homes. The drive toward economic development is causing a herd mentality, everyone is out to get theirs.

So when we talk about trying to persuade people to make sustainable choices with their new earned money, Its not about polar bears: its about clean air, clean water, clean food. The western perspective doesn’t translate: its not carbon dioxide. If they wanted to cut carbon footprint: they would stop exporting given that  40-60% of the carbon pollution is created from factories.

Okkkk….haven’t gotten your fill on information about the supply chain? Well you are in luck…because check out Day 4 Part 5: an interview with GIGA who is greening materials.

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Send your e-waste to China. No really, it might be good for the planet. (Sustainable Shanghai Day 4 part 3)

Posted on July 12, 2010 by Leah

E-waste is one of those issues that makes me cringe from the inside out. I want that pretty new thing, and I don’t want to deal with the guilt associated with knowing that people are suffering from illnesses associated with deconstructing them after I throw them away. So I figured when in China, apply the Joanna Macy method of dealing with things we want to avoid, and look at the issue straight on. I had seen Laura Ling’s piece about Guiyu:

While I didn’t have time to make a visit for myself, I did the next best thing, and met up with Adam Minter at a local coffee shop. Adam went to China seven years ago, in part to report on what was happening in the Chinese recycling industry which, even then, was the number one importer of America’s recyclable wastes. Only thing, that was 7 years ago and he is still there, meeting with factory owners, visiting e-waste deconstruction camps and writing all about it on his blog www.shanghaiscrap.com.

A quick history lesson:… The global trade in e-waste started as far back as the 1970s, when the first wave of computers and other electronic appliances began to be retired in the developed world. Taiwan was a major destination for this material in the 1970s and 1980s, until an emerging environmental movement began to demand it be cleaned up. In the mid-1980s, several Taiwanese entrepreneurs set up e-waste recycling facilities in newly opened South China, nearby the country’s emerging electronics manufacturing facilities. The plants were dirty and dangerous, but they provided cheap raw materials to the emerging manufacturing sector. In the 80’s: China opened up to allow scrap to come in. The Basel Treaty IMG_1426prohibits transboundry shipment to other countries. Thanks to journalists around the world, we are aware of the e-waste saga.

But what if it makes common sense to send our e-waste to China? What if we examined a different story, one that’s not about avoiding dealing with our own trash, but rather being practical about returning the contents to it’s original source in the supply chain?

Leah Lamb: Can you explain how recycling works in China?
Adam Minter: There are roughly 10 million scrap peddlers in China running a quasi public/private business. Everything goes into the trash, since it gets sorted in the building or by recyclers in the neighborhood. Done with your electronics? Call the door man and he will have a scrap peddler at your door in minutes to bargain the worth of your TV and weigh your cardboard. The items are then packaged and sent to Jiangsu provence. Recycling is not a green business and has nothing to do with the environment. It’s a commodity business. For example, lets talk about plastics. Where it ends up depends on it’s grade. It’s good for plastics to return to China because there the supply chain in China needs plastic. Auto tail plastic lights return to China because they make it here and are expensive to produce. On the flip side, a water bottle is manufactured in the US, and so it is flaked and melted in the US.

LL: Activist organizations are saying we shouldn’t be sending e-waste to China~ what’s your take?
AM: “Well, the global environmental community continues to promote the notion that third world e-waste processing plants are the result of first world exports of waste. But that’s preposterous: China is the world’s second largest PC market. Where do all of those computers go? India is one of the world’s fastest growing e-waste markets. Where do all of those computers used in call centers go? Talk to BAN or other organizations working on these issues, and they downplay the issue, claiming that their “sources” indicate that foreign exports of e-waste are at record levels. But this tests credibility: all other grades of scrap recyclable exports have declined over the last two years due to the global economic crisis. So how is it that e-waste has increased?

The environmental community would do well to wake up to that fact. The willfully ignorant belief on the part of some in the activist community that China is incapable of generating its own e-waste and environmental problems smacks of willful ignorance, a political agenda, and a colonial mentality. I have no patience for it.”

LL: China wants US waste, and it makes sense for it to come here because the supply chain is here.

AM: China needs raw materials, and the labor is cheap enough to get people to do the work. A classic example of this is the air conditioner: the first thing you need to do to recycle it is pull out the compressor. But no one in the US or Europe will do that.
It is a complicated process to dismantle motors and the steel mill’s can’t handle contamination. Our copper factories benefit from an e-waste exchange: those electric motors are given away at 35 cents a pound and sent at the rate of a 20 ton shipping container. They are purchased in China for a huge profit and then farmers are paid minimally to dismantle them. As we speak, in Taizhou, there is a factory the size of 6 soccer fields buildings filled with motors. Meanwhile, US’a method of recycling computers is to shred them.”

LL: What’s your take on Laura Ling’s coverage of ewaste?
AM: For the record: Even if the United States ceased to exist tomorrow, China would remain the world’s largest e-waste recycler for years to come. This is based on a number of factors:

1. China is the world’s second largest PC and consumer electronics market and, by extension, the world’s second largest generator of e-waste. That e-waste remains in China; it is not exported.

2. Guiyu continues to exist not because of local corruption, but because China lacks environmentally sound e-waste recycling options AND officials in Beijing have made the conscious decision to allow Guiyu to continue operating until something better is developed and implemented. That “something” is currently in the works, but it’s going to take time.

3. The reason that e-waste stays in China and flows into China is 100% market-oriented: China’s PC and electronics manufacturers are the largest consumers of the metals recovered from e-waste. If China didn’t manufacture so much electronic equipment, that e-waste would flow/go elsewhere. The biggest spur to developing better e-waste recycling facilities is as much a matter of engineering better metal recoveries as it is environmental.

So it begs to question, does it make sense to send our e-waste to China? The supply chain is there, labor costs are affordable (aka cheap) and people there are willing and have the skills to dismantle what most people in developing nations refuse to handle. Either way, at the end of the day, garbage is messy.

You can follow Adam on via his blog, www.shanghaiscrap.com, or on Twitter.

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