WORD OUT! The Blog to Build a New Society

Chip Haynes is helping to spread the news about "Stuff that Matters" on Important Media. He is a guest contributor to the green tips list featured on the blog, Planet Save. What does he suggest for green tip number five? "How's about a bicycle?", of course.

Giant Bicycles used to offer a bicycle called the Iguana. It came in green, and I always wanted one so when people asked me what I rode, I could look them in the eye and say… “I ride a Giant green Iguana.”

You don’t have to be quite that far out to go green with your bicycle- whatever you ride. Any bike you’ve got will do. You just have to do a little planning, and maybe you can leave the car at home from time to time. Wouldn’t that be nice?

You can read the entire post on Planet Save.

Chip also recently sent me his favourite bicycling video from Halcyon Bike shop's website, "a great local bike shop". I just had to pass it along. How do they get their hair to look like that?

     

So many of us at New Society Publishers are able to cycle to work everyday that we tend to get a bit lackadaisical about it - even forgetting to blog about Bike to Work Week (Eek! Sorry about that). But all is not lost, we still have today!

A report compiled by the City of Vancouver Standing Committee on Transportation and Traffic in February 2009 used Statistics Canada census data to compare the number to people in Canada who commuted to work by bike for the years 1996 and 2006 across Canada. Cycling to work rose by an astounding 0.2 % from 1.1 % in 1996 to to 1.3 % in 2006. Oh why did I ever bother to look for those stats? How depressing.

As seasoned cyclists and cycling activists, we can sometimes lose sight of what drew us to cycling in the first place and feel jaded by reading one too many official reports. Too often we take it all for granted - the smooth ride, the wind in our faces, the clean air, the freedom of movement. We are more interested in getting there than enjoying the ride.

This sweet video of “Madeline”, set to punk rock band Shonen Knife’s Cycling is Fun, reminds me of the joy, excitement and freedom of getting on your bike and getting going!! Madeline is learning to ride without training wheels. A remarkable feat, made all the more notable when you see that she and the boy on the other bike (a brother?) are the only two wheeled vehicles in sight on the shady suburban avenue where they ride.

Thanks Madeline for reminding us, "Cycling is Fun!" Maybe if more of us returned to those happy memories of our first days on our bike, the official stats will be more encouraging next census!

Alexandra Morton will reach Gabriola Island today at around 6:30 pm. She will be arriving by ferry and leaving by sailboat. New Society staff members will be walking with Alex on each leg of her tour of the island. Visit our Facebook page for photos.

Here is a message Alexandra sent describing what the trip has been like for her so far.

"Walking through the communities of Vancouver Island on the Get Out Migration has been a powerfully emotional experience. We are walking to tell people that if they simply stand up and make themselves visible to government, there is no reason we have to lose our wild salmon. But as we walk into towns with our flags flying, brilliant salmon signs, singing we are walking to Victoria to save our fish, an entirely unexpected thing is happening. People are coming up to me and holding me - crying. They are speaking about schools without children, independent livelihoods lost, communities dying. This is about much more than fish.

This is about the independent way of life that built these communities going extinct. As we walk I see a land of beautiful clear streams, fertile soil green with life, air sweet with flowers and then I enter towns so burdened by global corporate markets that they can no longer thrive on the richness of this land. There is something very wrong here, it is painful to witness and people are sad.

Somehow we have become blind to our public resource - millions of salmon flowing annually to our doorstep, feeding people and our economy province wide. We have somehow been convinced that Atlantic salmon, dyed pink, vaccinated, fed Chilean fish, in pens where we cannot catch them, infesting our fish with lice - are better. We believe there are jobs even as the Norwegian companies are mechanizing as fast as they can to reduce the number of jobs. When people see us they know we have been duped and they dont know how to turn this around. The Get Out Migration has been protected, blessed, gifted and honored by the First Nations who know best what has been lost. Everyday more people are joining our trek - weathering storms in tents, waving at thousand honking motorists on the road to Victoria. Our ranks swell as we enter the towns, white doves have been released, First Nation canoes parallel us, songs have been written, feasts laid out, flotillas surround us, people are awakening.

Do we still live in a democracy? Our essential rights and freedoms are being lost as foreign shareholders decide our fate, what happens on our land, dividing our communities, in an equation where they get more as we get less. As our salmon go so we go, they are a lifeline to the powerful natural world that gave birth to us. We must lead our governments back to where we can survive. Walk with us. Be there for our salmon, our towns, our children for yourself. If you want to be represented you must represent yourself."

Alexandra Morton, www.salmonaresacred.org

Chip Haynes doesn’t mean you should squeeze your size 9 feet into a size 6, but he does mean that it is time to shrink our combined global footprint. In his most recent book, Wearing Smaller Shoes – Living Light on the Big Blue Marble, his light hearted approach to saving money while incidentally saving the planet is irresistible. Here he is in person to let you know just some of the ways he and his wife, the Lovely JoAnn, have managed to shrink their footprint and their power bill.

(apologies to Jan Wong for "mixing" her book title with my headline!)

When I was in Vancouver last weekend, I had serious red mitten envy. Those fancy red mitts with the white maple leaf and Olympic rings were everywhere and on everyone! From the Prince of Wales to Oprah, those toasty little beacons of Canadian patriotism were fluttering everywhere I could see - except on the ends of my arms. I had black gloves, how boring.

Despite my envy though, I just didn't feel right buying the mittens. Obviously, the contract to produce this many mittens must have been with a developing country (they are made in China) and probably under doubtful conditions as these economies of scale always seem to benefit the developed country. $10 for a pair of mitts purchased at The Bay probably does not translate into a very good weekly wage for whoever put them together in China. Also, I don't need another pair of mitts, red and trendy not withstanding.

Just where have those mitts come from? What factories manufactured them? Google search results just let me know that most Canadians didn't realize Canada doesn't mass produce anything like 2 million red mitts and were shocked and disappointed to find their mitts not made in Canada. I guess most Canadians don't read their labels very often or understand the global manufacturing world. I tell my son that somewhere in China there must be cities dedicated to teddy bear making (and probably mitt making too now!). Has anyone found information on the source of this red woolly tide that is sweeping the nation?

But never fear, for those of you constrained by your ethical buying consciences, I have found a slightly more ethical source of red woolly Olympic mittens! The Canadian Red Mittens Shop! The Red Mittens Shop is a 100% Canadian website, designed and built by a Canadian family on Vancouver Island, B.C., Canada.

Here is how it all got started:

We watched on TV as millions of Canadians were disappointed to find that the fabulous red mitts, with the charming little white maple leaf surprisingly tucked into the palm, were NOT AVAILABLE. We decided to launch this friendly, helpful little 'hand knit' website to gather up all the mittens that were still for sale somewhere, so that people could get their mitts on a pair of those red mitts! So far, as of Feb 20, 2010, over 2000 people from ALL OVER THE WORLD have managed to find themselves a pair. We never expected to be hosting an international website, but it soon became apparent that the whole world was shopping for a pair of the Canada red mittens. It has been our greatest pleasure to have been contacted by mittens shoppers from every country, sometimes not in English or French. We have a great MAC computer that translates any language for us - that is really cool! It is opportunities like these, where a Canadian heart is warmed to a full blaze. How wonderful to 'meet', via the internet, every day citizens of planet earth and have the chance to say to them with a big 'web style' Canadian smile, ":-D "Sure thing! I'll can give you a hand with that!" :-D"

All advertising revenues from the site are going to support the Special Olympics Games on Vancouver Island.

If that still isn’t ethical enough for you (all these mittens were still made in China after all) for $5.00, you can download the knitting pattern by Canadian knitter Rachel Bearse, and make your own red (or perhaps purple) mitts, from homespun sheep wool dyed in beet juice!