Is eating meat part of a sustainable lifestyle? Not when we eat lots of it. And also not when the animals are raised without respect.
But especially in parts of the world where agriculture is difficult, herding some cattle is necessary.
And so, we think that eating some meat can be part of a sustainable lifestyle. As long as you know where it comes from, prepare it with love and eat it with respect.
What is sweeter than sweets? When you are in the tropics, like here in Columbia, it is easy. But come to think of it, it was also easy in the Netherlands. If you don’t eat or drink sugar, fruit is the sweetest thing on earth. Especially when you eat it in the season, nearby to where you can pick it. No plastics, no chemicals. Enjoy!
We had a young guest in Cartagena, Columbia. An amazing 8 years old girl. She wants to be an environmental scientist when she grows up, ‘just like Peter!’. And, she politely refused the ‘juice’ we had brought with us from Suriname. ‘This one is not too bad, but some drinks have only water with sugar and colorants’. She was right. And it made us think.
When we are working on our computers it is easy to eat sweets, like these:
We will enjoy these artificial sweets as a ‘guilty pleasure’ and dispose of the plastic responsibly. But, we certainly will eat less of them, especially now we are in Columbia where you can buy incredible fruit from the street vendors!
A selection:
A little gem. You can slice the peel of or just crack the shell with your teeth and suck out what is inside. That may take a while but it is sweet and a little acid closer to the pit. When you feel like binge eating, it is a great alternative for peanuts.
This exotic fruit is believed to originally come from Colombia. The pitahaya generally has yellow or red skin with white flesh and black seeds. You can only eat the inside.
Chop of the head and you easily spoon the inside out in one move. It tastes nice, refreshing and sweet. The seeds are not hard but crunchy.
As beautiful as it is, it’s not known to be a love potion, but it is supposed to be good for your bowels.
This fruit has a smooth skin that is orange and red when ripe. You cut it in half. You can eat it out with a spoon, or just take a bite out, mold it a bit, take a bite again, till you hit the skin. The intense orange pulp is fleshy. It tastes a bit like a tomato and is rich in vitamins A, C and E as well as iron, potassium and magnesium.
Guava is used for the most exquisite pink drinks. You can also eat them; peel and slice or spoon it out. They also make all kinds of jams and jellies, but then the colour turns into a slightly dull brownish orange.
The flavor of guava is complex and rich. Despite the hard seeds, it is definitely worth a try. It is fruity, but it is not very sweet. But you can also taste hints of flowers and spices.
The sweetest fruit we met so far. It looks a bit like a kiwi, but bigger. We cut it in half around and were surprised to find a big pit. Take it out. Mamey has a custardy texture with a flavor reminiscent of sweet potato, mango, and papaya.
You can find Papaya anywhere in Middle-America. It is well known for its specific taste and a good source of vitamin A and C. You cut it over the length and take the seeds out. The taste of this fruit is very specific and kind of heavy. When you also eat a coincidental seed, there is a pepperish addition to it.
We like to eat Papaya with something else, like with some yoghurt and muesli in the morning. The combination with lime adds freshness.
They don’t keep really well. So, if you get a big one (which is not uncommon here) you can easily make lots of jam or ‘dulce‘.
Lime is indispensable. You can buy them everywhere, in large quantities, and cheap. They keep long if they’re not in the sun. Even if they turn yellow or brown on the outside, they are still fresh and green when you slice them open. They are served with every dish. Rich in vitamin C and less sour than lemons, they have become our favorite addition to afternoon tea.
So, you can imagine that this sweeter than sweet fruit has drastically reduced our bad taste for artificial flavours and plastic wrapped ‘sweets’.
Want to know more?
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Here in Cartagena, Colombia, we see, as simple Western people, what we have lost on fossil free solutions. One of these solutions is definitely the flexible and cheap and accessible means of transport. Look what we’ve found!
Colombia has the advantage here. All variations of fossil free transport are still present. In Western cities we gave them all way to the bigger means, “for safety reasons”. And indeed, all smaller transport is pushed to the margins and the big cars and trucks have that much space, they can’t do harm anymore. Now, with much pain and difficulties, planners and traffic planners are experimenting, like in a Paris area around schools, where they forbid all cars. Or like in Amsterdam, where they stimulate the bikes again. Well, reluctantly, not too much, because the Amsterdam county needs ‘her’ parking fees. Better do it as in Cartagena, where still all is possible. And in the mean while, many people have a proud living from it.
Looking for the ‘spirit of the Caribbean’ we found the beautiful beach of Bayahibe, and we found the colorful market in Barahona, but we also found Larimar. This pectolite can only be found near Barahona, Dominican Republic. We talked to David of Casa de Larimar. What makes Larimar so special?
It is not all roses. One day after we went to Casa de Larimar, the New York Times published an in-depth article on Larimar. Two miners had died in April, so, the government had shut down the mine. Let’s hope the improvements come fast; the artisans need the income from Larimar. They benefit most if you buy Larimar jewelry that is produced in the Dominican Republic itself. So, if you are in Santo Domingo: visit the museum and the museum shop. And if you are in Barahona: visit Casa de Larimar!
Do you want to know more about these treasures of the Dominican Republic?
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Just anything, as long as you can transport it by moped or motorbike, you will find it on the market of Barahona. There are so many people living from it.
This is another loud call from us to buy local, and don’t buy the stuff from the supermarket (mostly cooled vegetables, because of the long voyages from other continents in cool ships so an enormous use of fossil fuels). Just use your senses, including the common one, what products to buy.
We are at Isla Beata. The beach is incredible. We thought it would be very crowded. But, we saw only fishermen’s boats. After a short swim, we were received by the ‘commandante’ of the village. 20 people live here, all fishermen and their wives. Sometimes, when all the fishermen are here, the population is up to 60 persons.
The commandante offered us to use his internet to solve our problem. This is why we can send you this newsletter. Not the one we had intended, but the one we can. Have a great day!
We were curious about the relation between sun blockers and the coral reef. How much sun blocker gets into the reef? How much harm does that do? Or does it not?
So, we dived in. Watch and see what we calculated.
And having seen that, what can you do?
And use your consumer power.
Further reading and sources:
Consumerreports: the truth about reef-safe-sunscreen
Sunscreens Cause Coral Bleaching
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We went snorkelling at Las Palmillas, in the South East of the Dominican Republic. And in 5 minutes we saw 2 starfish and 1 small manta ray, but also lots and lots of very dead seagrass. So, we wondered: what is the state of Coral Reefs in the Dominican Republic? We asked Luca, the owner of Coral Point, one of the biggest diving centres in the Dominican Republic.
Luca came to the Dominican Republic 20 years ago. The coral reef was much more colourful then. He is hopeful. A short while ago they saw seahorses. There is still hope. But, the sewage system has to improve. Big resorts and towns drain their waste water through the sewers without treatment.
Also, dangerous sunscreens, especially the ones containing Oxybenzone, have to stop. Read our next blogs to know more.
Do you want to know more? Sail with us? Let us know on info@fossilfreearoundtheworld.org
During our ocean passage, we enjoy the darkness of the night. And the moon and the skies above. Very special, because we live in Rotterdam where there is always light. But maybe because we appreciate it so much, this is also why we noted that the skies are less dark than they used to be. Nowadays, the brightest sparks in the skies are not the stars or the moon. What is happening?
The satellites reflect the sun so we see them as bright objects moving in the sky. It’s at the same time confronting, comforting and confusing.
First the comfort-part: some of these satellites enable us to communicate. We use them to update our position and occasionally update our weather forecast when we are on the ocean. Satellites can gather loads of information to solve sustainability-issues. And they can enhance communication also in remote areas.
The confusing part is that, even in the middle of the ocean, we are ‘not alone’. And it is harder to experience the deep awe and relaxation of ‘the moon and the skies above’. Let alone knowing that there is debris of all those floating manmade objects in the skies. But these are perhaps ‘luxury-worries’. Indegenous people who use the night sky in their cultural practice raise alarm. The skies are changing and we don’t yet know if we can reverse it.
In some remote parts of the world, more satellites could improve the connection with the rest of the world. This might be in the very parts where the indigenous people live. But there hasn’t been any meaningful environmental review of these launches. And the people have not been consulted.
From 2019 to 2022, the number of functional satellites in orbit has more than doubled.
It might be 25 times this within 8 years, with possibly up to 100,000 operational satellites. In large part this increase is from the launch of satellite mega-constellations such as SpaceX’s Starlink.
The confronting part is that most satellites are related to energy-devouring systems. The ‘war’ on information and the military system all need satellites too. And these are the big owners of the satellites. With the rise in the number of objects in space, collisions and debris might grow. The collective reflection of sunlight from all of those objects actually raised the brightness of the night sky itself, which makes it difficult to see the stars.
Perhaps looking into the real stars more often, instead of surfing the internet might be a wise idea. This gives you energy instead of using it. And, nature is – still – most impressive.
If you want to keep surfing…
International Dark Sky Association
https://dewesoft.com/daq/every-satellite-orbiting-earth-and-who-owns-them
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunstmaan
https://spie.org/conferences-and-exhibitions/space-satellites-and-sustainability
https://pages.devex.com/satellites-for-sustainability
sky/https://www.universetoday.com/103382/how-to-spot-and-track-satellites/
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Ya’s motto is: use only what you need. It saves a big chunk of energy, so less windmills, solar panels, and money.
Now the Ecodesign Initiative of the EU makes legislation for this. Because it forces manufacturers to make their machines use only the energy they need. And that saves us lots of unnecessary use of energy and combustion of CO2. How does this work?
Let’s look at an example. Ever wonder why your vacuum cleaner gets so hot? Well, most customers believe ‘more power is better’. So, the 2.400 watt vacuumcleaner must be the best one. Well, it is not. A research on vacuum cleaners concluded that ‘some of the 2000 watt-plus vacuumcleaners are for 1.200 watt heaters’. After this study, the EU forced manufacturers to lower the maximum wattage while at the same time demanding better functioning. From 2013, the maximum power was limited to 1.600 watt, from 2017 even to 900 watt. These measures save 23 terrawatthours in 2030. For example, this is enough to light 23 million houses for one year. It is more than two times all the windenergy generated in the Netherlands in 2021 (8,9 terawatthours).
Ecodesign worked out more guidelines and in 2020, which all together saved some 1037 terawatthours of energy. This is more energy than The Netherlands used in 2020 (some 933 TWh).
The Ecodesign Directive is a success story. Thanks to boring EU-guidelines, the EU emitted 170 megatonnes less CO2 in 2020 (which is more than the total of Dutch CO2-emissions!). As a matter of fact, these ‘boring’ EU’s ecodesign rules, made by a group of dull and grey office workers, could account for one third of reduction EU has targeted ( a 55% greenhouse gas reduction by 2030).
With the recent EU -Sustainable products initiative, EU widenes the Ecodesign Directive to a broader range of goods. They also force the industry to make products durable, repairable, reusable and recyclable.
So you see, at Ecodesign, grey office workers work day by day, detail by detail, consistently doing the real work on sustainability in their boring offices. We think they do miracles.
Sources:
Euractiv (1)
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