The Green Spot

My daughter called the Charleston (SC) Green Taxi Company to take her to the airport. How about that? Hybrid taxis.

We were to meet in San Francisco. Denver Flight F9 696 was delayed, and it was a close connection even if I had been on time. And to top that off I had to pick up and then recheck my bags with the new carrier. After speaking with several people about my situation, I was told I could not make my overseas flight. I thought of my daughter and I having to take separate flights. I wouldn't take no for an answer. I pictured both of us making the trip and then spoke to the right person. A Frontier flight attendant took up my cause and made the impossible happen.

In San Francisco, another jack rabbit Frontier employee, raced with me to my daughter (who had a late Delta connection- when I was on the plane in route to San Francisco, I thought she would be on time and waiting on the plane), took us through barriers, under ropes and delivered us just in time to make our flight. Two winded, but happy women, sat down and embraced. We arrived safely in Seoul, spent a few days, and headed for Thailand.

Following are green observations from my travels.

• Seoul, S. Korea and Bangkok, Thailand are major metropolitan areas. Greater Seoul sports a whopping population of 24.5 million, and the Bangkok area is home to 15 million people. Seoul is clean and one feels safe to roam around town. The traffic should be horrific, but the streets seem orderly, even during the busy times. What makes a city of 24.5 million orderly, clean and easy to travel? Public transportation. The Seoul Metropolitan Subway is one of the most heavily travelled in the world with more than eight million trips made daily. More than 70 percent of the subway is underground.

• The Bangkok Skytrain opened in December 1999. It revolutionized travel within the congested Thai capital for millions of city commuters. Trips that previously took an hour now take minutes.

• The Bangkok Metro, officially called the Mass Rapid Transit, opened in July 2004. More than 180,000 persons ride the metro daily. Wouldn’t you love to travel from The Woodlands to downtown in 10 to 15 minutes and save tons of CO2 emissions? The metro serves the areas not serviced by the Skytrain.

• Seventy percent of Thailand’s energy source is natural gas, which burns more cleanly than other fossil fuels. It has fewer emissions of sulfur, carbon, and nitrogen than coal or oil, and when it is burned, it leaves almost no ash particles.

• Neither country uses chorine or fluoride in their water. Of course the people don’t drink the water, but I don’t drink unfiltered water here either. My hair shined for the first time in years. Other countries that do not use fluoride or stopped using it when the toxicology reports came in are: West Germany, The Netherlands, France, Belgium, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Japan, Italy, and Scotland. This is a controversial subject, but I use reverse osmosis to filter out those chemicals. The fish and micro organisms, which get our runoff water, have no choice as we continue to poison them with the chemicals. My friend, Dr. Anthony George, says, “We live in a chemical stew.” And unfortunately we are in the stew pot.

If you are interested in the toxic effects of chlorine or fluoride you will find over five million articles on the internet. Here are a few links.

http://www.toxicfluoride.com/
http://www.wholywater.com/fluoride.html
http://www.nontoxic.com/water/moreonfluoride.html
http://www.nontoxic.com/nontoxic/chlorine.html
http://www.lightparty.com/Health/DangersOfChlorine.html

It looks like green is a turn on near and far. I saw recycling, green attitudes and general conservation. How refreshing. Let’s continue to join the global community as green citizens.

Green Tip

What can we do to put more green in our lives? Use beeswax candles with cotton wicks, soy candles or other vegetable based waxes. Paraffin candles are toxic when burning and 40 % of our candles have lead in the wick. For more information read http://www.coopamerica.org/pubs/realmoney/articles/candles.cfm