CONTENTS

• Quote of the Month – Chosen by Maggie Young, Mercy HS, Burlingame
• Three Photographs - By Jeff Martin
• Question of the Month – By EarthTeam’s Youth Coalition
• Bay Area High School Students Clean Up the Berkeley Marina - By EarthTeam’s Youth Coalition
• And We Thought WE Had It Bad . . . a Glimpse of Ghana - By Natalie Nava, Monte Vista HS, Danville
• Life as a Ladybug - By Rebecca Smith, California HS, San Ramon
• Nature and Thoreau - By Ailene Brukman, El Camino Real HS,     Woodland Hills, CA
• August's - Website poll Question
• Rant's and Raves
• Join Now
• The Green Team
• Previous Issues

Mission Statement: Our mission is to strengthen and unify the young environmental community in the Bay Area by sharing interests, information, and calls to action. We seek to inspire participation in projects and events between groups, strengthen journalistic skills, and foster career exploration.

September2004
Issue 20

Quote of the Month

“Let us ... permit nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs than we.”  - Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592)

Chosen by Maggie Young, the Green Team, Mercy HS, Burlingame

"Path, Black Diamond Mines" by Jeff Martin
(Click Photo to view Larger image)

Question of the Month - Asked at the August 15 EarthTeam Youth Coalition Meeting.

How can you motivate your school/community to be more environmentally conscious?

“School gardens can build awareness and are aesthetically pleasing.”,
Ben Lerch, Washington HS

“They could supply recycling bins.”
Elisa Sconza, Oakland School for the Arts

“Create a personal connection.”
Josh Mettzer, Jewish Community HS

Bay Area High School Students Cleanup the Berkeley Marina

By students of the Youth Coalition

Sunday, August 15th, high school students joined together to clean up an especially dirty section of shoreline at the Berkeley Marina. The trash in this section of rocky shoreline came from both onshore and offshore sources. Some of it washed in from the bay and became trapped in the nooks and crannies of the rocks and seaweed. People hanging out along the shoreline had discarded some of it.

The students removed approximately 15 bags of trash and 5 bags of recycling from the shoreline, with only an hour and a half of effort. The main types of objects that we removed from the shoreline included glass bottles, plastic bottles, ropes, fishing line, food wrappers, and pieces of Styrofoam and plastic.

Fish, birds, and marine mammals can easily become trapped in ropes and fishing line, and they accidentally eat pieces of Styrofoam and plastic that look like other types of natural foods they eat. The funkiest stuff students found were shoes (matching and unmatching), a leopard print outfit, a magic wand, and a few bras. Unfortunately, we could not persuade anyone to model this saltwater-and-seaweed-soaked outfit. Maybe next time.…

Many thanks again to the students who cleaned up the shoreline, thereby improving habitat for some of the one thousand creatures that live in the San Francisco Bay!

And We Thought WE Had It Bad . . . a Glimpse of Ghana

Back in Spring 2004, EarthTeam was asking around for people who might be interested in doing something with an environmental group in Ghana, Africa.  Although I knew nothing about the project whatsoever, I was intrigued and decided to get some more information. 

I contacted a woman from the EPA who gave me all the information on this project. Lynda Deschambault was vacationing in Africa when her bus broke down and she found herself talking with a local man named Nana about the cleanup group he organized around his village.  Lynda suddenly had an image: Ghanaians could learn from students back in the States about proper ways to care for their environment.

Lynda showed me dozens of pictures from her trip, which were truly amazing; the people seemed so friendly and the culture so rich.  Unfortunately, as is true for many third-world countries, these impoverished people do not have the technology or the knowledge we do about pro-environmental behavior; they are struggling just to survive. I saw picture after picture of gorgeous beaches packed with trash.

With what little they have, many Ghanaians like Nana do care about living in a clean place and are willing to devote their time to their village; his group gets together every week after church to clean up trash. These people, living on $10 a month, definitely express the willpower, but just need some information and a little money to fuel their projects.

If others of you are interested in undertaking this project with me, simply by organizing information to send to this group and possibly raising some money for them, please contact me: Natalie Nava nnava2@pacbell.net

I think this would be a great project for Earth Team to get involved in.

"Steelhead" by Jeff Martin
(Click Photo to view Larger image)

By Rebecca Smith, California HS, San Ramon

Have you ever seen a ladybug tree? I have only once, while walking down a little known path in the woods. The cold November air heightened my sense of expectancy and joy at being able to come to where the creatures live, and be a guest in their house. There, in the hollowed-out cavity of a lightning tree, was a community of ladybugs, packed in for winter hibernation. Thousands of brilliant, carmine-coated shells were layered upon one another, pooling their warmth to withstand the storms of winter. Though a gale may come their way, they will be safe with their fellows throughout the longest night. Content to fly solo when the breezes are fair, they know that they always have a home to come back to when the wind turns colder. In their time of need, their meandering paths find one another, as they settle down to weather out the next storm. For they all know that they are just one small bug against the whole world and they can't do it alone. No one can do it alone, for the home they seek when snow begins to fall is not a physical hollow of a tree, but the companionship of others.

Ladybugs are simple creatures, really, yet they hold their own in the affections of humans because of their simple elegance and innate beauty. A ladybug knows its purpose and its needs, endlessly seeking, endlessly moving from leaf to leaf, driven by the forces of nature that are beyond them, beyond us all. Though they don't know what fate will throw them next, they continue on their journey. The destination is unimportant, for they live only in the moment – concentrating on the need to feed themselves, as well as the need to keep moving on. Though their path may seem aimless, each movement is as deliberate and vital as the next. At the moment, that particular action is the most necessary thing to their existence, the thing most true to the pattern of their lives. Destined to wander, their nonchalance and agreeable, trusting nature endear them to us, for though we are large and unknown, they will stay with us, content to just be crawling on our fingers, unafraid or unaware of potential danger. There is a lesson to be learned from their trusting disregard to future danger, for at the moment, they are alive and well, and that is all that matters to them – being alive and thankful for each moment.

Nature and Thoreau

By Ailene Brukman, El Camino Real HS, Woodland Hills, CA

Nature has many aspects to it and Thoreau enters many of these aspects in the book Walden as the calendar of his life flips pages. But Thoreau cares less about the calendar, what he really pays attention to are the seasons that change before his eyes. This is one full year from springtime to spring time. Springtime is the book’s starting point, which Thoreau explains is when the construction of his cabin begins, or symbolically the construction of nature when many animals mate to make a new world. Even though Thoreau follows the seasons he does follow his society too. On Independence Day he removed from society to his cabin and to live with nature. During summer time Thoreau participated in many activities involving nature like growing bean fields, as any farmer would do at this time. Winter  – Thoreau separates himself from the outside of his cabin, which becomes a symbol of plumbing his own spiritual depth in isolation, staying in his cabin by himself. As springtime comes back, the ice melts and as Thoreau thinks, all sins are forgiven and the cycle starts again. The season is a cycle of ethical and spiritual rebirth made possible by unity with nature and with one self. 

The pond symbolizes spirituality and the withdrawal from society and of course the calm of nature. Thoreau believes that the pond is a metaphor for spiritual belief because he heard rumors saying that the pond is “bottomless”, yet he found out it was only one hundred feet deep. This also led him to think that people need to believe in infinity. Thoreau describes the pond as heaven on earth. “Looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.” The pond not only symbolizes heaven but symbolizes Thoreau as well. This idea can reflect on any human because symbolically if a person looks inside the pond it reflects an image of his or her own self; in other words heaven is within each one of us just as it is inside Thoreau. This is why Thoreau explains in “The Pond” chapter that the pond being on earth is like heaven being on earth for everyone to visit.

Ice is something that evaporates from the earth to the sky, and when it falls down again as snow not all ice gets to its destination. It melts and goes back to the pond, earth. This statement is something that Thoreau tries to explain as an example of humans using the earth and not even bothering it one bit. Nature regenerates itself faster than humans can ever hope to affect. He makes ice into a poetic subject rather than a product, and makes us reflect on the question of the value, both market value and spiritual value, of nature in general.

Thoreau reflects nature on religious matters. In springtime the book begins, which symbolizes the Christian idea of rebirth. During summertime when Thoreau plants his bean fields this event goes back to the biblical phrase from Ecclesiastes, “a time to sow, a time to reap.” Wintertime for Thoreau is most symbolically religious because it is a time for Thoreau to reflect his inner self and learn the “heavens” within him. Spring comes again, which reflects on judgment day when the ice breaks and as Thoreau says, “all sins are forgiven”.

Thoreau the man and nature are two different things that collide in Walden. They do collide yet Thoreau writes about nature resembling him or any human being. Animals, ice, and the pond were all compared to humans in Walden, which shows what Thoreau is trying to prove; the whole cycle that life is.

Nature is humans and humans are nature; therefore, humans should react within nature and not run away from it by going to expensive restaurants or buying clothes or materials that we don’t need. The things we need most are what capitalize humanity – intelligence, being on top of the food chain, being transcendentalists, and experiencing spirituality through nature.

If you are voting this year or could vote would the candidates environmental policy decide your vote and why?

Result: 24 total votes

• 8 (33.3%) Are you kidding, absolutely
• 11 (45.8%) Depends – Other issues are also important
• 5 (20.8%) No

Dear Editor,

While reading the article covering the poll which questioned non vegetarian environmentalists, I was shocked to see that themajority, if not all of the responses, stated that a meat-eating environmentalist is nothing more than a hypocrite. I consider myself to be a pretty active environmentalist, as well as a meat-lover. As I sat down and tried to think of all the people I know whom I would consider to be environmentalists, I realized that the majority of them do eat meat! I think that by telling people they are hypocritical based on one of their actions and overlooking the good they do, is nothing more than discouraging. Becoming a vegetarian is ONE of the many things people can do to help better the world, but if someone was to make a list of all the things environmentalists should be doing, I would have to guess that none of as are fulfilling all the "requirements." So, how I look at is is – do what you can to make a difference, but realize there are ways to save the environment without becoming the "perfect environmentalist," if there even is such a thing!

-Meika Hollender, Burlington, Vermont

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