SY future plan: a global community of purpose..join us actively

Dear all,
Thanks for showing interest to be with us at Sustainable Youth Community. as you know, Sustainable Youth is promoting Green Lifestyle among youth and trying to contribute towards Sustainable Development. This is not a NGO rather a Global Community or Greater Family solely based on interest to create a futuristic eco-friendly society with innovative alternatives. To extend the existence of human beings on Earth.

Sustainable Lifestyle does not only mean using eco-friendly products, it's about a healthy lifestyle that is going to fit into our future. In brief within current and future economic set up nuclear families are coming under enormous mental/economic pressures to cope up with various needs and expenditures. Many such families are even broken up in divorce. In this situation, community life is the only way out.
Community like Sustainable Youth will provide services like: medical insurance, legal and financial guidance, logistics transfer, recreation tour etc. Even your children can be looked after by other community members who gets time. However, we need to follow practical steps with enthusiasm to build this dream community.

~*~As the second step of the growth plan, Sustainable Youth wants to
make www.sustainableyouth.org as next generation social networking site with field activities and community support services for paid members (both associate and advisory) who are willing to commit for SY activities. The beta version is already uploaded. The portal would invite visitors for following purposes:

1. investors, financiers and advertisers> information about activities/ projects

2. non-members> information about activities/ projects, topics on forum, sample member's home page, benefits for a paid member

3. free-members>information about activities/ projects, access forum and information database/links, member's home page, benefits for a paid member

4. paid-members (both associate and advisory)>information about activities/ projects, access forum and information database/links, member's home page, registration for community services like medical insurance, financial planning guidance, travelling and logistics booking service etc. registration for activities, submission of report in text, graphic and video format, payment account for honorarium transfer or yearly membership fees submission.

SY Web (beta):
www.sustainableyouth.org

this portal is going to be re-designed by professionals. above 10 people including some web design farms and freelance designers have shown interest and we have received 3 full quotations. the most economical one would around INR 35000-40000 or USD 875-1000 (revised on Nov 28, 07). we are looking for sponsorships from companies or organizations dealing with eco-friendly products and services now. we hope to get generous help from all of you.

~*~however the sub domain with detail reports of our previous
activities will remain available at:
SY Infobase:
www.sycomm.byethost9.com/home.html

~*~Sustainable Youth has opened a News Service through googlegroups.com to mailcast news on environment, lifestyle and sustainability related issues (daily), job openings (as soon as received), community activities (weekly) and member responses (monthly). Anyone interested to have this mailcast is welcome to subscribe at

SY News Service:
http://groups.google.com/group/synews

~*~Sustainable Youth has opened a Blog to publish its Online Magazine. this will contain recent reports of our activities both online and on the field. please visit the blog site and catch the feed.

SY Online Magazine:
www.syinfo.blogspot.com

~*~and till today, we are most active on orkut.com where we originated on April 30, 2006. check our forum and take part in discussion.

SY on Orkut:
http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=12663294

The online forum, wiki and shopping mall are still to follow.

our future activities will focused on 5 basic stands:
1. activities should be useful or real time initiatives towards sustainable development.
2. activities should fit into lives of both crazy pupil inside University campus as well as busy professional in the office or field.
3. activities should primarily aimed at changing our own lifestyle to preserve both our joy and natural resources.
4. activities should be innovative and practical enough to change the conventional approach whenever it is required.
5. activities should fit into our long term growth plan.

~*~The community will be registered as trust, will be handled by the core members (comprising committed associate as well as advisory members) and will abide by legal bindings of the location where it's going to be registered.

~*~Sarit is just one of the initiator, along with Arun Murali,Srinivas Cherla and Rahul Bhat et al. and will help this system to run on its feet.

~*~we have our draft constitution comprising vision, commitment, policy and growth plan. the document is attached herewith. please take a look. its only a draft to start with. every member and well wisher has the right to point out fallacies and is welcome to put more innovative thoughts as well as practical planning.

So, join us actively. those who really take part in designing our activities or want to share similar activities, please send your ideas to this id . we need people around the world to make teams to manage our services described above. we also need to locate sources of funding and unconditional donations.

Happy Diwali , make it Green

Diwali is the Festival of Lights being celebrated in different parts of India and by Indian communities around the world. It is being celebrated with fervour and gaiety during November first week, just before the winter sets in. The festival is celebrated by young and old, rich and poor, to dispel darkness and light up their lives. The festival symbolizes unity in diversity as every state celebrates it in its own special way. Diwali is common for Hindus, Sikhs and Jain religious communities. Diwali is known in various names in different parts of India like Deepabali, Deepavali, Deepawali etc. These festivals with their own history and origin are very much similar in style of celebration, the motto and obviously relevant questions of sustainability.

For getting more details on history and origin, please check the following links:

http://www.indiaexpress.com/faith/festivals/dhistory.html
http://rumela.com/events/festival_diwali_history.htm
and many more by searching “diwali, history” on any search engine.

Diwali is generally celebrated by illuminating houses with diya or pradeep or deep (a handmade illuminating stuff with small bowl and a lit), candles and chain of tiny lamps along with decorating floor and walls with rangoli (a decoration practice using coloured pastes) bursting fire crackers and distributing sweets and sharing exciting gifts.

For getting more details on celebration in India as well as around the world, please check the following links:

http://rumela.com/events/festival_diwali.htm
http://www.thatsqingdao.com/images/qingdao/chinaFirecracker.jpg
and many more by searching “diwali, celebration” on any search engine.

Diwali celebration brings joy and fun for millions of people around the world. However, the usual way of bursting lots of noisy fire crackers, using excessive packing for gifts as well as electricity for illumination make the festival harmful to human health and environment and wasteful as well. The fire crackers made of a kind of gun powder create noise in the range of 100-150dBA which is well above the human tolerance of 80-90dBA. Such noise can cause hearing loss, increase in blood pressure and even heart attack. The crackers along other fireworks cause smoke with contains high amount of Sulphur di-oxide, Nitrogen oxides and heavy metals like Lead, Cadmium etc. According Government of NCT, Delhi, the air pollution level in the city manifolds upto 10 times during diwali. Exposure to such smoky air, could lead one to diseases like asthma, anaemia with kidney damage. The unburnt parts of the fireworks containing harmful chemicals like lead, copper, cadmium, sodium nitrite or potassium nitrate can contamination to water bodies. The wrapping for gift and other items piles up substantial amount of solid waste across the country. The washout of such mostly non-biodegradable substances chocks the drainage system and create flood like that in July, 2005 in Mumbai.

For getting more details on harmful side of diwali celebration as well as the legal initiatives taken to stop this menace, please check the following links:

http://www.diwalifestival.org/environmentally-safe-diwali.html
http://www.indiatogether.org/environment/articles/diwali.htm
http://environment.delhigovt.nic.in/cm_msg.html
and many more by searching “diwali, environment” on any search engine.

So, can we compromise our joy in Festival like Diwali for environment safety or healthy life? Surely, it’s a difficult choice for most of the common people and may be easy to choose joy for many of the youth despite knowing the harmful effects. Recently Yahoo Answers floated an online question on “How can we celebrate Diwali without harming the environment?” There are over 300 answers have been received for the resolved question. Many were a bit casual in answer, some answered in practical way making sceptic remarks like “Come on! diwali is the celebration of light and sound, if we compromise with fire crackers, then whats the diwali meant for????” Yes, you cannot ignore there voices, but you may look for some practical alternatives which keep the balance between these two sentiments. There are crazy people like the members of Sustainable Youth to suggest some innovative ways. And the best chosen answer has given the following blue print:

“we can have a crackers show for 2 hours in a common place where people can see and enjoy the crackers, instead of each doing at their home in a small way and making the whole city dusty with paper if in a common place

(1)the sound will be only for a particular time
(2) the paper dust will be only in one place
(3) the cost of diwali celebrations can be reduced
(4) no neighbours envy
(5) only a little of air and sound pollution
(6) can be had in a place far from hospitals
(7) safe measures can be ensured in that place
(8) monitoring of the safety of the people is easy
(9) enjoyment can be shared by all at the same place
(10) a get-together is easy”

She is not alone there are plenty of sensitive as well as innovative people out there. Even leading daily new papers in India viz. Indian Express, Times of India have come out with eco-friendly or sustainable way to celebrate diwali with available options.

For getting more details on question related to eco-friendly diwali celebration on yahoo answer and ways suggested in Indian Express and Times of India, please check the following links:

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071021080004AAysxRm
http://www.indianexpress.com/sunday/story/235205._.html
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-251216,prtpage-1.cms
and many more by searching “diwali, green” on any search engine.

Sustainable Youth, being a crazy community which believes in youthful innovation for sustainable lifestyle would like to offer following tips to “Make your Diwali Green” without compromising the level of joy and fun for people in India and abroad:

@ Buy and sell fire crackers which are tested not to create noise above 100dBA.
# Use fire crackers in the open field, during the days of Diwali only and within 10 pm.
$ Buy and send gifts with minimum wrapping.
% Collect the residues of fireworks and gift items and discard them to municipal solid waste collection system only.
@ Use earthen diyas or pradeeps or handmade candles to illuminate your home, reduce or do not use electric bulbs.
# Use public transport or pack up your new car with relatives or neighbours to have efficient usage of fuel.
% Be responsive to the inconvenience of your neighbours.
@ Go for community celebration, share the joy and happiness.

These tips are applicable for 2007 only, next year we may come up a new breed of fire crackers which produces maximum light with minimum harmful residues and noise to make diwali greener. And we would like to continue our similar campaign during Christmas this year.

Check our community page on Orkut for more discussion on Green Diwali tips:
http://www.orkut.com/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=12663294&tid=2564838554463078184&start=1

Sustainable Youth wishes a very happy diwali and requests to make it Green.