Officially two days before the Paapedi; it is full steam ahead with preparations!

Hello, my name is Jie Chen, an international Eco Friendly Volunteer who just arrived in Sri Lanka about a 36 hours ago from San Francisco, California. Immediately I was warmly welcomed into Kanchana’s home, which doubles as Eco-V’s headquarters, and by her team of volunteers who have been working tirelessly to put together various components of the bicycle journey for climate justice.

I met Kanchana for the first time in November 2012 when she paid the Crissy Field Center a visit. We were sharing about each other’s work with young people and I could immediately see the passion she had about her work in developing a more environmentally conscious and just society in her home country of Sri Lanka.

I was drawn to participate in this journey for many reasons. One of which was the immense potential for an exchange of learning of best practices and also a professional development opportunity for myself. It was also a great opportunity to see how, through the journey of a 10 day bike ride, young leaders would be inspired and trained to become tomorrow’s environmental stewards.

In the past 36 hours I have been able to witness the hustle and bustle of Eco-V’s office (in no particular order):

          ·         endless phone calls, faxes, and errand running to manage and changes and finalize and confirm plans

          ·         media studio interviews and communication with two major Sri Lanka networks Sirasa and MTV Sports

          ·         The pick up of supplies: bikes, helmets, repair equipment, water bottles, t-shirts, first aid, pamphlet and curriculum materials, and more

          ·         the organizing of the camera crew (Kanchana’s own brother) to document the journey and the stories of the ride

          ·         updating social media outlets

I look forward to the next couple days when the yathra (journey) officially begins. We will jump right onto a train and head towards Anuradhapura where all the yathris will convene together for the first time from different areas of Sri Lanka. We will start riding 28.4km towards the town of Thambuttegama in the first leg of our 234km journey.

Please continue to visit this blog for more updates in the next few days!

Jie Chen

 

Exploring Anuradhapura to Wariyapola on Paapedi route

Thalawa tank- one of the awareness sites for Paapedi 2013

Planning ahead of Paapedi in Thalawa

Last Monday Kanchana, Trudy and I (Sion) spent the day finalizing the route and logistics for Paapedi.  We left home before the sunrise and when I woke up in the back of the van the sky was gray and raining.  We were approaching Anuradhapura, our first stop for the day and starting point of the bicycle journey.  The air was cool and the scenery a lush green.  The tanks seemed full to capacity and the landscape looked to be an endless wetland.  This is a completely different scene than in the dry season, where the landscape is arid and brown.  The bicycle journey will be wonderful and the participants will get a real treat seeing all the greenery, the birdlife and the tanks.

We stopped briefly for a string hopper breakfast before entering Anuradhapura.  I’d never been there before, but was struck by how calm, clean and quaint the town seemed.  It is of course one of the ancient cities of Sri Lanka and it is nice to see that the modern life has not completely taken over.  Our first visit was to the secretary of the provincial council.  We entered a massive government complex and found his office.  Kanchana spoke with him about our journey and confirmed their support and collaboration.  He agreed to have a small ceremony for the yaathris before leaving Anuradhapura and Kanchana agreed to offer a workshop for media representatives.  The goal of the workshop is to educate the media about the issues that we will be talking about on the journey so that their coverage is accurate and educational for the public.

From there we visited an ancient dagoba (stupa) where we paid a visit to the head monk.  While we waited for him we observed the langurs in the trees and enjoyed talking about birds.  When the head monk arrived Kanchana requested that he offer some blessing or ceremony to the yaathris before we start the journey.  He was willing to do it and agreed that on the 14^th in the evening we would come to the dagoba and he would lead some chanting and ceremony for our group.  Everything was falling into place.

From there we visited the circuit bungalow where we will spend the first two nights.  The accommodation is nice and close to a tank where we will be able to do yoga in the morning and begin our preparations for the journey. 

We left Anuradhapura and continued on to Thambuttegama, our second stop.  Before reaching Thambuttegama we stopped in Thalawa to meet a contact of Kanchana.  He learned about Eco-V from the Kelani Nadee Yatra and was interested in helping with Paapedi.  He introduced us to the local council and showed their garden.  It was a nice mandala style garden, but clearly there was not a great interested to keep it up.  He expressed concern because they had sprayed “round up” a weedicide to kill the grass.  We agreed that it would be a good place to bring the yaathris to learn.  From there we went to the local tank and saw some beautiful trees.  Kanchana explained that they were planted by the British and have some harmful effects on bees.  They decided to arrange to plant some native trees nearby so that after the life of the non-native trees, the natives could grow up in their place.  What a nice idea!

After this meeting, we continued on the Thambuttegama where we were searching for accommodation.  We met the manager of a hotel and in conversation, Kanchana helped him to understand how to make better environmental choices, like switching from very dark curtains to lighter curtains so he wouldn’t have to use the lights during the day.  He was open to learning and said that he would help find accommodation for us.

We continued on to Galgamua where we went in search of a place for the yaathris to stay.  We visited the irrigation department training campus which is set in a beautiful garden.  Unfortunately the head of the center said that the facilities were completely occupied because they host students there.  She suggested a few places to us and we visited a lovely little guesthouse where we will be staying.  It is located on the banks of a beautiful tank.  The family that runs the guesthouse is willing to help us and we all thought that the location would be great for the group to stay.

From Galgamua we carried on to Variapola, our last stop of the day.  We checked in with the agriculture training school to confirm accommodation for the group.  Everything there is set and we spend the last of the afternoon light enjoying the garden and visiting a local nursery.  From here we spend the next few hours coming back to the city.  The roads get progressively more crowded and there are more and more shops along the way. 

The day was beautiful and the roads are quiet in the north.  It will be a pleasure to ride our bikes through the country.  I’m very excited for the journey and it feels that the experience will be so rewarding and transformative.  Go Paapedi!

Sion

Legendary Cricketer Muthiah Muralitharan Endorses ECO-V’s Paapedi 2013

As the countdown for Paapedi 2013 begins, World Class Cricketer Muthiah Muralitharan’s endorsement has been a tremendous encouragement for all at ECO-V.We are much grateful  to

 Mr. Kushil Gunasekera  Founder, Foundation of Goodness, who has made this endorsement a reality and for the support he extends towards Paapedi.

With just 11 days to Paapedi, we are faced with new challenges everyday; to have the support of this legendary personality has given us the extra energy to achieve our goals. Mr. Muthiah has long been actively supporting environmental causes in Sri Lanka, and we admire his dedication towards Mother Earth. Hopefully this brilliant message will reach the youth & encourage them to join with us to combat Climate Change on an individual and global level.

 

Dhilmi

 

Hello! I’m Dhilmi Suriyaarachchi, a medical student from Sri-Lanka. Currently I am on my semester vacation, thoroughly enjoying my time working with ECO-V.  

Jai, Preethi,Sameera, Kanchana, Kavindu and Dhilmi at ECO-V office

I was excited to be a part of ECO-V’s  first project for 2013, Paapedi : A bicycle journey for climate justice. I found this journey very close to my own love for nature and long overlooked passion for cycling. Kanchana Weerakoon, ECO-V’s ‘Mum’, had me awe-struck the first day I met her. Her energy and dedication for Nature was captivating!

I was introduced to ECO-V at a very crucial point in organizing Paapedi.  Quite often, we are exposed to selfishly driven ideas & corruption dominating everyday life. I was pleasantly surprised by ECO-V. Every project revolves around nothing but pure love for Mother Nature. Isn’t that amazing?? It has re-instilled my hope that honest work is not an entity of the past. 

The office is beautifully surrounded by a natural wetland. You can feel  the cool breeze flowing in, birds chirping, and the buzz of nature! It’s a lovely space. While working, Kanchana shares snippets of precious knowledge with us, which reminds me of one occasion when she taught us effective hand washing with slightly opened tap, we cannot shrug off the image of her listening closely to see if we are wasting water !!!

I went on to take up social media. Our objective was to inter-link the various social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Blogs e.t.c to bring together a virtual ECO-V network. Through this network we could build a platform to communicate with similar organisations, whilst connecting Nature lovers all over the world. 

I realize everything I learn, knowledge & insight gained is definitely one of the most positive influential experiences in my life. I am lucky to be a part of it. I’m sure our collaborative effort, as team, comprising of volunteers and ECO-V members, will make powerful footsteps towards a greener, beautiful Sri-Lanka. Our dream is to popularize bicycle riding among young generation and country moving towards green transportation and sustainability to combat Climate change!

You can help us to achieve these objectives through “Paapedi”. We have crowd funding event on

http://www.pozible.com/project/15721/

ECO-V Page: www.facebook.com/ecovsrilanka.

Paapedi event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/533497810004978/

"Paapedi" will be  a 10 day bicycle ride empowering green youth leaders

The first Volunteer for ECO-V in 2013

My name is Raquel, I come from Spain but I´m traveling around Asia since 4 month ago.

Besides discovering new places and cultural, my goal is collaborate on projects to improve the living conditions based on sustainability. I´ve been helping in construction of schools, organic farming, sustainability education for children.

On 24^th of January I´ve arrive to Sri Lanka and I started to look for local projects that I can join with.

Suddenly ECO-V appeared in front of me on the Internet; ecological organization mostly with local volunteers to support conservation of the environment.

Interesting to me! I didn´t read much and without hesitation I sent an email to request more information.

Everything happened very quickly. Kanchana informed me about the next project (Paapedi) and invited me to attend the next meeting with the others volunteers and without thinking twice I went there.

Very impressed with the amount of people that assisted and the idea of the project I hope to contribute on it.

It was also great to see projects from other organizations and how they can help each other as well as a lot of young (less than 30 years old) interested in contributing to its work. Paapedi, consist in a bicycle journey that will be take 10 days travel from Anuradhapura to Colombo with 25 youth. During this fascinating journey young will learn about the climate change, environmental conservation, organic agriculture, local traditions…Through the project aims to create young green leaders bringing them training, information and living the experience. Also it wishes to encourage sustainable transports like bicycles and share the experience with the local communities where they will stop.

During office work...volunteers busy at work!

There is a lot of job to do so next day it was a worker´s meeting in Kanchana´s office where we set up all the tasks that have to be done: media, contacts, logistics… and how to divide them in the team.

For me it is a great experience to share with other people and other country my experiences but it is very grateful to live how a project like this could be done in a country so different that mine.

All the actions that is necessary to do like meetings with ministries, organizations, sponsors…

Media, logistics, coordination, budget…. So many things that each one chose according on their skills.

Join with us......(Nadeesha, Raquel, Kanchana,Sujatha,Jai, Sameera)

Working, talking, eating with them is something that enriches me, is the real way to live and learn from a culture. 

Being and living with a local people is something that I recommend to all those travelers who besides want to visit the beautiful sites of a country want to know something of their culture.

By other hand, projects like Paapedi make us grow as person. Because if humans do not respect and give back to nature what it offers us we can´t be called person.

Thank you for your dedication Kanchana, without your dedication and perseverance, many young people do not appreciate the value of our Mother Earth.

Very grateful for the opportunity to enjoy with ECO-V,

Raquel .