California IX - Plastics in the oceans

By coincidence, Laku showed me yesterday this interesting video. It is honestly quite alarming, so are we turning eco? :)

California VIII - Food Wasting

Today I would like to give a short thought to this general IN-trend of saving, saving energy, saving sources, saving our planet. Everybody today who doesn't want to be considered a moron and a reactionary declares how she/he back-ups recycling and saving the environment and as I have Americans right now all around myself I have to be prepared to listen to a half hour speech (they call it dialog) about how they, meaning their family, live modestly and effectively and save every resource that enters there household. Water, gas, paper, tin cans, energies etc.

But then, I went to a Valentine's party at David's local pre-school. The kids were treated with ice cream with all sorts of toppings, as chocolate spread, sugar sprinkles, whipped cream, caramel sauce and cut fresh fruit. They were offered by helping parents all these goodies and they were given what they asked for. But after a while when they started to be distracted by other kids playing around or just to be filled up, they started to throw their left-overs away in a huge nearby standing garbage bin. Full plates of a very good (most likely organic) ice cream were disposed into a big black rubbish bag. No one was surprised neither trying to stop them, not even me, I just made sure that David finished his portion of his treat. They practice it at school in a similar way everyday at snack time, kids help themselves with cereals, milk, cheese, crackers, fruit or whatever they have and when they feel they want to stop they take the paper plates with rest of the food to the bin. So you can see a boy carrying a bowl filled to the rim with milk and cheerios, splattering the stuff all over the floor, heading to the bin.

I am sure that without this basic private forehanded custom these kids won't be able to save more important resources in future and act considerately to the environment. And it throws a significant shadow for me on their parents' proclamations about their responsible recycling family policy. I've just read that Americans (each and everyone) in average throw away 0.5kg of food a day which sounds surreal to me. And that more arrogant around the world are only British (hence the flourishing foxes in cities) and Japanese. On the other end of the scale, the most progressive within the Euro-American civilization are Swedish who are far far ahead in trying to handle there energy consumption vs. environment conflict in a reasonable and honorable manner. Not that I am an environmentalist fanatic or an alternative no carbon person, I just try to be as effective and moderate as possible and do have, probably because of my Central European past, my limits still little lower and, in the end it saves our family money a bit, too.

California VII - Dejduv babylon

Tak jsme v posledni dobe s Laku sklouzli do categorie 'hey, guys'. Dejda prejima stale vic a vic anglickych slov a tak misto tradicniho 'mili rodicove', jsme jen guys, 'hey guys, co takhle si zahrat nejakou hru'. Do bezne mluvy se mu vyrazy ze skolky dostavaji cim dal casteji a tak zacinam mit pocit, ze je to trochu boj s vetrnymi mlyny, nutit ho mluvit cesky. Nastesti uz je dost stary, ze si uvedomuje, ze mluvi dvema jazyky, a kdyz se soustredi, tak je schopen drzet se jednoho nebo druheho jazyka, coz se ted snazim prosadit. Bud jednim nebo druhym, nemixovat prosim. Bohuzel v ani jednom jazyce nema slovni zasobu jako v obou dohromady. Takze kamaradovi na navsteve rikal: 'Now you can't see my kolenas' a doma nam vypravi nejake bojove situace asi v tomhle stylu: 'Pak prijel tenhle ship a udelal velkou shotku a tohle auto takhle flipped.' Smutne, ja vim, ale ocekavatelne a snad s postupem casu i zvladatelne. Nicmene to stejne zachranim jen pro nej, dalsi generace tady v tomhle prostredi uz nema sanci. Nejvetsi moje ostuda je, ze v cestine neni stale schopen dopocitat ani do deseti, v anglictine pocita uz skoro do stovky, obcas se mu sice plete poradi, ale zna ta slova aspon. Do toho je ve skolce uci pocitat i spanelsky a taky dny v tydnu atp, protoze jednak spousta deti je z hispanskych rodin a jednak je to tu oficialni jazyk, ktery budou mit i pozdeji ve skole. Takze se mi zda, ze tuhle bitvu zvolna prohravame a kdyz zustaneme delsi dobu, vlastnejsi mu asi bude anglictina. A to mluvime doma vsichni cesky a cteme ceske knizky, tak 1:1 s anglickymi, a sleduje ceske pohadky, ale stejne kamaradi a skola jsou holt dulezitejsi.