I am currently observing Earth Hour.
Well, sort of.
I mean, I am using a computer. But I'm sitting in the dark. I haven't touched a light switch for 36 minutes and counting.
I was going to turn on my XBox except then I figured that using a high-wattage LCD screen with it would be even worse than using a PC and thus defeat the whole point of it. From what I gathered in the publicity reports, you're meant to sit for an hour in the darkness in a sort of contemplative silence.
Except seven minutes into Earth Hour, I got wholly sick of sitting in contemplative silence so I trodded downstairs to read bad fanfiction.
Anyway...our house is currently divided, as the upper storey is an Earth Hour zone (my mother is currently making phone calls by the light of a candle) and my father is enjoying his television program on the bottom storey with all the lights on.
My father, who actually drains the washing machine water to recycle precious H20, who demands I recycle frozen food boxes even if they have bits of frozen mozzarella stuck to them, who went out and swapped our showerheads for the Government water-saving ones, and who uses energy-saving globes with the creepy white alien light...has refused to observe Earth Hour.
To be honest, he does his bit for the environment every day by taking short showers, recycling water and such, whilst I am merely participating in a symbolic yet token gesture of global unity, and he's not really big on symbolism.
Except that this isn't just about turning off the lights for an hour. Apparently, it's about committing yourself to reducing 5% of your carbon emissions for the year, and that's certainly not an impossible target.
Post Earth Hour note: My mother said that using the computer during Earth Hour is really not observing Earth Hour- I suppose she has a point, but at least I did think about my own little environmental footprint for 60 minutes, unlike my neighbours- whom were obviously ignoring it, judging by the warm orange glow emanating from their curtained windows...
2 comments:
I was at a friend's 21st, I rocked up at 8pm and noticed the entire room was bathed in silence and candlelight. I was confused, until someone explained that it was Earth Hour and thus stereos and lamps were not permitted. Ahhh.
Seems a bit like the Make Poverty History Campaign to tell you the truth...doesn't do much but makes us feel better. "Raising awareness"...at least until the next campaign.
It was very tokenist, wasn't it.
I was at a friend's house where we walked around in pitched dark, ate cold pie and then went up to the local bridge to 'watch the lights in the city switch off'. All this seemed to achieve was chilled kneecaps and intense frustration at supermarkets with their refrigerators, and cars, all who still had their headlights on. for shame.
We went home again then did all the things we had avoided doing in the hour - warmed up food, saved ankles from some serious bruises and laughed at ourselves.
Extra bogus since I drove my car to her house which is around 1.5ks or a bus away - probably equalising out the carbon we saved anyway. damn.
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