It all started on this day

Ghy is the guy who wore the first leaf
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We turned over a new leaf

It was 31^st March 2007, 09h30 local time, in the breakfast room of the Angkor Paradise Hotel, Siem Reap, Cambodia. A Swazi, a Samoan, a Fijian, a Kenyan and a Tanzanian from Zanzibar, sat down for breakfast. An idea was floated, a very simple idea and within 5 minutes the 1^st leaf appeared on the breast of Ghy Sokhum, a Cambodian waiter. There was a sense of this being a moment in history and Bernard (the Kenyan) snapped a picture.

we pinned a leaf on a waiter’s chest, just above his heart

The idea is simple, it effects every single person and in fact every living organism on this planet. Whoever and wherever you are reading this blog…it effects YOU.

We human beings are the smallest common denominator of every organization, government, country and continent. We are at the bottom of a huge pyramid of human achievement, development, trade, economics, travel and discovery. In the past hundred years or so that pyramid has grown so phenomenally fast – that it towers above us. In contrast we often feel very small and insignificant.

The problem is that we have built this pyramid in the wrong way. It is now so large and top-heavy that it is throwing the operation of our planet into jeopardy. Climate change is the main issue here…and the issue is immediate, it is not tomorrow’s problem. We also can’t point fingers anywhere but at ourselves, we are the foundation of this pyramid. We, at ground-level, have to immediately change the way that we are living, consuming resources and unconsciously abusing this planet. We have to simultaneously stand-up and shift this pyramid to a new and better position.

The simple idea that we had in Siem Reap that morning was about how to get this issue of climatic change and the need to change resource usage into the daily consciousness of the entire world’s population.

So we pinned a leaf on a waiter’s chest, just above his heart. It was a green natural leaf, a renewable resource, a symbol of planet earth. Ghy Sokhum wasn’t immediately sure what we were going on about, but one of his colleagues was and helped explain the link between his daily decisions and climate change. The real value of this leaf “badge” is that it is going to whither and die, just like this planet is going to, if we don’t individually and globally change our behaviour. It is a daily reminder that YOU have to do something NOW.

Our leaf campaign had kicked off and the idea was to encourage ourselves and everyone around us to wear a single leaf every day from that moment onwards. The challenge is, that before the leaf dries up, cracks and finally falls off your chest, you need to make sure you had done something, anything that lessens the drain on natural resources and reduces climate change. If you live in the developed world, it could be taking a shorter shower, switching off an energy-chewing device or walking to the park rather than driving. In the developing world it could be burning a little less wood to heat your food, deciding to ride a bicycle rather than catching a bus or planting an extra tree outside your home. Then for each day of heightened conscious, start aiming for a bigger target. Change to energy-saving light-bulbs, buy fresh locally produced food, avoid excessive plastic packaging, start farming organically, vote for leadership that has the same consciousness as you.

So having dispersed from the breakfast room I found myself standing in the hotel lobby 20 minutes later. My own consciousness told me that I wasn’t too aware of how to live with less impact, was it better to hire a tuk-tuk (Cambodian style 2-man carriage pulled behind a scooter) or to share a bus with 25 others? So I resolved to find out more about it as soon as possible. It’s pointless being aware of a problem, but unaware of how to solve it. The other thing is I needed a pin, because I didn’t have a leaf on my chest and I was feeling like a naked traitor without it.

Ron from Lebanon (another conference delegate) and I headed off to the market. We shared a tuk-tuk, because that would have saved a little petrol (gasoline). In the market, finding someone who sold pins was like finding a needle in a proverbial haystack. It gave us an opportunity to explore a labyrinth of stalls, alley’s and passageways. These markets (and there is more than one of them, are a fascinating example of entrepreneurial activity, they are the hub of the city. You can buy almost anything you want here, its like a huge mall or shopping centre, except that it is made up of individual people all playing their small part. At home in Swaziland, the supermarket or mall concept has taken over and the old traditional markets are slowly dying. There were probably more entrepreneurs in a single market here than we have in the whole of our country, its no wonder we have an unemployment problem.

Ron and I overcame the communication problem in our search for pins by borrowing one from a dressmaker. With the little sharp object in our hands it didn’t take long to track down a supplier. We headed off to the Paper Tiger Restaurant (Tigre de Papier to be more precise) in nearby Bar Street. Its not actually called "bar street", but precisely what it is no one seems to know. According to the locals, it has developed from two small restaurants to the centre of Siem Reap’s restaurant and nightlife culture in a matter of a few years.

Ron and I were sporting leaves and our waitress turned over a new leaf too, as did her supervisor. Two backpackers also got the story and enthusiastically pinned a leaf on. The campaign was on the move. I parted ways with Ron, who was off the the airport. He took the campaign onwards to Lebanon, he’s a very Internet savvy guy so I had no doubt this idea was going to spread like a virus…mmm… “virus” is such a negative word…let’s rather say spread like a cure. Ron’s business site is www.greymatterX.com by the way and it’s a gateway to many useful tourism sites in Lebanon. I’ve resolved to go skiing in Lebanon next year…yes…you can ski in Lebanon and yes…the place is safe, just ask Ron, he’s my local connection, now he’s yours too.

Later on in the day I checked into Earthwalkers, a local backpackers lodge-cum-guesthouse. Our conference at the hotel was now over. Talk about a soft target. The story of the leaf spread rapidly. Earthwalkers (www.earthwalkers.no ) is really a model for sustainable tourism development. They are probably the main reason that our WHL conference (www.worldhotel-link.com) was held in Cambodia in the first place…it was an in-your-face example of how to do things RIGHT. No doubt as a result of this Earthwalkers is packed full of volunteers, travelers with conscience and all sorts of nice folk. It was a viral hotspot, the leaf concept was debated refined formalized with input from all over the world.

So in a nutshell, if you want to turn over a new leaf and be part of the climate crisis cure:

• Pin a leaf on your chest
• Wear it daily and prominently
• Replace it when it shrivels up and falls off
• Let the leaf be your consciousness or awareness of climate change issues
• Make personal daily decisions that are guided by this constant awareness
• Feel sad when your leaf shrivels rapidly and use this to renew your personal commitment to improving the way you live even faster.
• Proactively use the leaf badge to attract attention
• Carry a box of pins with you and get others to pin their awareness on their chests
• Contact opinion leaders, politicians, company CEO’s and get them to pin their consciousness for everyone to see.
• Write to websites, chatgroups, blogs, and newspapers and get everyone to turn over a new leaf.
• Find and research ways of living more sustainably and share this info around.
• Most importantly, when you see someone else wearing a leaf; smile, greet them and get a light fuzzy feel-good sensation. That feeling of lightness is the human burden of ignorance slowly being lifted. It is the huge development pyramid being slowly shifted in the right direction.
• We, each one of us, can work to reverse climate change.

Day one of turning over a new leaf was great. I hit the bed and slept like a baby…mmm “slept like a baby”, that’s a term I use regularly without thinking. Now that it crosses my mind, that doesn’t make any sense at all. I’ve got two young kid of my own, who woke me up incessantly when they were babies. I slept a lot better than that.