The fireworks have begun

It's that time of the year when fireworks go up in the sky and people celebrate the dawn of a new year. It's that time of the year when people only exhibit happiness and hope. Happiness about a fresh start, and hope that the new year would bring about goodness.

Alright, let's cut to the chase and focus on some serious issues like grown-ups should do. We have a lot of facts and figures from the last year, and they're mostly grim. We've had some very bad news headlines which have rendered 2019 as a very very bad year.

Here are some headlines with respect to heatwaves:

Here are some headlines with respect to microplastic pollution:

Here are some headlines about the fashion industry:

Also, we've been notoriously careless about food:

By now, you would've got the point that we were one hell of an irresponsible species the last year. We were responsible, knowingly or unkowingly. No. Wait. Not unknowingly. We modern humans don't have the excuse of not knowing what's going on around us.

We're talking about the most advanced species on the planet, with enough technology to colonize Mars, but not cleaning its own backyard. What a shame. Shame on us humans.

Do you understand the gravity of the situation? Yes? Good. No? I have more for you. What I'm talking about is not something like a couple of people dying because they ate plastic without knowing that they weren't aware of it. I'm talking about entire species becoming extinct owing to the microplastic pollution issue. I'm not talking about dirty communities with no waste disposal methods. I'm talking about the entire planet stinking in its own junk. I'm not talking about people fainting because of heatwaves. I'm talking about thousands of people dying because of heatwaves. And those heatwaves are because of climate change. I'm talking about temperatures above 40 degrees celcius becoming the norm everywhere. I'm not talking about some people dying because they ate too much fast food. I'm talking about the entire human race stuffing poison into their bodies and taking medicines to cure the effects of the poison. How stupid is that? I'm not talking about people not getting food because we don't have enough farmers. I'm talking about people dying from hunger because other people choose to eat unsustainably produced food without any consideration, without any consciousness.

Your obsesion with meat is resulting in people dying because the cow you eat daily takes up a lot of the food which other humans should get. Not something a mature human would want to be part of.

Now tell me whether that's fair. Forget fair. Is this even human? Is this even civilized? Is this even something an educated person would do? Some of you may be wondering how meat-eating habit could harm the planet. I shall explain how this works in a future post.

Now, the core of this post- some new year resolutions which I think; No. We must all take them up. We don't have a choice. Comrades, we're looking at the collapse of human civilizations by continuing such unsustainable lifestyle practices. Here they are:

1. Ditch wasteful and disposable products wherever possible and switch to more natural, less wasteful and environment-friendly products which can be used for long periods of time- like bamboo, cardboard, metal, etc. For example, ditch your plastic toothbrush for a bamboo toothbrush. Ditch your tissue paper practice and cary a kerchief or a small napkin whenever you go out.

2. Don't take the car just because you have it. Of course, if you own an EV and get it charged from clean sources of energy, you have the best life! But otherwise, switch over to public transport, use a bicycle, or best- walk wherever you can, whenever you can. It hardly hurts to leave 15 minutes earlier so as to have time to reach nearby places by walk.

3. Choose more organic food. Don't simply buy cheap fruits and vegetables because they're cheap. They are unhealthy and have a large carbon footprint on the planet. They're usually shipped from some corner of the world and that involves a lot of CO2 emissions. Buy local or buy organic. It's worth the extra money. Moreover, it is through buying and supporting such products that we can bring down the costs.

4. Carry your own reusable water bottle. Even if you're going to university from the dorms, carry your water bottle and don't rely on the disposable cups which are kept near the water dispensers. They generate a lot of waste.

5. Switch off electrical devices whenever not in use.

I keep hearing about university students (20 year-olds) who don't switch off the lights in their rooms when they leave, and when I hear their reason, it literally pains within me. They say this, "I am paying for this shit". That is unarguably the most irresponsible, immature, non-sensical, absurd and uncivilized response one can ever give at this age. And there's no excuse for such crime.

I mean, I totally understand that you're fortunate enough to be able to afford all these facilities, but it's not fair that you take them for granted. That's just irresponsible. We must be grateful to what we have. If you can't even take responsibility to do such a small thing, I really doubt if you'll ever be ready for life.

6. Against wasting food. Have the habit of first tasting the food before taking huge portions of it. Don't take food onto the plate and then end up wasting it either because you took a lot of the food, or because it doesn't taste good. Again, I keep hearing about university students ordering food to be delivered to them, but then decide to go out with someone else to have food, and end up wasting one of the meals. Also students take a large portion of food onto their plates but end up wasting at least 10-15% of the food that they take. I've seen people take paneer gravy but waste all of the gravy and just eat the paneer. I mean, why not take just paneer then? I've seen people fill a compartment of their plate with sauce or chutney but waste all of it. Why take if you don't want to have it? The worst of them all? They come to have breakfast at 7:20 when their class starts at 7:30, take up 4 slices of bread, but throw away 3 of them because they don't have time. This is just utter nonsense.

It's not funny that you happily waste food just because you can afford it or because you're paying for the food.

The next time you waste food, remember this- you're committing a crime which is a million times worse than stabbing a pregnant lady in the womb. A billion times worse than murder. A trillion times worse than hunting animals. I don't give a damn about who you are or what you've achieved with your life. I want you to promise yourself that you won't waste food. Don't order 3 large pizzas and end up wasting 4 slices of them.

Take your time to eat the meal, digest it slowly and then order in smaller portions until you're satisfied.

Remember, people don't get meals and water for days. So take the time to appreciate the efort that has gone into preparing the food that you eat. Be grateful to the food that's served on your plate. Respect it.

7. Buying clothes only because they're fancy is totally immature. If you want to buy fancy clothes, make sure that you use them and keep them for at least 3-4 years.

Buying a fancy-looking dress, using it only once a year and buying another one next year is just nonsense, irrespective of who you are and what your job demands.

You may argue that you want to be trendy. But how ignorant should you be to realize that, by following a trend that's set by some corporations which seek profit and don't give a damn about you, you're succumbing to their market strategy. Is that the level of your intellect? Think about it- what you need during summer are just 5 cotton shirts and maybe 3-4 cotton t-shirts along with perhaps 3-4 trousers at the most. Winter? 5 full-sleeve shirts, one sweater or pullover and maybe a hoodie or a jacket. The intermediate seasons can be a mix of summer and winter clothes. But if your wardrobe is stuffed with 15 shirts, 10 t-shirts and a trouser of every colour, firstly you've wasted money on things that don't matter. Secondly you're not confident of exhibiting your vibrance and you rely too much on the clothes that you wear in order to fill a room with your charisma. Why do you want fancy clothes to be the attention-seeking element? Instead, let your character attract all the attention.

8. Use electricity sensibly. This could include the energy you spend on ironing clothes, hair dryers, air conditioners, etc. Simple tricks like buying wrinkle-free clothes or spraying your clothes with water and allowing them to hang through the night could not only save your electricity bills, but also a lot of time that's otherwise wasted doing something which most people don't like doing. I personally love to spend time ironing, but when there are alternatives that could prove equally efficient and time-saving, why stick to the harder route? When you're travelling in your car, try lowering the windows to allow fresh air and some breeze into your car rather than turning on the air conditioner. Try opening your windows whenever possible to allow air and light into your homes rather than relying on artificial lights and air conditioning. Fresh air ventilation does a lot of good to you. Instead of turning on the hair dryer, use a cotton towel and briskly wipe your head after a shower. This age-old method has been followed for thousands of years by people, and has been proven to increase blood flow to your brain, rendering you more fresh and active for the day. Whenever possible, try scheduling meetings outdoors so that you can not just stay fresh throughout the meeting because of fresh breeze, but also avoid wasting electricity inside the rooms for lighting and stuff like that.

There could be more resolutions which you could take up, but these are the ones that struck my head the most. If you've reached this part of the post, I am highly optimistic about you and have incredibly high levels of hope on you. I have good confidence in that you'll achieve at least a few of these above-mentioned practices. I want to leave you with two lines-

Where there's a will, there's a way.

and

Do what you can, where you are, with what you have.