What About Beauty?

My group’s trip to Cochiti Dam left me thinking about beauty. Yes, the reservoir of water is beautiful, but the dam itself is so damn ugly. Gray concrete. A “beach” of gray gravel. No color, no trees, no fun.

I couldn’t help but think about beauty—and the lack of it—and my thoughts led me to the Presa de la Olla. The Presa de la Olla is a gorgeous dam built in the town of Guanajuato, a colonial gem in the highlands of central Mexico, my home for a year.

The dam was built in the 1740s, a time when construction was both functional and beautiful. Today, the reservoir is bordered by a lush green park—a favorite spot for locals and tourists alike. Visitors can participate in a variety of activities there—paddleboating and canoeing; running, walking, and cycling; bird- and wildlife-watching. And every year, hundreds of visitors flock to the dam for the annual Dia de la Apertura de la Presa. A public holiday, the Dia de la Apertura (or “Day of the Opening of the Floodgates”) has its origins in the 18th century, when people gathered to clean the dam. Nowadays, the holiday is purely festive: the park is filled with food stands, a state band plays traditional songs, and people eat, drink, and dance until well past nightfall.

Granted, this is a tradition dating from the 18th century—it seems unlikely that we could expect anything close to this in 21st-century New Mexico. But still, what happened to beauty? And fun? When my group visited Cochiti Dam, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer official there told us the dam was built for purely functional reasons—that the dam could also be used for recreation was an “afterthought.” Function first, fun much, much later.

And how fun is Cochiti? It’s a blast, as long as you like lying on a bed of gravel on a shadeless concrete beach, burning away under the desert sun. It’s a blast, as long as you own a boat and a truck to tow it with. It’s a blast, as long as you bring all your own food and chairs and tables for that comfy picnic on concrete.

Why is it that the fun in “functional” occurred to them as an afterthought? Humans are animals: we congregate around water. Always have, always will. We like to do things on or near the water: we fish in the water, we ride boats on the water, we swim in the water, we have picnics by the water, we lay in the sun by the water. We are water-seeking, water-loving creatures. Would it be so difficult, so economically unfeasible, to build a few picnic tables and benches? A food stand, maybe? Even a boat rental place? Would it be so outrageous to plan for a little fun?

And would it be so outrageous to plan for a little beauty? Is monochrome gray rock the one and only option? What about those gorgeous earth tones that make New Mexico one of the most beautiful places on the planet? What about beauty? Does it matter anymore?

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For pictures of the Presa de la Olla and the Dia de la Apertura, see:
http://www.travelbymexico.com/guanajuato/atractivos/index.php?nom=kguaaperturapresa

David Suzuki, Fig Leafer

Re-Creating the Flood

Re-Creating the Flood

Every year the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge is home to the Festival of the Cranes. This week-long celebration honors the thousands of sandhill cranes that migrate there winter after winter, using it as their fairweather resting grounds.

A crucial spot along a major migratory flyway, the area has provided refuge to tens of thousands of birds—including sandhill cranes, Canada geese, snowgeese, and ducks—for millennia. The mighty Rio Grande flooded the arid plains year after year, creating the perfect marshy haven for these migratory birds.

And then, the river was dammed. The damming of the Rio Grande stopped the natural flooding of the river, altering forever, it seemed, the land these birds depended on for their livelihood. Until, in 1939, as part of President Roosevelt’s efforts to create a national wildlife refuge system, Bosque del Apache was founded. Its purpose: to provide habitat for wildlife.

Many first-time visitors assume that the Bosque del Apache refuge is a completely natural system; in fact, it is a completely man-made construct. Every aspect of the refuge is engineered and managed. Men, not God, control where and when the water flows, when the fields are flooded and drained, even where the birds fly, by controlling the amount and location of crops planted on the refuge.

In a sense, man is playing God: God creates the flood; man destroys the flood; man re-creates the flood. A risky game? Certainly an expensive one: each year millions are spent on re-creating what once was: a fertile floodplain, a warm winter home, a watery heaven/haven on this dry earth.

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To find out more about the history of the Refuge, watch this short video produced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBVVllM2ofA

Progressive energy use reduction in use now!

Using our competitive spirit to encourage energy efficiency:
http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/12/03/opower.energy/index.html?hpt=C2

Response to Christine's "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" Question #4

Time's special report on the 50 Best Inventions of 2010 came out a couple of weeks ago. The full list can be found here:

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/0,28757,2029497,00.html

I was especially amused and inspired by two of the advancements in the field of clothing.

The first is a textile made from the bacteria usually used to turn green tea into the delicious and addictive fermented beverage kombucha. According to Time, Suzanne Lee, a researcher at London's Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, discovered that when the bacteria digests sugar, they "produce a mat of cellulose, which Lee figured out how to harvest and dry. The resulting fabric, which has a vaguely skinlike texture, can be molded and sewn into shirts and coats. It's not perfect yet; if it gets wet, it absorbs up to 98% of its weight and "gets heavy and gooey."

Pictured is a Members Only-esque jacket stitched from this "BioCouture" fabric.

The second invention is this plastic-fur coat:

As the article says, "Most of us toss those annoying plastic price-tag fasteners without a second thought, but Maison Martin Margiela Artisanal's coat gives 29,000 of them a new life. The French avant-garde fashion house — known for transforming shoelaces, combs and wigs into couture dresses — spent 42 hours embroidering the fasteners in a herringbone pattern on a leather coat, turning the disposable into a fashion statement: fake fake fur. "It's a message about sustainability, but done with humor," says Matilda McQuaid, a curator at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, 'saying we should look at reusing our resources. We need to stop and think about what we immediately discard.' "

In case you're curious, here is a sampling of some of Maison Martin Margiela Artisanal's other designs.

The Shoelace Dress

The Comb Tunic

...and my favorite, The Tinsel Dress

Here's my leapfrog pitch:

MEMORANDIUM

DATE: Right NOW!

TO: All of the Fashion Forward Men and Women Out There Who Also Happen to Love the Planet

FROM: A Concerned Constituant

SUBJECT: Do you care what you wear?

Question: Where does polyester, acrylic, acetate, nylon, spandex, rayon, and latex all come from?

Answer: OIL! Unless you were interested in self-immolation, wouldn't drive to the gas station and drench yourself. Why then would you cover your head, torso, arms, and legs with a fiber produced from petroleum, an non-renewable resource?

Question: How green are your blue jeans?

Answer: Consider this: About 1,500 gallons of water are required to produce the 1.5 pounds of cotton used to make a single pair of jeans. If you're like most Americans, you have eight pairs of jeans in your closet. That's 12,000 gallons of water if you buy your jeans new. Additionally, the polluting doesn't stop there. http://www.onearth.org/article/how-green-are-your-jeans

Solution #1:

THRIFT!

or "borrow" clothes from your friends!

Solution #2:

Sustainable Fabrics like organically produced cotton, hemp, soy, bamboo, and linen.

or better yet!

Untraditional Fabrics! Lady Gaga is doing it! Why not you? Instead of throwing that plastic bag away, use it as a bathing suit. Collect all of the lint from your dryer to weave into a cozy winter hat and scarf. Why eat your food when you can wear it?

What a hunk!

This is what all the women in Paris were wearing this fall!

Response to Christine's Questions

Question 2: As I read Hot, Flat, and Crowded I feel a sense of data suffocation: there are literally too many facts, authorities, statistics, anecdotes, and connections for me to process. How does this method of data-dumping and information-overload help and/or hurt Friedman's ethos? Provide an example from the book to support your argument.

Response: Reading this text was much like a rollercoaster ride with climactic rises, dips, turns, dizzying drops and a deep breath of relief at the end. Following the text a read of the acknowledgements gives a strong indication of the means by which Friedman was able to present so much information in such a compact volume. It seems that this is a book meant to be consumed in small doses, the information reflected upon, before the reader goes back for more.

Until I heard Dr. Coffey, I did not share Friedman's final optimism, with the thinking that, in light of the data presented, the future would probably be very dark, if there would be a future at all. I had gravitated toward the pessimism of Mike Davis (Ecology of Fear), whom Friedman cites, and Alan Weisman (The World Without Us). However, Dr. Coffey, while acknowledging the climatological difficulties we face, presented solid evidence that we have the potential for continuation in a sustainable manner, countering the pessimism in favor of mild optimism.


Question 4: Based on Dr. Coffey's talk and Friedman's scary statistics on global warming . . . I am pretty certain that we are doomed. but, I was given some hope by two things: Dr. Coffey's faith in our ability to "leapfrog" with new technology and cleaner alternatives and the suggestion that scientists and the media have "interfaces" that can mediate information and make for a better informed public. . . . .

Response: A letter to Donella Meadows, whose eulogy is printed at the end of the text (411-412):

Dear Dr. Meadows,

For years I read your columns in Catalyst, alternating between hope and despair at what humans, particularly in the developed portions of the world, had accomplished in despoiling the earth, especially in developing nations and some sections of the US, in the name of progress and economic gain.

In the early 1990s, the monthly published "If the World were 100 People," which put the global village in perspective. You indicated that we all are neighbors and must acknowledge that fact and behave accordingly. The village is comprised of a population where some have much and others virtually nothing. We are diverse, and yet have so much in common. If we are to continue the village, we must take care of each other and make sure all have what we need to survive and thrive, including clean, safe water.

You later updated the message in your "State of the Village Report," expanding the village to 1000 people, showing a declining woodland, growing wasteland, increasing pollution from human actions and the perils of nuclear weaponry and waste. The message took on great urgency, but left room for mitigation, if and only if, we of the village would heed the wisdom of the responsiblity of caring sustainably for each other and for the village.

After depending on your wisdom for the years your column ran, I still mourn your passing.

In pacem,
Linda


Reference:

http://catalystmagazine.net/
http://www.100people.org/
http://www.sustainer.org/

Response to Christine's Question #4

4. I want you to position yourself as an interface delivering a message on an environmental “leapfrog” (real or pretend). Here is the scenario: you are a reporter of some type (newspaper, online blog, weather girl/boy, etc) who has a short amount of time to present the leapfrog and provide just a few interesting facts on it. You need to consider who your audience is, what your ultimate message is, and how to make the biggest impact in this short amount of time.

Make a video, write a new brief, or maybe write up a dialogue. The options are endless.

(Based on the technology mentioned in this article: “Sun and sand breed Sahara solar power” at http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19785-sun-and-sand-breed-sahara-solar-power.html)

Me: Hello, and welcome back to Cathy’s online radio talk show, purveyor of two-minute technology talks since November 2010! Today we have with us Dr. Hideomi Koinuma of the Sahara Solar Breeder Project, a collaboration between universities in Japan and Algeria. This project aims to build a series of self-perpetuating solar plants in the Sahara Desert, with the hope of building enough solar power stations by 2050 to supply 50 percent of the world’s energy. Dr. Koinuma, will you please tell us more about your project?

Dr. Koinuma: Thank you for inviting me to your show! My group is working on the premise of “breeding” clean energy. Our plan is to build a small number of silicon manufacturing plants along the edge of the Sahara Desert, taking advantage of large amounts of silica in the area. These plants will manufacture solar panels out of sand from the desert. These solar panels will then be set up in solar farms inside the Sahara and used to generate electricity. We’ll then sell the electricity in order to finance the construction of additional silicon manufacturing plants. These plants will produce more solar panels, which will help set up more farms, which will produce more electricity, which will in turn generate more money for more manufacturing plants. The cycle will continue until we have enough manufacturing plants and solar farms in the Sahara to supply, hopefully, up to 50 percent of the world’s energy needs!

Me: That sounds great, Dr. Koinuma! If this idea really takes off, there won’t be any need to build dirty coal-fired plants in Africa—all the continent’s burgeoning energy needs can be met using renewable solar energy, without taking up agricultural land or requiring expensive imported equipment. Let’s hope this enables Africa to “leap-frog” into energy plenitude without requiring destructive mining or polluting power plants in order to get there!