I’m here to show you my journey about
with trash and where I am and how it has
influenced the work that I do now but
before I start can you give you are just
alike on your forms were like one second
and I’m looking at your hands you can
pick it once up later but now just look
at your hands and think about what your
hands have done for you how you know use
them what your hands you’d like your
hands to do for you okay there’s a
little thing just under that thanks so
much
no I’m going to begin my little journey
when I was seven years old in primary
school Bukit Bintang girls school and we
had a blast playing around the school
compound every recess for 20 minutes in
between lessons right and then when the
bell would ring we would all line up and
would go back to our classrooms but one
day our headmistress miss assumed kind
of changed things a bit she said okay
this time before you go up to your
classrooms
the two classes we’re gonna take turns
each class is gonna stay back for 10
minutes and clean up the school compound
and then we looked around and we had
made such a mess of the school compound
and we had been doing this for weeks
because every time we go to school can’t
even buy a fish sticks after me or one
Quinn Bacchus and maybe not time to sit
down we’d be running and playing and as
we were running around we would throw
out the rubbish on the floor so we had
to do this and of course that even as
little kids and we can do this but we
did it with a lot of prompting we were
not very thinking thinking very nice
thoughts of of us assumed and we were
complaining amongst each other saying if
this is the sweepers job this school
sucks we first paid to do this why have
we doing this but in the man we did it
when you came to our second time around
has to do it we stopped complaining
about mrs. sue and the school cleaner
but we started blaming each other I saw
you putting hopscotch just now through
this artistic that kind of thing
we didn’t own it yet we were blaming
each other right but we had to clean up
the third time round we were like oh we
still have to do this okay this thing we
just said and I said but if they were
all feeling the way I was feeling it was
I just want to get this done and never
do it again and I began to own it and I
think eight and what we held each other
they they they’re coming for you we help
each other there was a little bit more
collaboration there was no more chapter
chapter noise we just got stuck in and
did it and we thought that was it we had
to do it the fourth time the fourth time
but you know what this time we made a
game of it we’re gonna do better than
plus eight they took seven minutes so we
started having sort of enjoyed and we
did it so quick and you know one reason
why we did it so quick because through
that third time we started throwing so
much less that there was hiding anything
to pick up right and we’re picking up
dead leaves another and the compound was
like this so this this is stuck with me
and I think it stuck with a lot of my
classmates probably that whole school
look for it you know for a whole lives
and we’re all a bit more like listen
reflex now we’re not gonna catch people
up when you throw cigarette butts but
anyways it stuck with me more so because
in the nature life I realized when I
reflected by that it was the practice of
repeating if you want to get a message
engrained into you and embedded you have
to repeat it like playing the piano
between your master problems you have to
repeat it there has to be a mindfulness
to it and it takes time to you to get
that mindfulness but you have to own it
and you have to say it’s not his problem
it’s not his problem it’s our problem
let’s just do it and this is something
that I appreciate and I use in our
Catholic
and I’ll show you later later on when we
were going to holidays with my family
this is another relationship we have
with trash we go to the beaches and
they’ll be all this trash bitten and
it’s like mind boggling the right how
some people just have their picnic get
up and walk away and everything is left
behind
this isn’t not most of this is not
washed up from some other Beach Ocean
this is probably mostly levered so one
day my husband my kids would do is like
we just collected but we tried to have
fun with it and make kind of make sense
of it and we would do these sort of
Beach trash installations completely
meaningless to son but I think in the
process of doing it what we ourselves
were learning promised was swords he
trying to find order trying to make
sense trying to make it beautiful and
not so ugly right so that that’s
something that also stated me I always
do something why did we do that for but
I think the idea also is that if people
didn’t see it they would start seeing
trash differently and I was hoping that
if they start to see trash differently
they would appreciate it and respect it
a bit more and be less care less about
it yeah and so with my own waking at
home in my home my own supply of trash
that my house generated I would
faithfully put aside for recycling and
in those days there weren’t very many
Recycling’s chains because you needed to
have a recycle stream not everybody took
the certain type of plastic that we were
producing and I would wash it clean it
sort it and when there was enough of it
I would try and find something to do
with it and this is I mean meditations I
call them where I would I infused
plastic bags together and make a bigger
bag and hopefully a tougher bag that
won’t fall apart and that was my idea
trying to find useful material before it
ended up in the landfill I’m giving it a
second life yeah this one was the yaqoob
pops that my children like to drink a
lot of and that’s probably like
perfection worth of the Autobots so
instead of throwing them away every day
had tried to make something a little bit
more interesting about them so that’s my
making happened and I would use things
that we had at home and try me and I’m
so lucky objects out of them useful this
is an egg basket and a basket made I
made and wool and I put in an Baskin
Robbins ice cream spoons there and the
idea was that to challenge myself to use
these materials in a way that people
would would hopefully appreciate the
material as well as alternative
materials to craft art making you didn’t
have to go to the shop to buy all this
material new brand new material the
material was around you you just have to
be a little bit resourceful but more
importantly what I was getting out of
business happening all the time was that
by using my hands sometimes it was very
frustrating sometimes I go why am I
doing this why do I need to find ways to
use of this rubbish but also just
equally there were times which were wow
this is exciting
Wow I solved that problem and then I
didn’t know I could do that those
moments of self-discovery which we are
so lacking these days because we have
out sourced almost everything to
consumer products we buy our own clothes
we buy our food not many do have the
time for cooking or find the time for
working we buy furniture we buy our
houses all these things that previously
in generations before us craftsmen were
there and made and there was a sense of
strong a sense of ownership and people
who make their own stuff it turns out I
have great problem solvers yeah because
the agenda figured things up and that
was something that we were losing and
try to think as I was making these these
objects and I call them meditations are
thinking and and when I get into that
meditative so it was reflective zone I
would wonder whether that was why we are
so distracted respectful to our
environment and nature because we’re
just company lost connection we are so
disconnected from the sense of materials
from the value of materials from how
long they last we the stuff that we buy
now we have no idea how long they last
really one would have thought that a
plastic bag would lost from last 400
years for instance they’re not really
disposable so I started to teach because
making this stuff was it’s almost kind
of like a little very hobby I would I
would display it in exhibitions and I
would get feedback and people would say
you know that was my point I I didn’t
want to make more for the sake of making
more I wanted to try and somehow
influence people inspire people to
serious material as as something that
needed to be noticed and couldn’t needed
to be used before being chucked into the
landfill so in I decided to teach and in
my teaching and I’m not a trained
teacher in any way I taught a refugee
children creative crafting upcycling so
again I taught of the skills and I felt
that if I should gave them the basic
skills of making they would feel that
euphoria that I would feel they would
feel pride in what they did they could
be created without having to spend money
buying stuff from the art supply shores
stores it was all there for them they
could get on with it quickly and make
and get the benefits out of using their
hands with it and in this teaching I had
to own do things like lesson plans and
oh geez and in my research for all this
I discovered that I hadn’t known that
what I had just been telling you or some
way I just been telling you and I had
been experiencing myself the hand brain
connection had been validated by
scientists and neuroscientists and
psychologists the hand brain connection
is amazing our brain neuroscientists
have found that six years ago that our
brain dedicates a lot of it to
controlling our hands meaning our hands
are not just for lifting and moving or
for censoring and telling a brain or hot
cold it’s it’s more than that our hands
are like our second brain you make
decisions with our hands we change our
minds using your hands it’s more than
just it’s more it’s more than just a
tool right it’s it’s a thinking tool and
by using our hands in whatever we do
whatever learning we have it embeds
deeper in us right and it stays and it
hardwired into us better and I’m
something about how this is this is
really good stuff
no wonder I feel so good when I’m making
no wonders there are some people who
love cooking right and because it’s that
creative you know you might be tired and
all no wonder that people who love
crafting and sewing we just needed more
of them and as I said earlier we have
out sourced so much that we don’t do
that and we don’t we don’t hardly use
our hands anymore for pleasurable making
a lot of the research that scientists
have come up with as well is that it
prevent being a kind of therapy is that
it it’s it’s a primal need to make we’ve
got ancestors have been making faux fur
for thousands and thousands of years and
it all had to be practical stuff because
that’s what they needed and then it got
to find time and when when they think
that the need to make was separated and
became art and then it became practical
craft and then art but the basics are
the same we make to feel good to feel
validated to feel necessary to feel
pleasure and when we outsource that and
we don’t and we deny ourselves the
ability to feel that I think that is
where a big disconnect in how we view
ourselves when our environment happens
and in my because I’m so focused about
trash I was trying to think that maybe
that is one possible reason why we we
don’t care so some of us seem not to
care about the state of our environment
and a state about pollution plastic
pollution in return so teaching them
also was one step further but I thought
if I could reach even more we set up a
group as mentioned earlier sampling
young class citizens action Misha
Finnish ative we wanted to spread
awareness about litter and plastic
pollution we might have taken our
Malaysians that you know take back
stewardship of our environment and love
it again we wanted to collect all the
little individuals and all the groups
that were already doing this in whatever
we possibly could and we wanted to make
them more visible
you don’t really gather all these
reports and be the big seventh wave of
citizens power these were some big
manifesto right and this is our basic
tool we started off with our first
campaign has mentioned that not strong
not strong means no strong please direct
template adopted from all the other
nostril movements around the world
especially in the last row project or
once draw this it’s very simple you’ve
got five this we tell a story of the
journey on plastic straw which is to
tell the nation kids
people you know 20 minutes on their lips
but it lasts forever and lands above
landfills and tips we tell them that 31
million straws are thrown out in
Malaysia every day we’ve got to hate
everybody here we have two heads up a
bit about this because we all play a
part and it’s just this poster which is
a story one other pasta which is the
pledge and that was our tools that’s all
we had of course we had social media and
we had tried to wherever anybody invited
us for free we’ve never got a free table
we tried to be there awesome we were
like between three to five people and
I’m not all active at one goal because
we’re all mothers and we have day jobs
I mean being the most free one I was
probably the most visible but we would
just tell this story simply and we say
to people hey this first step is just to
say no sow seeds we try to empower them
and we’re saying look you just saw seeds
do that whole repetition think that
assists you taught us when I was young
is like just loosing every time you’re
in a restaurant or in a cafe just be
little simple things like that so we
were like what I had felt it intuitive
that we needed to repeat we needed to
practice and we’ll be mindful and we’ve
also needed to sow seed so that the
environment that we would be moving into
would be familiar with what we were
requesting and would help us and support
us in making that change and also we
would be educating and supporting them
in making that change so not only will
be telling people who are keen about the
thought not straw open and the dog the
Deaf adopting it we were saying that you
you guys are the teachers you guys are
the moon was you know not just one face
or two faces it’s it’s you you can do it
a little baby steps what three words at
a time not strong things okay
that’s John don’t worry this words are
out there and there’s Zoe and they’re
growing this is the other one this is
the this is the this is the other panel
that we have the second panel above and
it’s the five steps so then I’ll step
being if you can try and get your
favorite restaurant and our service
draws at all very simple this so much
energy and focus with them one small
innocuous little busting single user
suppose elect them which can today a
big part of our campaign work even
though that was our only to print
material its workshops taking from my
experiences of making with your hands we
decided that this campaign Salman Appa
is also going to do their awareness our
awareness work via workshops as much as
possible we wanted to give people the
opportunity to use their hands so that
not just to embed our message better so
they wouldn’t forget it but happened
possibly those little short Eureka
moments in that five minute or ten
million were clapping yeah I can do this
yeah and maybe that’s something that
they would carry them within their lives
and in in their habits of conception so
we have the Bieber straws here wax paper
straws also in our campaign there was no
alternative so we were showing people
how you can find and make your own
alternatives you need not buy everything
you do not have to outsource you can do
it yourself
with very simple materials and not just
paper straws we also work but this is
the way we how we work with kids with
straws so we’re very kind of like
gorillas any space we can we will just
come and do it and we’ll muscle that way
in
have to we got we got that Mastro’s
going as well this is where something is
also a handcrafted things I appreciate
there were no last year we started this
movement there were no straws and it is
possible except stainless steel straws
her to bring brought from China and
nobody was producing bamboo straws here
locally and we felt hey when he grow
back somebody here must be able to do it
so we approached somewhere last me and
they were willing to try even though
they had no real understanding of straws
because they don’t use them so you know
but we worked at it and over the months
and years we figured it out so I use
this as part of the workshops as well
where we give people rather straw that
sandpaper and say here have a go at
making it beautiful you send it down six
five ten minutes but people begin to
appreciate the work that is involved in
an object and hopefully then they have
the appreciation of that object and they
won’t simply just discard it or lose it
too easily and then this I’m going to
end with this picture so this can
anybody guess what this is this is a
picture of otter in a plastic bag
floating in off the shores of langkawi
and i think this as the poster child of
malaysia equitable to the turtle with
the Strada snows from Costa Rica which
started and helped push the no strong
momentum again with this picture to me
is is Malaysian we have to own it when I
look at it I wonder who on that plastic
bag what was carried in it why was it
discarded so easily and how can we stop
it
so I’ve end with this because I want
this horrible metal image in your mind
I’m sorry but it hope it will stick and
make you think about it but I’m going to
sum up by saying whatever we do in life
and any changes we want to make try use
your hands practice practice practice a
little increment for baby steps try
using your hands even if you’re studying
do something with your hands I think
that’s why guys like to spin the pins
because all this helps with our learning
and embeds deeper in us and try using
your hands more so that become we will
all become more mindful and have a calm
sense of well being sought hopefully we
will have more energy and mind space and
heart space for the person next to us
for the stranger next to us and also for
our environment so that we can be more
mindful about the amount of trash that
we generates and yeah use your hands
look at them differently now okay thank
you very much [Applause]
with trash and where I am and how it has
influenced the work that I do now but
before I start can you give you are just
alike on your forms were like one second
and I’m looking at your hands you can
pick it once up later but now just look
at your hands and think about what your
hands have done for you how you know use
them what your hands you’d like your
hands to do for you okay there’s a
little thing just under that thanks so
much
no I’m going to begin my little journey
when I was seven years old in primary
school Bukit Bintang girls school and we
had a blast playing around the school
compound every recess for 20 minutes in
between lessons right and then when the
bell would ring we would all line up and
would go back to our classrooms but one
day our headmistress miss assumed kind
of changed things a bit she said okay
this time before you go up to your
classrooms
the two classes we’re gonna take turns
each class is gonna stay back for 10
minutes and clean up the school compound
and then we looked around and we had
made such a mess of the school compound
and we had been doing this for weeks
because every time we go to school can’t
even buy a fish sticks after me or one
Quinn Bacchus and maybe not time to sit
down we’d be running and playing and as
we were running around we would throw
out the rubbish on the floor so we had
to do this and of course that even as
little kids and we can do this but we
did it with a lot of prompting we were
not very thinking thinking very nice
thoughts of of us assumed and we were
complaining amongst each other saying if
this is the sweepers job this school
sucks we first paid to do this why have
we doing this but in the man we did it
when you came to our second time around
has to do it we stopped complaining
about mrs. sue and the school cleaner
but we started blaming each other I saw
you putting hopscotch just now through
this artistic that kind of thing
we didn’t own it yet we were blaming
each other right but we had to clean up
the third time round we were like oh we
still have to do this okay this thing we
just said and I said but if they were
all feeling the way I was feeling it was
I just want to get this done and never
do it again and I began to own it and I
think eight and what we held each other
they they they’re coming for you we help
each other there was a little bit more
collaboration there was no more chapter
chapter noise we just got stuck in and
did it and we thought that was it we had
to do it the fourth time the fourth time
but you know what this time we made a
game of it we’re gonna do better than
plus eight they took seven minutes so we
started having sort of enjoyed and we
did it so quick and you know one reason
why we did it so quick because through
that third time we started throwing so
much less that there was hiding anything
to pick up right and we’re picking up
dead leaves another and the compound was
like this so this this is stuck with me
and I think it stuck with a lot of my
classmates probably that whole school
look for it you know for a whole lives
and we’re all a bit more like listen
reflex now we’re not gonna catch people
up when you throw cigarette butts but
anyways it stuck with me more so because
in the nature life I realized when I
reflected by that it was the practice of
repeating if you want to get a message
engrained into you and embedded you have
to repeat it like playing the piano
between your master problems you have to
repeat it there has to be a mindfulness
to it and it takes time to you to get
that mindfulness but you have to own it
and you have to say it’s not his problem
it’s not his problem it’s our problem
let’s just do it and this is something
that I appreciate and I use in our
Catholic
and I’ll show you later later on when we
were going to holidays with my family
this is another relationship we have
with trash we go to the beaches and
they’ll be all this trash bitten and
it’s like mind boggling the right how
some people just have their picnic get
up and walk away and everything is left
behind
this isn’t not most of this is not
washed up from some other Beach Ocean
this is probably mostly levered so one
day my husband my kids would do is like
we just collected but we tried to have
fun with it and make kind of make sense
of it and we would do these sort of
Beach trash installations completely
meaningless to son but I think in the
process of doing it what we ourselves
were learning promised was swords he
trying to find order trying to make
sense trying to make it beautiful and
not so ugly right so that that’s
something that also stated me I always
do something why did we do that for but
I think the idea also is that if people
didn’t see it they would start seeing
trash differently and I was hoping that
if they start to see trash differently
they would appreciate it and respect it
a bit more and be less care less about
it yeah and so with my own waking at
home in my home my own supply of trash
that my house generated I would
faithfully put aside for recycling and
in those days there weren’t very many
Recycling’s chains because you needed to
have a recycle stream not everybody took
the certain type of plastic that we were
producing and I would wash it clean it
sort it and when there was enough of it
I would try and find something to do
with it and this is I mean meditations I
call them where I would I infused
plastic bags together and make a bigger
bag and hopefully a tougher bag that
won’t fall apart and that was my idea
trying to find useful material before it
ended up in the landfill I’m giving it a
second life yeah this one was the yaqoob
pops that my children like to drink a
lot of and that’s probably like
perfection worth of the Autobots so
instead of throwing them away every day
had tried to make something a little bit
more interesting about them so that’s my
making happened and I would use things
that we had at home and try me and I’m
so lucky objects out of them useful this
is an egg basket and a basket made I
made and wool and I put in an Baskin
Robbins ice cream spoons there and the
idea was that to challenge myself to use
these materials in a way that people
would would hopefully appreciate the
material as well as alternative
materials to craft art making you didn’t
have to go to the shop to buy all this
material new brand new material the
material was around you you just have to
be a little bit resourceful but more
importantly what I was getting out of
business happening all the time was that
by using my hands sometimes it was very
frustrating sometimes I go why am I
doing this why do I need to find ways to
use of this rubbish but also just
equally there were times which were wow
this is exciting
Wow I solved that problem and then I
didn’t know I could do that those
moments of self-discovery which we are
so lacking these days because we have
out sourced almost everything to
consumer products we buy our own clothes
we buy our food not many do have the
time for cooking or find the time for
working we buy furniture we buy our
houses all these things that previously
in generations before us craftsmen were
there and made and there was a sense of
strong a sense of ownership and people
who make their own stuff it turns out I
have great problem solvers yeah because
the agenda figured things up and that
was something that we were losing and
try to think as I was making these these
objects and I call them meditations are
thinking and and when I get into that
meditative so it was reflective zone I
would wonder whether that was why we are
so distracted respectful to our
environment and nature because we’re
just company lost connection we are so
disconnected from the sense of materials
from the value of materials from how
long they last we the stuff that we buy
now we have no idea how long they last
really one would have thought that a
plastic bag would lost from last 400
years for instance they’re not really
disposable so I started to teach because
making this stuff was it’s almost kind
of like a little very hobby I would I
would display it in exhibitions and I
would get feedback and people would say
you know that was my point I I didn’t
want to make more for the sake of making
more I wanted to try and somehow
influence people inspire people to
serious material as as something that
needed to be noticed and couldn’t needed
to be used before being chucked into the
landfill so in I decided to teach and in
my teaching and I’m not a trained
teacher in any way I taught a refugee
children creative crafting upcycling so
again I taught of the skills and I felt
that if I should gave them the basic
skills of making they would feel that
euphoria that I would feel they would
feel pride in what they did they could
be created without having to spend money
buying stuff from the art supply shores
stores it was all there for them they
could get on with it quickly and make
and get the benefits out of using their
hands with it and in this teaching I had
to own do things like lesson plans and
oh geez and in my research for all this
I discovered that I hadn’t known that
what I had just been telling you or some
way I just been telling you and I had
been experiencing myself the hand brain
connection had been validated by
scientists and neuroscientists and
psychologists the hand brain connection
is amazing our brain neuroscientists
have found that six years ago that our
brain dedicates a lot of it to
controlling our hands meaning our hands
are not just for lifting and moving or
for censoring and telling a brain or hot
cold it’s it’s more than that our hands
are like our second brain you make
decisions with our hands we change our
minds using your hands it’s more than
just it’s more it’s more than just a
tool right it’s it’s a thinking tool and
by using our hands in whatever we do
whatever learning we have it embeds
deeper in us right and it stays and it
hardwired into us better and I’m
something about how this is this is
really good stuff
no wonder I feel so good when I’m making
no wonders there are some people who
love cooking right and because it’s that
creative you know you might be tired and
all no wonder that people who love
crafting and sewing we just needed more
of them and as I said earlier we have
out sourced so much that we don’t do
that and we don’t we don’t hardly use
our hands anymore for pleasurable making
a lot of the research that scientists
have come up with as well is that it
prevent being a kind of therapy is that
it it’s it’s a primal need to make we’ve
got ancestors have been making faux fur
for thousands and thousands of years and
it all had to be practical stuff because
that’s what they needed and then it got
to find time and when when they think
that the need to make was separated and
became art and then it became practical
craft and then art but the basics are
the same we make to feel good to feel
validated to feel necessary to feel
pleasure and when we outsource that and
we don’t and we deny ourselves the
ability to feel that I think that is
where a big disconnect in how we view
ourselves when our environment happens
and in my because I’m so focused about
trash I was trying to think that maybe
that is one possible reason why we we
don’t care so some of us seem not to
care about the state of our environment
and a state about pollution plastic
pollution in return so teaching them
also was one step further but I thought
if I could reach even more we set up a
group as mentioned earlier sampling
young class citizens action Misha
Finnish ative we wanted to spread
awareness about litter and plastic
pollution we might have taken our
Malaysians that you know take back
stewardship of our environment and love
it again we wanted to collect all the
little individuals and all the groups
that were already doing this in whatever
we possibly could and we wanted to make
them more visible
you don’t really gather all these
reports and be the big seventh wave of
citizens power these were some big
manifesto right and this is our basic
tool we started off with our first
campaign has mentioned that not strong
not strong means no strong please direct
template adopted from all the other
nostril movements around the world
especially in the last row project or
once draw this it’s very simple you’ve
got five this we tell a story of the
journey on plastic straw which is to
tell the nation kids
people you know 20 minutes on their lips
but it lasts forever and lands above
landfills and tips we tell them that 31
million straws are thrown out in
Malaysia every day we’ve got to hate
everybody here we have two heads up a
bit about this because we all play a
part and it’s just this poster which is
a story one other pasta which is the
pledge and that was our tools that’s all
we had of course we had social media and
we had tried to wherever anybody invited
us for free we’ve never got a free table
we tried to be there awesome we were
like between three to five people and
I’m not all active at one goal because
we’re all mothers and we have day jobs
I mean being the most free one I was
probably the most visible but we would
just tell this story simply and we say
to people hey this first step is just to
say no sow seeds we try to empower them
and we’re saying look you just saw seeds
do that whole repetition think that
assists you taught us when I was young
is like just loosing every time you’re
in a restaurant or in a cafe just be
little simple things like that so we
were like what I had felt it intuitive
that we needed to repeat we needed to
practice and we’ll be mindful and we’ve
also needed to sow seed so that the
environment that we would be moving into
would be familiar with what we were
requesting and would help us and support
us in making that change and also we
would be educating and supporting them
in making that change so not only will
be telling people who are keen about the
thought not straw open and the dog the
Deaf adopting it we were saying that you
you guys are the teachers you guys are
the moon was you know not just one face
or two faces it’s it’s you you can do it
a little baby steps what three words at
a time not strong things okay
that’s John don’t worry this words are
out there and there’s Zoe and they’re
growing this is the other one this is
the this is the this is the other panel
that we have the second panel above and
it’s the five steps so then I’ll step
being if you can try and get your
favorite restaurant and our service
draws at all very simple this so much
energy and focus with them one small
innocuous little busting single user
suppose elect them which can today a
big part of our campaign work even
though that was our only to print
material its workshops taking from my
experiences of making with your hands we
decided that this campaign Salman Appa
is also going to do their awareness our
awareness work via workshops as much as
possible we wanted to give people the
opportunity to use their hands so that
not just to embed our message better so
they wouldn’t forget it but happened
possibly those little short Eureka
moments in that five minute or ten
million were clapping yeah I can do this
yeah and maybe that’s something that
they would carry them within their lives
and in in their habits of conception so
we have the Bieber straws here wax paper
straws also in our campaign there was no
alternative so we were showing people
how you can find and make your own
alternatives you need not buy everything
you do not have to outsource you can do
it yourself
with very simple materials and not just
paper straws we also work but this is
the way we how we work with kids with
straws so we’re very kind of like
gorillas any space we can we will just
come and do it and we’ll muscle that way
in
have to we got we got that Mastro’s
going as well this is where something is
also a handcrafted things I appreciate
there were no last year we started this
movement there were no straws and it is
possible except stainless steel straws
her to bring brought from China and
nobody was producing bamboo straws here
locally and we felt hey when he grow
back somebody here must be able to do it
so we approached somewhere last me and
they were willing to try even though
they had no real understanding of straws
because they don’t use them so you know
but we worked at it and over the months
and years we figured it out so I use
this as part of the workshops as well
where we give people rather straw that
sandpaper and say here have a go at
making it beautiful you send it down six
five ten minutes but people begin to
appreciate the work that is involved in
an object and hopefully then they have
the appreciation of that object and they
won’t simply just discard it or lose it
too easily and then this I’m going to
end with this picture so this can
anybody guess what this is this is a
picture of otter in a plastic bag
floating in off the shores of langkawi
and i think this as the poster child of
malaysia equitable to the turtle with
the Strada snows from Costa Rica which
started and helped push the no strong
momentum again with this picture to me
is is Malaysian we have to own it when I
look at it I wonder who on that plastic
bag what was carried in it why was it
discarded so easily and how can we stop
it
so I’ve end with this because I want
this horrible metal image in your mind
I’m sorry but it hope it will stick and
make you think about it but I’m going to
sum up by saying whatever we do in life
and any changes we want to make try use
your hands practice practice practice a
little increment for baby steps try
using your hands even if you’re studying
do something with your hands I think
that’s why guys like to spin the pins
because all this helps with our learning
and embeds deeper in us and try using
your hands more so that become we will
all become more mindful and have a calm
sense of well being sought hopefully we
will have more energy and mind space and
heart space for the person next to us
for the stranger next to us and also for
our environment so that we can be more
mindful about the amount of trash that
we generates and yeah use your hands
look at them differently now okay thank
you very much [Applause]
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