Hey, it is Pille, introducing you to a one of a kind day, World Kindness Day and one of the kindest individuals towards the planet. Everyone understands “kindness” differently. Often it is considered as only something kind you do to others. We need not only be kind to other people but also to the planet and to ourselves! The World Kindness Day was first introduced by the World Kindness Movement in 1998, a coalition of nation’s kindness NGOs. The objective of that day is to promote the acts of kindness and to highlight the importance of being kind. It’s about focusing on positive things. I have met many people who are kind to others, but not many of them are consciously kind to our planet, to The World We Have. I met Anaïs thanks to the ESC voluntary service, and she has inspired me since the beginning. Because of that I decided to make my kindness post about her. We visited the local market together to buy some goodies. I was kind of surprised and happy to see that she had brought her own hand-sewn little fabric bags for fruits and vegetables with her instead of using the plastic bags everyone normally uses at the shops. I bought my vegetable bag in a store in Estonia, but how much better it is to the world, to give some of your old clothes a “new useful life” and sew one!! So much better for the world and reducing our footprint on the Earth. Of course these little bags full of produce fit nicely into a big reusable shopping bag. I had never heard about beeswax wraps before she showed me that she had taken these with her to Lecce. Beeswax wraps are fabric coated with beeswax that are a reusable replacement for plastic cling wrap and/or tin foil. They can be used to cover food, containers, literally anything you want to keep fresh. With proper care and regular usage they normally last for up to a year. You can only wash them with cold water, and after they dry you are good to use them again. To make them you need 100% cotton fabric. By the way, she is planning to organize a workshop on how to make these! I am already so excited to learn how to make them, and help my family and friends become more sustainable and kinder to the planet! I have been using glass straws for some time myself, but I had never thought about taking them with me when I go out. I got the idea from Anaïs to take my glass straws with me when I am planning to have lunch out on the town. Another great example of being kind to the planet is to use second-hand stores rather than fast fashion chains. The amount of water consumption, energy, pollution and textile waste used to produce fast fashion is enormous! Millions of barrels of crude oil have been used just for producing synthetic materials (polyester, nylon, spandex, etc). Also many countries where these clothes are produced don’t pay workers a living wage and the working conditions are terrible. To get an idea of how she got so conscious with sustainability I decided to have a short interview with Anaïs. She discovered a Youtube Channel of an American girl who does videos about zero waste and she has a zero waste store in NYC. Anaïs became aware of this friendly lifestyle, but it took her some time to actually be more sustainable herself. She lived right next to a local market when she did her Erasmus exchange studies in the North of Italy. She realized that she can also live a zero-waste lifestyle. She sewed her own grocery bags to take to that market, instead of using the bags there. She shared the bags with her friends and family as well. Her family has always recycled trash, but they have taken to a more sustainable lifestyle now as well. Since then, she has been spreading the idea but has never forced it on anyone. During her master’s degree she volunteered for a Green Office of Utrecht University where she got more information about sustainability; how to minimize plastic use and cause less waste. Anaïs has done both of her theses on plastic consumption, while doing so she realized over and over again that only 9% of plastic actually gets recycled. So in the grocery stores when it is possible to find the product in glass containers, she always prefers them, because it is far easier to recycle glass and it actually gets recycled. It was shocking for her to see that in the cafes in Lecce, coffee comes with plastic water cups. Hopefully this article inspired you to make better choices and be kind to our planet. And it’s not hard, you can start by simply choosing glass over the plastic, using your own reusable fruit/shopping bags. If you want to know more about how you can be kind to the planet and also to yourself and others, then stay tuned and follow us on our Instagram, because Kindness Day is coming.
5 Comments
Sofie Van Doorne
10/30/2020 05:56:14 pm
I love the way you describe how Anaïs inspires you Pille, but I know for a fact that you are inspiring in many ways to her too. We are a big fan of your writing skills by the way, what a talent!!
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Pille
10/31/2020 11:57:49 am
Thank you very much for your kind words! This means a lot to me!
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Koen
11/1/2020 06:32:47 am
I like the way you described the examples of the extra steps to sustainability. And reading them, I realise they are small and easy ones to apply, but with a big impact. That’s inspirational. Thank you.
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Pille
11/1/2020 11:33:54 am
Thank you for the support! I realized the same thing thanks to Anaïs :) Please let us know of any other small things we can do!
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