Hello from sunny and windy Sicily. I am on holiday this week - and what a beautiful place with a pristine sea a few meters from the house. And even better, the fishing harbour is so close that I can 'spy' on their operations and get some ideas on the state of the fisheries. So for today's post, I want to just tell you the story of what I see and what I think about it. I'd like to hear your views and other similar experiences from other locations..
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As I walk down the street, things seem to have normalised once again.
Face masks are only needed in little occasions, people are no longer going to great lengths to avoid one another, bars are open and the noise of coffee machines can be heard once again. Everything seems ‘okay’. But then, as I make a trip to the office in the university to pick something up I realise it’s really a parallel normal. From the temperature scan at the entrance through to that eery feeling of being alone on the floor. I feel in a parallel world. I notice it also on the choice of what i want to listen to (podcasts for example) or watch. I feel that life pre-pandemic was a different one. Not necessarily life itself, i mean we breathe, eat sleep and feel emotions the same way now than we did before. But something has changed. Perhaps the way we view the world? Perhaps the realisation that maybe it is a frail system and a little blow can throw us off course. We are not omnipotent, and a tiny little invisible thing can cause madness, political chaos and lock us in our homes. Personally, it showed me even more how much life is worth living (not that I ever doubt that, but it reinforced the fact that every moment should be lived to the fullest). And anyway, I believe a lot of us have a whole new set of priorities to what they had before. I think we should harness this change.. We need system change not climate change - that’s what we were discussing about nearly a year ago at the Venice climate camp. Yes , a system change that would revolution every aspect of our lives - a system change that will not induce migrations with its extractivism and then proceed to treat these refugees as animals or even worse.
I have not yet spoken about the racism event(s) in America and the subsequent protests that have emerged from it. You might guess , if you know my train of thoughts, that I believe the issue is even more deep rooted than that. And somehow all of the #blacklivesmatter posts on media madden me , not because I believe they don’t, on the contrary, but because those same people are the one voting to send away the migrants from our shores. It’s easy to judge what goes on at the neighbor house and not see the issues under our own roofs. If you are wondering what the heck does this have to do with my blog , I would like to say that I am a believer of viewing the world in a holistic way. You can’t separate it into little compartments. Around 70% of the Earth surface is covered by water. And a lot of planet health depends on it. Yes, these waters (mostly oceans) provide many ecosystem services that we couldn't live without. From nutrient cycling, to carbon sequestration. Whether you put a monetary value to it or not, the services are there. |
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