Are you Environment Friendly..

Few days back I watching news on some Indian channel and how one can become environment friendly.

Somebody had sponsored the event to create awareness amongst common people to go green. The reporter was standing outside a shopping mall and asking questions to a group of young ladies the ways to become environment friendly. Most of them, being interviewed by TV channel, were all smile to answer the question. "I will not use plastic bags as they are not bio-degradable and chokes the sewers. blah blah... and so I will use paper bags".

I was so amused by this environment awareness. I thought it was a cheap publicity by some to go "Green", and to make a fashion statement. Some stupid people do not understand the consequences of using paper bags! Do not they realise that it would mean cutting more trees? In India, the concept of recycling is still in nascent stage. So more paper means, losing more green areas. What hypocrisy ! I felt like clipping the lady who was answering the question and her friends who were all smile and no brains and in complete harmony with their friend's answer.

I remembered my younger days. I used to love to go to the market with my Dad on cycle. Before we could leave the house, my dad always asked for the reusable shopping bag. It used to be a default question before leaving to market. But gone are the days. How many people now really cares about carrying a re-usable bag? I am sure most of us understand the importance of being "Green" but we are just so lethargic to do anything about it. We simply fail to make any effort towards it because it may cause us little inconvenience.

I am in UK for more than 3 and half years and that means visiting the superstores for groceries and other household stuffs. For more than first 3 years of stay, I never carried any bags with me to the store as I knew that the superstores provide the plastic bags. So just imagine, millions of people visiting the superstore and others and coming home with many million plastic bags. The checkout points were simply putting everything in the plastic bags without any question.
But I do find that things are changing and rapidly in my part of world. The checkout points are keeping the plastic bags away from the eye of customer and the first question at checkout is "Would you take a re-usable bag?". Some stores have started giving away extra points, "green points", to its customer (the store points gathered on amount spent in the store and are redeemable) And its having a positive impact. More and more people have started using the re-usable bags. Its a good feeling and now its becoming a fashion here to use multi-use bags and to say to the checkout points "no thanks, I have a bag" or sometime get an appreciation that you are carrying a multi-use bags.

I carry these multi-use bags but not to make any statement but I am doing my little bit to preserve my Planet Earth. I loved one of the ads on Indian TV ".......we have inherited the planet from our children".

PS:- When did you last planted a tree and helped it to grow big?