guilt

let's look at the toll on the environment taken by my being in Denmark.

First we have the things I bought exclusively for this trip. This includes cliff bars (plastic wrappers = won't biodegrade for a long long time), little travel bags (who knows what they're made of), a passport and case (plastic in there), a pack (although I wanted one of these anyway), a water bladder (a ton of freakin plastic, and no real alternative), umbrella (plastic handle), raincoat ( i love it so much though, and it was quite necessary, and people keep trying to give me plastic bag ponchos so at least i can avoid those), a computer case, a nightgown (non fair trade. well, nothing so far was i don't think :( ), a sleeping bag (although that was also something i wanted for backpacking anyway), hostel sheets (yeah cloth packaging!), a travel book, new portable speakers bc mine were blown (fucking all plastic), a bajillion art supplies that they required us to bring (SO MUCH PLASTIC. SO MUCH.), i bought a bike before coming here from a summer student (at least it's second hand), a pair of shoes (luckily mostly recycled rubber, all vegan, etc, so that's good but still, they had to be made), american apparel scarf and socks (fair trade! woot! but had to be shipped from CA)...

now let's look at what i've bought here that would have been different had i been in the US- nuts in bags for snacks while traveling since i knew (and was right) that they wouldn't really know what to do with a vegan (I CAN'T FIND BULK FOODS HERE. THAT IS NOT DONE IN DENMARK APPARENTLY. HOW DOES ONE GET NUTS?!), rice and lentils in bags because i just needed some backup stuff like that (bought right when i got here before i learned food names--i had to get what i recognized), bread in bags (i can't find the ingredients to make it myself :( nor do i really have the room in the kitchen to do it), some earrings, 2 of the 3 of which were fair trade (woot!), envelopes wrapped in plastic to send letters to the US, stamps (goddess knows what's in there), various other food items in plastic (although i really try, i do the best i can), plastic ties to fix the basket on my bike, postcards (all separate, no wrappers -woot!), detergent (omg i love this brand, cardboard box and even the scoop is cardboard! it's called ecover), dish soap (plastic bottle ughh!), yarn (unfortunately not animal free. but at least it's norweigan, not australian--australia is known for the bad animal treatment. hopefully norway's better), lots of chocolate (i'm learning and memorizing which brands have stupid sneaky plastic wrappers on the inside), VEGAN NUTELLA IN A GLASS JAR (but with a plastic lid, but still, how amazing is that), almost every day i buy soya milk in tiny cartons, but they have plastic straws (plus, it might be aspetic packaging carton--might have a layer of plastic)...
ALL OF THESE WOULD BE DIFFERENT IN THE U.S. BECAUSE I KNOW WHERE TO FIND THE THINGS THAT DON'T COME IN PLASTIC. I'D BUY BULK FOODS AT WEGS, IN MY CLOTH NAPKINS, AND I'D HAVE A SINK WHERE I COULD JUST USE BRONNERS TO WASH EVERYTHING. VEGAN NUTELLA WOULD NOT EVEN BE AN OPTION. et cetera.

not to mention of course: the car ride from my home to baltimore, the plane ride from baltimore to iceland, the plane ride from iceland to copenhagen, the bus from the airport to the orientation, the taxi from orientation to home (NONE OF WHICH ARE EVEN HYBRIDS OR ELECTRIC ANYTHING. JUST PLAIN BAD), the ferry ride this past weekend, the buses every single time we take a field trip..
and now that you think about that, let's consider a world in which people didn't travel at the drop of a hat like they do now. such things as DIS (my program) wouldn't exist. that means no 24-hour computer labs sucking electricity. no enormous amounts of time spent with buses idling, waiting for students. maybe -gasp- no airplanes! no airports! no airport shit food!

now think about all those things i named. every single one was produced, somewhere, (usually not around here). it was in a factory, a factory which emitted all kinds of shit into the atmosphere, and still does, continuously. it may have been made by child slaves or people barely being paid (although hopefully not, i didn't buy almost any clothes, just one nightgown and one shirt). then it was probably packaged in some way, and transported to wherever i got it from. that means trucks and ships and airplanes just FULL of this stuff, burning oil, getting it to me.

now. is it worth it? that's the question. giving my at least small understanding of this toll on the environment, why did i choose to do it? well, i understand that sometimes we make sacrifices for our education (although it's not really ME making the sacrifice, is it? besides the guilt, it's the world that is suffering, not me.) and i am trying to learn a lot that will help me get into grad school and get a job where i can HELP the environment. (landscape architecture.) so it's like, if i do things like this that help me look like a better student, i can get a better job and have more power to make decisions about the environment.
speaking of which, do you know, reader, what my goal is now? i want to specialize in environmental consulting. that means, i actually get to go the woods you want to build in and say, "no. you can only build this five feet over here, but don't touch these woods. they're too important." i think that if i could get that job, i could do a LOT of good.
so that's why i'm doing this. that's why i bought ALL that freakin plastic even though i know it will all end up in a landfill and take thousands of years to biodegrade. because i think i can do more to counteract that later in life if i do this now.
take it or leave it. am i just making excuses? maybe.
that's all.

edit: at least denmark has a lot of windmills. on that subject, there's this.