Oce-anna

A spoon full of sugar helps unemployment go down

Mama Bongi, dressed in her personalised apron, in her kitchen at Amazing Spaces.
Image by: Anna Cocks

In a kitchen attached to an office in Wynberg, works a Zimbabwean woman with a personality to make anyone smile, and coupled with her charming character is her love for baking that can be tasted in the chocolate-chip cookies she makes and sells in order to provide a living for her family. Yes, not all heroes wear capes as Sibongikosi Msipha, known to many as Mama Bongi, is a hero to her family that wears an apron.

Mama Bongi left Zimbabwe in 2007. “Life was tough there, so I had to leave my kids and come to South Africa to look for the better pastures,” she explains. Leaving her two children with her sister, she came to South Africa in search of work. After struggling for a while, she finally found work with a Jewish family in Sea Point. She was the Abrahamson’s house keeper. It was with this family that she learnt to cook and a passion was ignited. “Daniel Abrahamson would be cooking and he would say, ‘Come, chop the tomatoes, do this, do that’…that’s when I started to love cooking.” He taught her to make soups and salads, and how to use spices. In 2010 she left that family, worked for another family for two years and returned to Zimbabwe for a year. However, things hadn’t changed. “It was still tough there so I came back to South Africa,” she says with sorrow in her voice as she laments over the idea of leaving her children behind again. She only sees them once a year over the Christmas holiday period.

Upon returning to South Africa, Mama Bongi started working for an American family living in Sea Point. They were Brazilian and taught her how to cook Brazilian food. Sadly in 2016, this family returned to America, but before leaving, secured Mama Bongi another job. The au pair working for the family at the time posted on Facebook that Mama Bongi, a wonderful cook and housekeeper, was looking for work. Enter Mama Bongi’s lifesaver, Julia Finnis-Bedford.

Julia saw the Facebook post and hired Mama Bongi to work at her office, Amazing Spaces. Julia smiles as she relays the first time they met. “I remember she was a bit hesitant because it was an office. She was worried she was going to be bored.” Amazing Spaces scouts out locations for film companies and shoots, and Mama Bongi works at their Headquarters in Wynberg, serving lunch to the staff every day. Julia soon recognised a talent in Mama Bongi and wanted to help, “I believe that if you help one person in life, you’ve made a difference.”

Julia thus began to work with Mama Bongi to develop healthy meals and recipes. In describing Mama as a hard and willing worker, Julia concluded, “I saw Mama with her cooking and I thought, hold on… we can do something here!” Julia posted to the Constantia Society Facebook page, as well as on her own page, that Mama Bongi was now giving cooking lessons; she would go to people’s homes and teach their housekeeper to cook.

“When I teach I just feel happy… I feel like someone!”
– Mama Bongi

This has been successful as Mama Bongi goes to homes weekly with a handful of recipes and teaches others – something that has been a dream of hers. “I dreamt of being a teacher. If I had continued with school then I would have been a teacher”. Mama Bongi lights up as she adds, “When I teach I just feel happy… I feel like someone… like something.” Her students are also grateful for her lessons and are easily able to connect with her since she can speak English, Xhosa, Shona, Ndebele and Zulu.

Text Box: Mama Bongi with her chocolate-chip cookies.
Image by: Anna Cocks — Mama Bongi with her branded chocolate-chip cookies.
Image by: Anna Cocks

Mama then took her culinary skills further and started baking chocolate-chip cookies. She expresses that it took a while to perfect the recipe. Julia laughs with Mama as they remember those first few attempts. While laughing Julia recalls, “The first few batches weren’t great, remember?” By adding more choc-chips and playing around with the recipe, they were able to perfect them to what they are today, a blend of chocolate, chewy, crunchy sweetness. Her cookies were so loved by everyone in the office that they were even taken with to the various sets and given to clients. Packaged neatly and with the label “Amazing Spaces supporting Social Entrepreneurship”, including a picture of Mama’s smiling face on it, clients were in love and started asking to buy them. The idea was germinated.

Julia helped Mama to set up the kitchen in the office to cater for her production baking. They also changed the label to a ‘Mama Bongi’ brand and started taking orders. They started by simply advertising through the Village and Constantia Society Facebook pages. Over Father’s Day this year, people went mad for them and they sold like hot cakes… more like hot cookies. People loved the cookies and more importantly the story – here is Mama Bongi conducting her own business with the help of Julia, her employer, empowering her.

Mama’s story was recently featured in the Weekend Argus which has opened up many business opportunities and expansion for the future. Mama Bongi is now selling her cookies at The Chilled Market at The Range in Constantia. Their first market at the beginning of September saw them sell about 50 packets of biscuits. Julia says, “Loads of people came up to her and said: ‘We are here especially for you, Mama Bongi!’” Mama expresses with delight, “Some people were like: ‘It’s you Mama Bongi. I saw you on Facebook. I saw you in the article.’”

Mama Bongi showing-off her beloved coffee machine.
Image by: Anna Cocks

The future for Mama Bongi involves her collaborating with other small start-ups and plans are developing for her business to move into a bigger kitchen in the house below the offices, where she can host cooking classes for three to four people – earning more for her time.
But in the far future, Mama plans on returning to Zimbabwe and to her children where she will live in the house she built from the money earned through this small enterprise.

“Creativity is coupled with psychopathology”

Prof Raj Ramesar at the *Art and Science in Health* seminar
Image by: Cynthia Augustine

Prof Raj Ramesar stresses, through scientific evidence, the importance of the creative arts in mental well-being. He expresses his findings in a seminar titled, Creativity, Imagination and Science, as part of the ‘Art and Science in Health’ seminar series held at UCT’s Faculty of Health Science.

Prof Ramesar, head of the Division of Human Genetics at UCT, reveals his understanding of the scientific functionality of creative people’s brains as well as he reveals his findings in genetic research of the laterization of the brain and hand skill in people with bipolar disorder. In his seminar, Prof Ramesar differentiates between how the sciences see ‘creativity’ versus the humanities with an analogy where he explains, “The way we engage with concepts is different. 1 + 1 = 2 in the sciences, but 2 + 2 = 22 in the arts.”

Prof Ramesar reveals, “Artists have a smaller corpus callosum meaning there is a decrease in connectivity between the right and left hemisphere of the brain.” He explains that this small connectivity links to creativity. The two hemispheres specialise separately forming a process many scientists call, “incubation of the brain.”

Prof Ramesar draws on other studies as he explains that highly creative people have more connections in their brain between three specific regions: the default network (responsible for spontaneous thinking and imagination), the salience network (responsible for identifying important information from the surrounding area), and the executive control network (responsible for cognitive control functions and evaluations).

He continues his seminar stating, “Creativity is coupled with psychopathology.” With research done since 2007, Prof Ramesar reveals from his studies, Lateralization of hand skill in bipolar affective disorder. His research reveals “that schizophrenia and BPD (Bipolar Disorder) are aetiologically distinct and that these differences may be related to a degree of hemispheric lateralization.” Schizophrenia may be associated with the ability to be left-handed and ambidextrous, reflecting a specialisation of function of one side of the brain; the right-hemisphere of the brain. In contrast, those with BPD 1 may have a dominance of the left-hemisphere as the right-hemisphere is dysfunctional owing to the deficit in emotional regulation. Prof Ramesar adds, “Left-handers might have an advantage when it comes to performing verbal tasks.”

However, when in the hypomanic stage of BPD 1, a patient has a higher ability to be more creative than the average person as Prof Ramesar exhibits, along with research presented from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, that individuals with bipolar disorder are over-represented in the creative field.

Prof Ramesar is then joined by Dr Dawn Garisch, an author and medical practitioner, who steps up to talk about her experience in how art has healed her.

Dr Garisch with some of the members at the seminar.
Image by: Anna Cocks

Dr Garisch tells her own story of how she became ill at a young age with chronic uveitis, a condition that affected her eyesight. This caused her to look beyond medicine to heal herself, physically and mentally. In her talk she states, “I began to be fascinated with the ‘poetry of the body’ to heal me,” a concept she explains that by focusing one’s attention on another creative action one can lessen the pain in one’s self. Dr Garisch continues to elaborate on ideas from her book, Eloquent Body.

She addresses how we can make decisions in our best interest that benefit the best behavioural patterns for our body. She encourages people to turn to creative practises to reduce anxiety. She calls it, “Turning mucus to gold.” Along with this statement, she proceeds to answer, why we were born to be creative? For her, “I wrote for my own mental health. I switched fear and hope into curiosity.” She finishes by saying, “Creativity relates to health sciences. It improves our mental health.”

The seminar concludes with a time of questions-and-answers from the audience. A member of the floor poses the question, “Will exposing people to different art languages help with anxiety?” Dr Garisch responds, “Yes! We should be singing in hospitals; using our creativity to debrief.”

The event ends with Dr Garisch theorising that creativity can modify mental illnesses, which Prof Ramesar supports, pointing out that the potential for great creative actions can be found in those with bipolar affective disorder.

Dr Dawn Garisch and Prof Raj Ramesar thinking over a question during the discussion time.
Image by: Anna Cocks

Does recycling really help?

We have just come out of plastic-free July. But why should we stop these eco-friendly habits just because it is now August?

Stats SA released a report in 2018 documenting South Africa’s recycling percentages. In 2011, about 90% of an “estimated 59 million tonnes of waste” were sent to landfills while only 10% was recycled. In 2015, they reported that only 5.2% of households recycled. However, things are beginning to look better. ESI Africa reported in 2018 that the percentage of recycled waste is growing with 48% of 1.144 million tonnes of waste being recycled in 2017.

Nevertheless the topic is still prevalent as the Western Cape Integrated Waste Management Plan suggests “there is limited landfill airspace available.” A great concern is the municipality’s lack of accountability in fulfilling their duty in collecting or sorting recyclable materials, or providing a service to do this.

Managing and disposing of waste is a big problem for most countries. It’s an important service that needs to be done right in order to reduce its impacts on climate change.

I, however, have heard a lot of conspiracies or opinions from people believing that recycling waste can’t help the situation at all. Yes, I agree it won’t solve the mass waste problem we have or combat climate change but it is a simple, practical way to reduce the effects of climate change.

I wanted to see how students felt towards recycling. I went around the University of Cape Town and interviewed a couple of students and asked them, “Do you think recycling is an effective solution in reducing climate change?”

This was the response I received:

One can conclude the general response was “yes, it is important”. But it isn’t the only solution. It’s important to follow that cliché reduce, reuse and recycle. In order to reduce our waste, we not only need to recycle but perhaps reduce our intake of it. It’s Important for everyone to get involved and play their part in reducing, reusing and recycling. #GetMAD #MakeADifference

The Homemade Toothpaste

I did a thing.

I made my very own homemade toothpaste.

I followed Lauren Singer’s recipe and watched her YouTube clip on how to make it. I was moved by the saddening realisation that toothpaste tubes can’t be recycled. I also recently learned about the ingredients in most commercial toothpastes, that digested in bulk, can be very harmful to your body. Therefore, I decided to try a natural toothpaste that is kind to the environment.

The Recipe:

Ingredients:

2 Table spoons of coconut oil
1 Table spoon of baking soda (or bicarbonate soda in SA)
15 – 20 drops of any flavoured organic essential oil (I used peppermint)

Mix all the ingredients together and…ta da, you are done.

So it is very quick and easy, and all the ingredients are safe for your body.

My critique

After using the toothpaste for two weeks, I decided that it wasn’t for me and to resort back to shop bought toothpaste.
The flavour is amazing; minty as all other toothpastes. My breath never smelt bad and my teeth did not suffer any dental-hygiene loss.
However, I could not get past the texture. It was grainy and salty, and frankly made me feel a little sick. I gave this my best shot, but I am resorting back to my old ways.

The Cost

Looking at this from a cost point of view it is actually more expensive than buying toothpaste from the store. I compared how much one would spend per 10ml of toothpaste with two other brands and this is what I discovered:

Aquafresh Herbal Toothpaste:
R1.60 per 10ml

Colgate Optic White Toothpaste:
R4.80 per 10ml

Homemade Toothpaste:
R9.80 per 10 ml

As we can see it is actually cheaper, in South Africa, to buy Aquafresh or even Colgate then it is to buy the ingredients to make your own toothpaste.

Alternative Solutions

There are other toothpaste recipe’s out there that I have not tried yet. I know Shop Zero sells a charcoal toothpaste for R90, which could be fun to check out.

The Bamboo Toothbrush
Image by: Anna Cocks

One could always purchase a bio-degradable toothbrush. I certainly did. It’s made from bamboo. When I am done with it one day, I can take out the bristles with a pair of pliers and put them in my eco-brick, while I can throw the rest of the toothbrush in the bin where it will return back to nature.

I bought mine from Shop Zero for R45. It’s working really well for me.

The thing about trying to live a zero-waste lifestyle is that it is a journey, and the fact that you are trying to change your ways and habits is what counts most of all. Each one of us has to find for ourselves what works. It involves a bit of trial and error, but hopefully we can all arrive at a place where we have reduced our plastic in-take significantly, however we may get to that place.

The start-up for a zero-waste lifestyle: Inspiration, costs and all

As a South African student I am here to tell you that living a zero-waste lifestyle does not have to break the bank. It’s been a week of this adventure and let me lay out some cost effective tips.

The oranges I bought in my netted bag – Bag from Shop Zero (R36)
Image: Anna Cocks

This week I took the next step and went shopping for those Mason jars, those netted bags for fruit and I hit the online health shops to equip me in this start-up phase. Obviously the start-up of any adventure is going to require a little more spending but in the end you will save on costs later…and you’ll save the environment (the main reason for this).

I have been following Lauren Singer’s blog, Trash is for Tossers, to get tips on how to live this lifestyle and make the necessary changes slowly one by one. I first encountered Lauren on a Ted Talk talking about her journey of producing one jar of trash a year. She then introduced me to Bea Johnson and her blog Zero Waste Home. These two women have been my inspiration for this journey. But the thing is Lauren and Bea live in England and France respectively. So the challenge for me is to see how I can live this lifestyle as a South African – with the resources we have – and on a student budget – with even more limited financial resources.

`The Why?`

Lauren encourages all new comers to the movement to establish their why? This is so you establish your inner motive for doing this in which you can draw inspiration from when times get tough.

For me: I am tired of seeing plastic float around in the ocean. I’m tired of seeing turtles, dolphins, fish and birds with plastic and balloons in their stomachs. It’s simple, I want to contribute to the difference and change in improving our climate situation.

With that covered it’s time to start the change…

I met with a 3^rd year Marine Biology student and friend of mine, Danel Wentzel, to hear her tips in what to change and focus on first. She has been on this adventure for nearly a year. After moving to Cape Town from Potchefstroom and learning in her course about the plastic situation in our ocean she decided to take action.

“I saw when I went surfing or diving, the trash everywhere. I wanted to give back to the ocean so future generations might enjoy what I can enjoy now.”

Thus Dani has been doing all in her power to recycle, re-use, reduce and refuse. She also participates in monthly beach clean-ups. Last weekend, she with 150 other people, collected 22kgs of plastic from the Dalebrook rock pools. As Cape Townians say it, “HECTIC!”

Dani at Nude Foods
Image: @mermaid_danii

Dani has made the decision to support local stores and markets. She also focuses on buying things in season which saves on money and allows her to focus on what local places are selling.
For her she has not said no to take-away food. She is simply more prepared and takes containers with her to restaurants. “You’ll be surprised at how obliging restaurants are,” she expresses to me. For her it’s about finding those better alternatives. When grocery shopping, if there’s no way to avoid unrecyclable packaging rather buy the good in a glass jar than a plastic container.

Being prepared and taking your own snacks to varsity is highly encouraged in Dani’s book. Dani indulges in banana chips, fruit, and date bars which she makes on the weekend. And you might be saying, “Ain’t nobody got time for that.” Well, if a 3^rd year marine bio student with a full schedule of volunteer work on the weekend can do it than I think you can find the time. It’s all about what you are prepared to do.

I promise Dani is normal. She still shops at normal places like Checkers, which is now packaging their meat in compostable containers. And she does own a car. She is privileged to drive a Jeep which eats petrol like we breathe oxygen. She has received backlash from people saying, “How can you be an advocate for the environment and drive that non-eco-friendly car?” She responds by saying, “This is all a process…and I am still doing better than the guy who isn’t doing anything”.

I sat with Dani and she helped me establish my first steps. We decided to tackle the food sphere of life. Buying groceries and wanting to live a zero-waste lifestyle is difficult because everything comes in plastic packaging. So we came up with some alternative solutions. We started with the basics:

Me in Shop Zero having the time of my life buying some re-usable packaging/bags.
Image: Sebastian Dunnington

When buying fruit or vegetables use a light weight netted bag to place your produce in for weighing. Pick ‘n Pay is running a trial run with these bags that can be purchased at the Rondebosch, Constantia, Gardens, Melkbos, Vangate Mall and Wynberg stores for R7,50. Or can be purchased from Shop Zero, 2 bags for the price of R66. These bags are washable and re-usable.

You could use a brown paper bag to purchase your bread from any store’s bakery. At Checkers it’s about R11 to purchase the bread. And brown bags can be purchased in bulk from any stationary shop for about 60c per paper bag.

Unfortunately we didn’t find an alternative for milk. So I’m just buying it and recycling the plastic container afterwards. If you know of a solution, then drop a comment.

Finally I bought jars! I went to checkers and bought one of each:

Item	Rand
1L Glass Jar	19,99
500ml glass jar	9,99
350ml glass jar	8,99
Total	38,97

Okay, so you probably don’t need to buy jars, you can re-use old jam jars. And Shop Zero has a crate of old jars that customers can take for free. I simply just couldn’t resist.

My jars from Checkers: (left to right) the 350ml, the 500ml and the 1L jar.
Image: Anna Cocks

I use my jars for honey, popcorn, baking soda, flour, olive oil. You take them to Nude Foods or Shop Zero and fill them up with whatever you need. It’s much cheaper.

For instance:
I saved R4 per gram of popcorn when I bought 830g of popcorn for R24,90 at Shop Zero.

The changes are little. I have mainly used re-usable bags and jars to purchase the groceries I possibly can in this way and I’ve recycled the packaging I can’t avoid (aka milk carton).

I personally spent R104.97 in starting up this phase, but obviously you can cut what expenses you wish:

1L Glass Jar	19,99
500ml glass jar	9,99
350ml glass jar	8,99
2 x mesh bag	66
Total	104,97

It’s all completely worth it and I’ve enjoyed this week of trying this new, refreshing way of living.

Do’s and Don’ts of recycling

I discovered Treevolution’s, The beginner’s guide to recycling, today. It’s a comprehensive document educating one on how to effectively recycle.

When you first open the PDF you presented with a quiz to test how well you are carrying out the 3 Rs: reuse, reduce, recycle.

I got a score of 40, so I’m not doing to badly I think.

The Do’s and Don’ts

It is important that recyclables are clean and dry when placed into bins. Please wash your recyclables so as to avoid contamination.

Metals to be recycled:

Aluminium cans
Steel cans
Food tins
Aluminium foil
Aerosol cans

Glass to be recycled:

Focus on recycling drinking glass bottles or general glass bottles. Glass bulbs, drinking glasses and T.V. screens cannot be recycled.
Fact: According to the Glass Recycling Company, in South Africa about 42% of glass is recycled. 86% of glass is prevented from going to landfill sites due to the returnable bottle system.

Paper:

Here are the different types of paper that you can collect for recycling:

white office paper
envelopes and shredded paper
all types of card board boxes
magazines and brochures
newspapers
wine bottle sleeves
egg cartons
pamphlets and telephone directories
paper gift wrap

Paper that can’t be recycled:

Wet or soiled paper or cardboard products
Waxcoated, or foillined paper and cardboard
Postit notes (because of the glue)

Tip: keep your paper clean and dry

Tetrapak:

Fruit juice and milk containers look like they’re made out of paper, but they are lined with aluminium foil and plastic so they must be recycled separately.

For more information go to https://www.tetrapak.com/za/sustainability/environmentalactivitiesinsouthafrica

Plastic:

All plastic packaging should have a triangle with a number inside to indicate the type of plastic. PET (or number 1 plastic), HDPE (number 2) and LDPE (number 4) are the most “popular” plastics for recycling in South Africa. Number 5 and 6 are collected at some sites.
Tip: It’s always good to check for yourself which plastics your nearest recycle-depot processes.

A small cause, but a big problem: Micro-plastics

Let’s talk about a small object that is causing big problems in our oceans: MICRO-PLASTICS

Man holding a couple of nurdles
Image: Obtained from the TwoOceans Aquarium site

What are micro-plastics?

Micro-plastics are small plastic pieces/granules/pellets/flakes/beads/nurdles that are 5mm or smaller. The term was phrased in 2004 and the definition agreed upon at a International microplastics workshop hosted by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) in the States.

Primary microplastics are tiny resin pellets used as a precursor in the production of industrial plastics and can be found in hygiene and personal care products such as make-up, facial scrubs, cleaning products, insect repellents, sunscreen and tooth paste.

Secondary micro-plastics form from the biological, chemical and physical break-down processes of macro-plastics floating in the ocean or river systems.
A third source of micro-plastic are from synthetic fibres released during washing cycles.

These microplastics enter river systems and the ocean through sewage disposals or industrial spillages. As unbelievable as it seems Durban has had a micro-plastic spillage in the past.

What happened in Durban?

On October 10, 2017, a container of nurdles (micro-plastic pellets) was swept off a cargo ship in the Durban harbour during heavy winds and storm conditions. This sent 49 tons of plastic nurdles washing up on South Africa’s east coast and into South Africa’s ocean currents. It was reported that these nurdles traveled along the Durban coastline, around the tip of Africa, and along and up the West Coast. Authorities were able to clean-up one third of the nurdles which has left more than 1 billion nurdles swimming in global currents. A year later Australia’s western shores were experiencing a micro-plastic invasion due to this plastic spillage.

The reason I bring up this story is to show that we don’t fully know the effects of our actions. A spillage that happened two years ago now, is having dire consequences on marine life and is affecting not only South Africa’s marine life but other places in the world.

What the problem looks like now:

Micro-plastics are found within all the five matrices of marine environment: on water surfaces, in water columns, on beaches, in marine sediments, and on the sea floor.
Scientists, Chibuisi Alimba and Caterina Faggio estimated, “About 5000 g of primary microplastics from personal hygiene and health care products gain entry into waste streams that end up in marine environment every year.” In South Africa, micro-plastics can be found along the coast lines, in the urban estuaries of KwaZulu-Natal, in our dams and in our sediment cores.

Who does this effect?

Micro-plastics affect marine life as they eat plastic pellets that look like their food. Their stomachs are believed to be full but actually they starve to death. Micro-plastics release and attract chemical pollutants making them more toxic than the surrounding water. As marine life ingest the micro-plastic the plastic can enter into their cells and affect neurological activity, release toxins in the body causing sickness, and effect molecular, cellular, organ, and organismic levels. Whole food chains can be affected. Larger marine animals have been found with micro-plastic in their stomachs from ingesting bottom feeders who diet on plastic pellets. Humans are also at threat of ingesting micro-plastics through eating marine life. The effects this has on us has not been fully discovered.

The Solutions

A good place to start would be to recycle as much plastic as possible.
Building eco-bricks are a fantastic way for non-recyclable plastic to be saved from the destinations of landfills and oceans. Eco-bricks are even being used to build homes for people so why not contribute in solving two issues: poverty and environmental sustainability.
Policies can always be changed or introduced around these issues. Plastic packaging can be banned or alternative packaging introduced. Policies could be introduced forcing factories to find alternatives for micro-plastic in cosmetics.

The solutions begin with all of us: producers, retailers, consumers, business people, designers, scientists, conservationists, government, and finally society.

The start-up of a zero-waste lifestyle

You know when you say you are going to start something but never end up doing what you say. Well this sort of happened with this zero-waste lifestyle I wanted to begin. But then I chatted to my mom (the one who always calms me down) and she revealed to me that I’d actually started this journey about a month ago…

Living a zero-waste lifestyle means trying to live a life that is as little dependent on plastic as possible. It’s about choosing a lifestyle away from generating waste; basically making your carbon footprint smaller. It requires great patients, doesn’t happen over night and includes a lot of small changes:

I live in a two bedroom flat in a block of six flats. And we’re situated in a complex that houses about 35 flats. That’s about 70 to 100 people living on one property. Every Monday our garbage gets collected. 8 bins get put outside filled with black plastic bags ready to be collect and dumped at one of Cape Town’s 3 legal landfills: Bellville South, Coastal Park (near Muizenberg) and Vissershok (in Table View). The issue is these landfills have nearly reached their capacity. The Coastal Park landfill was meant to last until 2030, but may even have to be closed this year.

I’ve grown up informed on the delicate situation of our warming planet and I’ve been taught throughout my life that recycling is one of the ways to lessen the effects of our litter pollution and help towards keeping our planet sustainable. How could I, as an Environmental Student and with the education I’ve been afforded, let so much rubbish from one location end in a place that causes more disaster for the planet? For me this didn’t seem right…So two months ago I got in touch with our Body Corp and requested that we employ a recycling service and house recycling bins on our property. And to my surprise, a mouth later, four wheelie recycling bins stood next to our other trash bins.

Our Body Corp chose to use Kool Waste Recycling as our recycling service. At a fee of R50 a month they collect your recyclables (paper, glass, tin and plastic) and deliver them to the Oasis Association who then separate the materials and pass them onto the various recycling companies for the necessary processing. I’m not sure who is paying this fee in our building because none of our fees have gone up #blessed.

This felt like a small victory. If your building does not have a recycling service, I highly encourage you to send a quick email to someone in charge requesting one. It doesn’t take long to send an email and there is such a reward in having this service. Contrary to lazy humans, recycling doesn’t add more hassle to your life and your conscience feels satisfied knowing you’re making a small contribution to solving a global problem.

So we have been recycling for a month now and this is the beginning of my zero-waste journey.

The zero-waste lifestyle is a journey. Like I said it is not going to happen over night but involves a person making small changes to their everyday living – changing habits one by one until your old habits become your new zero-waste living habits. So it’s important for one to remember to be patient as one begins to rewrite some very familiar ways of living.

The key to this new lifestyle is making little changes. I’ve started by:

recycling
building an eco-brick
carrying a metal straw with me wherever I go
carrying an eco-coffee cup with me
taking my own lunch to varsity in re-usable plastic containers

The beginning has been fairly easy. It has started with the decision to make the choice to do this and that has urged me to make these changes. I find the biggest challenge at the moment is being prepared. Being prepared to go shopping with all my material re-usable bags. Being prepared enough in the mornings to make myself lunch so I don’t buy lunch in single-use plastic. Or being prepared to take my eco-coffee cup or a container to a cafe or take-away restaurant. But as you do life, you remember these things, and the more you practice these easy steps the more they become ingrained in your daily routine.

I was fortunate enough to be given a William Morris Eco-cup for my birthday. The straw was given to me for a diving event I did. Look how full my eco-brick is!
Image: Anna Cocks

The Story of Some RADDicle Science

A Manchester lad, Mike Barron, is busy conducting research projects and leading citizen science expeditions to help conserve Cape Town’s seas.

The Founder of Cape RADD, Mike Barron
Image: Anna Cocks

Cape RADD (Research and Diver Development) is a one of those new companies in our economy that is radically working to support ocean conservation efforts. Their focus lies within two main pillars: the marine science scuba field course and citizen science projects. The field course equips new emerging marine biologists or professional scuba divers to accurately retrieve data and assist in Cape RADD’s research projects. My interest, however, lies in the Citizen Science Days Cape RADD runs. Being an ocean lover/conservationist but not a researcher this experience is perfect for the type of person like me – the average Mo.

Cape RADD offers Citizen Science expeditions where they take people, either snorkelling or scuba diving, to learn more about the ocean ecosystems on their doorsteps and more about the wildlife that breathes beneath our seas.

I first encountered this concept through the Underwater Club when they partnered with Mike to do a Citizen Science scuba dive. This involves one getting in the water with slates and pencils, swimming around kelp forests and identifying fish. I felt intimidated signing up…I’m an EGS (Environmental Science) major, what do I know about identifying fish…but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to go for a dive.

Mike getting into his rad Land Rover
Image: Anna Cocks

We arrived in Simon’s Town where we met Mike. Mike is one of those rad dudes with the Land Rover and many stories to tell about his travels. And he has travelled. He’s lived in England; studied zoology and conservation at Bangor University in North Whales; worked on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef and Ningaloo Reef, and obtained his Masters in Zoology from the University of Pretoria while working on shark deterrents in Mossel Bay. And now finally he resides in Simon’s Town along the beauty of the Cape Peninsula.

Upon arrival, we were directed to Cape RADD’s offices in the Pisces Divers centre where we were given a brief about the ocean ecosystem we would be swimming in. Mike also gave a brief history around the concept of Citizen Science.

Citizen Science has been around since the concept of ‘scientific research’ began. Jonathan Silvertown writes in his paper A new dawn for citizen science that along with Charles Darwin very few scientists were paid for their profession two centuries ago. He writes that Citizen Science was previously frowned upon by scientists because the public were believed to lack the skill to accurately collect data. However, in the last five to ten years the concept of citizen science has become quite popular. This is due to three reasons: firstly, the use of new technological instruments has meant more accurate data can be collected. Secondly, some scientists see citizens as a free labour force to bring in valuable research. Thirdly, research funders “impose upon every grant-holder to undertake project-related science outreach,” and what better way to achieve this than to involve the public in assisting you with your work.

With the history covered, we were educated on the type of fish we could typically expect to see and how we could identify them. Lastly were given our slates and pencils, and it was time to go beneath the surface.

Me with my slate and pencil identifying fish
Image: Francois van Schalkwyk

The conditions were perfect, the visibility was grand and suddenly my eyes were open to a whole new world. I’ve dived at Miller’s Point plenty of times but never had I seen it the way I did when we were swimming next to Mike and been shown all the fish, nudibranchs, shysharks and octopus. There were Red Romans, Galjoens and Pyjama Sharks. And the list simply continues. I was with many marine biologist students who knew the names of most of the fish they were identifying. So I mainly stuck with Mike and he was more than happy to help me place name to fish. I will say breathing underwater is an epic experience but being able to write underwater is surprisingly the most fantastical feeling. The thrill of writing under water was something I’ve never experienced before and yes I did play hang-man with my dive buddy.

Sea Urchins looking pretty with a Red Roman swimming in the background
Image: Anna Cocks

The dive came to the end and we re-assembled in the parking lot. We handed our slates to Mike who will release the data collected on the type and quantity of fish we’d seen that day onto many of their databases such as ELMO, iNaturalist, and EchinoMAP. This is then available for scientists to analyse and use for research purposes, mainly contributing to ocean conservation.

Mike looking out over the ocean
Image: Anna Cocks

I chatted to Mike on how he came up with this local expedition while we packed-up the gear. He expressed that with round about 20 people hopping into Cape Town’s waters each weekend for recreational scuba diving, he was curious to know why people shouldn’t get involved and learn more about ocean conservation instead of only putting dive gear on? He told me, “We wanted to blur those lines between recreation diving and scientific diving and make it more accessible to the masses.”

The aim of Cape RADD’s citizen science is to unite the community to get involved with understanding their oceans. This experience aims to develop oneself to engage with the threats of the ocean and contribute to finding a solution. It involves education in the hopes that society will change their ways of living and pressure those in power to change poor policies around ocean conservation.

Mike expresses, “Good news stories are out there but the threats are always there. It is basically like putting fires out.”
He continues to express how, locally, crayfish populations are declining and abalone poaching is a massive problem now. But overall the situation is getting better and as awareness becomes the order of the day, so does pressure get placed on authorities to improve policies. It is a continuous job but as Mike ends with saying, “I’m trying to stay positive.”

Diver24

Every year the UCT Underwater Club hosts this event called Diver24, in which students dive for 24 hours straight in the I&J exhibit at the Two Oceans Aquarium. It is all in the name of fun and fundraising. Through this event the club raises money for The Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) and the turtle rescue, rehabilitation and release programme of the Two Oceans Aquarium Education Foundation. Scuba divers and freedivers are all given a chance to swim in the tank and enjoy life beneath the surface with the turtles, stingrays, musselcrackers and fish. Among the fish in the tank is a Giant Guitarfish, found naturally in the Red Sea and western Indian Ocean. It is a vulnerable species due to its over-exploitation for its fin used in shark fin soup.
The turtles in the tank, both Green sea turtles, are Bob and Alvi (short for Alveoli due to the lung infection he had). Both had ingested plastic and were rescued by the aquarium where they are now undergoing rehabilitation and are soon to be released.

Besides spending long periods of time under water at ridiculous hours of the day, the evening consisted of talks, board games, movies such as Finding Nemo and Surfs Up (how could we not), and sleeping in the coolest places in the Aquarium. Imagine sleeping next to jellyfish in the Jelly Gallery or sleeping next to sharks in the Predators Exhibit or falling asleep to the calm sway of the Kelp Forest Exhibit – literally the best way to go to sleep.
The talks were conducted by SANCCOB and the Two Oceans Aquarium. Kyle Maurer from SANCCOB educated us on how the foundation tirelessly works to protect and rehabilitate sea birds all through public funding. Hailey McLellan, the environmental campaigner for the Two Oceans Aquarium, introduced us to her project, ‘Rethink the bag’. She inspired us all to ditch single-use plastic and turn to alternative ways instead of using straws, plastic cups and balloons. These single-use plastic items are killing our marine life and it’s time we took responsibility for our actions and change the way we live our lives.

She urged us to start small. Make small adjustments to our lives such as refusing straws at restaurants or taking our own coffee cups to cafes; then slowly move to bigger changes such as not buying groceries that are packaged in plastic containers. It’s a process and a journey, one that will take time. But it is one that needs to happen if we ever want our children to see turtles swimming in the ocean or even to see what a clean, natural beach looks like.

A little memento of the evening.
Video: Anna Cocks

A huge thanks to the Underwater Club for organising this event and to the Two Oceans Aquarium for allowing us to sleepover and swim in your tank.