Earth, in an embrace

India has enthusiastically started shopping for factory-produced goods. Till not very long ago, India had largely purchased forest-produced products. Almost every item of necessity was shaped out of nature.

Consider the charpoy or cot, for instance. It was made with bamboo/wood and natural-fibre ropes like coconut or jute. Garden chairs and stools were created with sarkanda/moonj grass. Footmats were made with coir, while sisal grass was turned into rugs and table mats.

The madur kathi reed from Bengal was woven into exquisite feather-light chattai (mat), as was korai grass in Tamil Nadu. The broom came from the flower of the amilso, or Thysanolaena maxima, growing on the hills of Meghalaya. And if you wanted flowers and pictures for decoration or wedding requisites (as the topor or headgear used in Bengal and Orissa), the sholapith reed was at hand to craft it.

The most essential of all belongings, cloth, came from nature too, be it from the cotton shrub or the silkworm. Examples are many, and these reflect sustainable living, wherein renewable natural resources were used to fashion items of daily use without harming the environment.

As a society, we proudly claim to have inched towards the path of industrial development, but along the way, we seem to have forgotten that progress needs to be gentle yet progressive. We have become a society where the market dictates terms to us. Where success is measured by flaunting more, and where big gets bigger.

This is the typical outcome of a consumerist economy. It creates an ecosystem where we begin consuming more than required. Social media, television and advertising blitzkrieg subtly impress upon brand consciousness and give birth to the desire to possess. Facilities like personal loans and EMIs let us make purchases beyond what the wallet allows.

High disposable incomes play their part too. Peer pressure adds itself to the list and we begin living up to a certain image we have formed about ourselves for the eyes of the society. We get sucked into the culture of overconsumption and find it difficult to wriggle out of it. What gets affected by this is the environment around us, but we remain oblivious to that fact.

Realisation on this score has begun creeping in and the discerning citizen is making a conscious effort to change gears. Organic living is the buzzword these days. It’s all about slowing down, pondering over your actions and the effect they will have on the environment. In a way, it’s about going back to how it all began.

Its focus is on undoing the harms and channelising energies to create better surroundings. The thought has caught on and slow living is being appreciated. It’s an urban concept, yes, but it’s begun bringing about a change in the mindset of the rush-hour crowd.
   
Under the weather

What do you think is affecting Planet Earth the most? The warning signals are all around us. The answer is climate change. Global temperature has sharply risen in the past 25 years. If the current trend continues, the earth could be sizzling soon. Natural calamities will be the backlash by a planet under dire stress. The effect of ecological imbalance is visible all around us.

Bengaluru, for instance, is an indicator of the times to come. An army officer hailing from Delhi, who was posted to the city in the mid-70s, never fails in recalling an episode where he needed to buy a fan for an outstation project. He could not get one in Bengaluru as the city had never felt the need for it. He mentions the city being a prize posting in those days on account of its salubrious weather and genteel living. He got a shocker when he visited it after decades, last year. “I had to use an air conditioner the whole day. That’s when the truth about global warming hit me hard,” he says.

There is a social-media message doing the rounds these days, which is meant in jest, but ably captures what changes we should be bringing about in daily living. It says: Dear Sun. It’s 42C outside. Please go to settings>display>brightness and lower your brightness. Please, it’s too hot to handle!

The Sun replies: I have not changed any settings. Please go to your settings and 1) Increase the number of trees, 2) Reduce carbon emissions levels, 3) Reduce concrete jungles, 4) Increase the number of lakes. Basically, switch to human mode.

Pause, play, stop

Slow living is a lifestyle shift of thinking globally but acting locally. It’s about doing what you can at an individual level and influencing the society around you with your actions.

The changes can begin from your home. In case you want to invest in a house, choose a residential project that has an eco-friendly concept and ensures that you can check the boxes for attributes like: harnessing of solar energy, harvesting of rainwater, optimum use of locally available building material, a design that allows natural light into the house and minimises the use of electric heating or cooling.

Your present home may not have the above-mentioned features, but you can still adopt a green way of living. Begin by taking small steps in conserving natural resources like water. At a friend’s house in Kerala, the kitchen drain water is directed towards the garden.

A colleague who lives in a flat doesn’t discard the water used to clean the floor mops, instead uses it to water her potted plants. Indeed, every aspect at home can be rethought with a view to minimise carbon footprints. In interior decor, for instance, natural fibres like cotton, tassar and jute as well as handloom and natural vegetable-dyed textiles can be employed for upholstery and linen.

In the kitchen, don’t get rid of the plastic vegetable basket, but buy a bamboo one the next time the need arises. By opting for local weaves, fabric and handicraft in your daily life, you will also be assisting in the promotion and sustenance of traditional skills.

The four R’s

Should you want to view a remarkable natural lifestyle of a couple in today’s times, tune into At Home with Venetia in Kyoto on NHK World TV. One of the most popular telly shows in Japan, a country very conscious about organic living, it takes you inside the home of Venetia Stanley-Smith, a British lady who has been in Japan for over 40 years. Married to a local, they set up home in the Ohara district of Kyoto a decade-plus back, with the thought of living among nature.

They invest in a century-old house, which is renovated and brought to life in keeping with the true character of eco-friendly construction in the area. Every element in that house and garden blends in with nature. For daily chores, Venetia goes to the extent of making her own chemical-free detergents and using traditional pots & pans and old-fashioned cane baskets. She prefers walking for her purchases rather than taking an automobile. She grows herbs and uses them in her cooking and to make medicines. Influenced by her, many Japanese families have shifted around Ohara to live a more handcrafted life.

Venetia follows the organic living mantra of four R’s: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Replenish. It sounds straightforward, and is actually quite easy to follow. Incidentally, it is a thought not alien to Indians. We have always reused and recycled. So how does one get back to doing this? All you need to do is recall what your mothers and grandmothers did. Simple measures like using a cotton shopping bag for supplies, saying no to plastic packing as far as possible, reusing glass bottles, grinding spices at home, opting for newspaper bags for your provisions, offering surplus carrybags to vegetable vendors, hailing the kabadiwala for disposing of unusable items... can all make a difference.

Consumerism cajoles us into throwing a working product and replacing it with an upgraded version of the same. Next time you’re tempted to do that, ask yourself whether you truly need a replacement. If it has a minor defect, can it be repaired? Even in the developed West, where once items went into the bin in the blink of an eye, people are beginning to realise that continuing with the same is not such a bad idea. Repair Cafe was a concept developed in 2009 in Amsterdam.

It was meant for people to come together and fix mechanical, electronic and other items instead of discarding them. It was felt MNCs were deliberately designing products with a short life span, forcing a consumer to buy new more often. Today, there are over a thousand Repair Cafes the world over as it’s always satisfying to do something yourself. Online videos are a useful resource in this effort.

Managing waste

By opting for such measures, you also make a small contribution towards garbage management, which is an enormous challenge at the national level. Have you heard about the zero-waste woman? She is New York-based Lauren Singer who could put four years of garbage into a small jar. How did she do it? By simply saying no to plastic packaging, changing her eating habits, and going the extra mile to pick and choose products and services that were eco-friendly. By changing her lifestyle, she had “prevented thousands of pounds of trash going to landfill”. She believed “one person can make a difference, it’s just having a desire to do so”.

Urban waste piles raising stink outside our township limits is not an uncommon sight. In order to reduce methane and carbon dioxide emissions generated through the usual waste disposal systems, recycling is what’s required. Compost plants for biodegradable waste have been set up in many cities, but every citizen can help by consciously producing less garbage, just as Singer did.

You can make a small start today itself by beginning with your kitchen waste, which can go into a pit in the backyard, or into a terracotta composter. Over time it will turn into bio-manure, a complete natural nourishment for the soil in your garden or for potted plants.
Sowing & eating right

Food choices are a way of caring for the environment and your health. The spotlight has rightly been turned on organic food. Organic farming emits far fewer greenhouse gases than regular cultivation, so it’s a great initiative to back. However, it’s not enough to merely consume organic food, which includes not just chemical-free vegetables, but also free-range poultry and meat. Attention needs to be paid on sowing it right too. Many indigenous seeds have disappeared as the tendency has shifted to disease-resistant hybrid growing. The need of the hour is to deliberate on preserving native seeds, which are more suitable to our climatic conditions.

Eating the correct way is as important as the food on your plate. The ‘slow food’ concept initially emerged as a reaction to fast food and the fat-carbohydrate it was pumping into our systems. The movement lays emphasis on the traditional way of eating. That effectively means consuming seasonal locally grown food, using more whole cereals and unrefined oils, less packaged foods, and most importantly, sitting down, observing, and having a meal in a relaxed manner.

Why are we being made to think of taking measures in saving environment? It was never the case a few decades back. The reason is simple: we want more but give back less. This doesn’t mean we need to live a minimalist life, or go out and buy a charpoy, but as consumers we do need to curb overindulgence and encourage initiatives that stop the plundering of our green wealth.

Let’s take a look at Japan’s lifestyle initiative once more. It’s called Shinrin-yoku or forest bathing. It means healing yourself by being washed by the atmosphere of the forest and its silence. The therapy was developed in Japan decades back and has become an important aspect of healthcare in the country. Slow living is all about this: incorporating nature into your lives. What are you waiting for? The planet needs an embrace from you.