Marc Sahara of The Inconvenient Bag at a California Green TV filming. The episode airs on Thanksgiving Day at 8:30PM on KCET (left to right: Marc Eco, Huell Howser, World Famous Artist Greg Pnut Galinsky).
Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful for the challenges we have met thus far, and to be at peace knowing that people are becoming more open to our green message.
We are not alone and belong to an environmental movement that started long before we were born; our Eco-Forefathers are so proud. The first Eco-Americans could be traced as far back as 1845 when Henry David Thoreau decided to move to Walden Pond in order to grow his own food, live simpler and wonder in the wilderness to write poems (July 4, 1845). In 1892, the Sierra Club was formed and headed by John Muir. Muir was interested in preserving the environment because all things we do have a connection to the universe. In his honor, the California legislature authorized $10,000 to begin planning and construction of the John Muir Trail.
In 1969, the National Environmental Policy Act and Environmental Protection Agency were passed and the first Earth Day was celebrated on April 22, 1970. In 2005, the Kyoto treaty was ratified by the United Nations with its main focus on stopping Global Warming. Unfortunately, the United States has not yet ratified Kyoto.
Marc Sahara with Adrian Grenier of Entourage filming at the Season Finale of Alter Eco showing on December 11, 2008 on Discovery Channel's Planet Green.
Now in 2008, here we are. The torch has been passed to us as the new group of Eco-Americans setting aside our cultural, political and religious differences and joining together. We are not waiting for laws or treaties to force us to act, but rather we are voluntarily doing our own share in preserving this great city. We share this scarce resource called the City of Los Angeles and we are writing the next green chapter.
Naturally, none of us are perfect, and we all have days when we forget or are in a hurry. Life in Los Angeles is indeed in the fast lane, but I see many of us taking a moment to slow down. We are all making new conscious decisions we have never thought to do so before, and taking a day-by-day approach to begin changing our behavior which leads to larger steps and influences others.
Our new eco-friendly lifestyles not only have been saving us money (electricity, gas, etc.), but also has the fringe benefit of creating good feelings that radiate out of us onto others. Its so exciting living in Los Angeles today and shaping the future of our city. Our city leads the way in lifestyle and trends and everyone is watching us to see what we are doing and thus we are shaping the world.
For example, Hollywood is showing America eco-lifestyle programming. Sitcoms have green themes in them such as the Emmy Award Winning Shows, 30 Rock, featuring Al Gore in an episode and My Name Is Earl, which talked about reducing one’s own carbon footprint guest starring Christian Slater. Huell Howser dedicated an entire show, California Green, to plastic bag reduction in the Greater Los Angeles Area (see picture), and Discovery Channel’s Planet Green has an entire series based on eco-living and change starring Adrian Grenier from Entourage (see above photo).
So, my friend, what’s the next bullet point in your own green history? How about an Eco-Angelino Thanksgiving?
1) Instead of paper invitations, people could contact each other via email (or Evite). If invitations are needed there are recycled paper invitations and even paper with seeds embedded in it so when it decomposes, new life is set in motion. Seed paper is usually handmade and decorated just as beautifully as ordinary cards.
2) Turkey is a staple for Thanksgiving. You don’t have to go as far as my hero, Ed Begley Jr., who will probably be cooking his turkey in his solar oven! However, make sure that many people are over and that one (or each) turkey satisfies as many people as possible. Hence, the energy consumed is for many people (along the same lines, everyone could watch the football games on one energy-star TV instead of their own - watching football is better with others anyway). Side dishes could be organic, if possible, or have organic ingredients. Take your canvas bag and walk to your local farmers’ market to buy the best, freshest and tastiest organic foods and buy locally grown flowers for décor (guys you can shop with a canvas bag also, its not a purse!). Additionally, there are many new tasty organic and eco-friendly drinks and liquors.
3) Use dishes instead of plastic and paper. When finished fill the sink up and wash all the dishes at once. The less waste, the better. As a Japanese-American growing up, my mother taught me “Mottainai!” which in Japanese means “Don’t waste!”. There are now corn-based or post-consumer recycled goods that could be used if disposable products are needed, i.e., utensils, plates, trash liners, etc. Keep all water bottles, cans and glass for recycling. Moreover, try to use the same utensils over and over instead of a new plate, a new fork, etc. I have found that a great way to clean off my dinner fork for desert is to lick it!
4) Thanksgiving is family time, so have everyone over. Instead of scattered family celebrations, have one large Thanksgiving party where everyone could be at one location, possibly carpool and pitch in. Invite those people who have family out of the area. This would reduce the use of energy to one location while increasing the festivity! Also, you could get others to help clean up the place! For those of us who refuse to cook, there are many green options. My friend, Allan of Cater Green (www.catergreen.com), has a green solution for every catering need, including cleaning up and an awesome “zero waste” plan.
5) Green Cleanup: Besides setting up separate bins for recyclable goods, there are other forms of green cleanup. There are a multitude of green cleaning solutions available in your local stores, i.e., Begley’s Best, organic cleaning solutions, chemical free, etc. If a dish washer is to be used, make sure it is full and hopefully energy-star certified (or just have your favorite guest hand wash the dishes! See #3 above.). Furthermore, extra food could be donated to a shelter for others to enjoy - Mottainai! Those of you who go the extra step could compost earth-friendly waste for your own organic gardens.
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As you can see, this isn’t a huge change and I’m sure people have thought of even better tips than mine. My message always has been simple: We don’t have to change our life drastically and there’s no need for us to be scared that eco-friendly living means we can’t live a normal life. Instead, we all could do minor things that lead to major change and as a group, Los Angeles could really make a huge difference because there are so many of us with so much diversity - this is our strength. How does eco-friendly living fit into your culture or ethnicity?
Marc J. Sahara is the president of The Inconvenient Bag. You can join him on Thanksgiving Day at 8:30 p.m. at Huell Howser’s show “California Green” on KCET (Channel 28) in which he teams with Heal The Bay and Bristol Farms in showing how the Greater Los Angeles Area is reducing the usage of paper and plastic bags - a show with a positive solution.
Until then, Sahara says "there is one thing that is always reusable and free, its called love. Thus, recycle your love and have a Happy Eco-Thanksgiving!"
Original Post from: http://laist.com/2008/11/26/5_tips_for_an_ecofriendly_thanksgiv.php
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Eco-4th of July
July 3, 2008
Guest Post: July 4th- An Eco-American Holiday
How will you be spending the holiday? Many people see fireworks from the same location every year. Others search the city for the best show.
LAist friend Marc J. Sahara of The Inconvenient Bag has a few thoughts to share with us about celebrating July 4th. He spends his days trying to convince people to use canvas bags, recycle, and think about the world around us. Does the holiday create too much environmental waste for us to feel right about enjoying the fireworks?
I did not want to write a typical Fourth of July environmental warning or threat.
In fact, I was going to talk about how fireworks cause air pollution. Heavy metals and salts cause the many colors include barium, aluminum, lead, mercury salts, antimony, magnesium, etc which pollute our air and our lungs. I was going to discuss about the waste created by fireworks, which end up in our landfills, gutters and hillsides. Approximately 1,000 tons of new waste is created by fireworks each Fourth.
Furthermore, I could have written about the manufacturing of fireworks, in which raw materials and energy are used to create the product. These materials need to be mined from our planet and processed with chemicals in factories that pollute, i.e., Made in China. Then the fireworks are transported place to place until they finally reach us.
I wanted to compare a firework explosion to the limited convenience a plastic bag brings. A firework lasts for a short period of time, a plastic bag is used for 10 minutes. After a few seconds, that firework has caused damage to our environment and then immediately turns into toxic waste. After a few minutes, a plastic bag is thrown out, and will now spend the next few thousand years in our ocean or landfill breaking down into poison and toxins.
Finally, other topics I considered included fire season, water pollution, noise, transportation, accidents stemming from the misuse of legal or illegal fireworks, etc., etc.
However, I know there are many articles, blogs, news reports and police warnings bombarding us from now until the Fourth.
Therefore, instead of being negative, a loser, I'd thought I'd take this opportunity to be positive, a winner.
I'm here to tell everyone that the Fourth of July is an Eco-American Holiday. In this year of our Presidential elections, we must remember that we are not Caucasian, African-American, Asian, Hispanic, etc. We are Eco-Americans, we are one culture, one people and we share one planet.
This is a wonderful time to be alive and to make the crucial eco-decisions that will shape the future of our nation and our planet. The time is now to unite and make a conscious choice to live sustainable.
As for me, I will be spending July 4-6 at Huntington Beach's Parade & Celebration making new friends, creating environmental awareness and learning new tips, tricks and secrets from our Eco-American brothers and sisters on how to reduce our own carbon footprint. In my experience, a bond is formed when someone shares a new way to be eco-friendly that I did not know.
Did you know that recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a conventional TV for three hours? Or it saves a half gallon of gasoline (the price of gas is hurting all of our pocketbooks)!
Pretty cool, huh? We the People of Eco-America, now that's pretty cool too. Eco-cool.
The Inconvenient Lifestyle – It's Worth The Hassle!
Marc J. Sahara
President, The Inconvenient Bag
Original Post: http://laist.com/2008/07/03/july_4th_an_ecoamerican_holiday.phpcomment-1399522
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May 1, 2008
The Inconvenient Bag's 5 Tips for Being Green in LA
LAist met Marc J. Sahara, of The Inconvenient Bag at The Earth Day celebration last week. We asked Marc to share his tips for being green in LA.
Marc: Living the Inconvenient Lifestyle, or eco-friendly lifestyle in Los Angeles, is not easy, and I must admit, I struggle with it because I'm also used to living conveniently and care-free. However, I have decided to make that lifestyle change and now learn everyday new ways to be a cool Eco-Angeleno. When I catch myself doing things out of habit that are not eco-friendly it makes me sad.
As a next-generation light green environmentalist, I figure there at least five things we can do, that will not change our lives drastically, but will make a huge difference if "We The People" all join together and decide to live a greener life… for each other:
1) Recycle Plastic Bottles – The best solution is to stop using plastic bottles altogether and use eco-friendly bottles, like the stainless steel bottles at klean kanteen. The leading beverage of choice today is water, which is great because it is healthier than soda and beer. However, this growth has created a plastic bottle dilemma. Because most people take a bottle of water with them, these beverages are consumed (i.e., office, home, etc.) where there are no recycling receptacles nearby. Therefore, take a drink and throw the empty bottle on the passenger floor in your car. As I finish a bottle, I throw it the back seat… yes, it builds, up and looks ugly, but just when it turns into my own plastic bottle patch, I unload them into our recycle bin.
2) Turn off your computer screen! When leaving your computer for a period of 10 minutes or more, i.e., lunch, break, phone call, meeting, etc. make sure you turn off your screen manually, and don't just have your control panel set to turn off display or sleep. Leaving your screen on 24 hours a day can cost hundreds of dollars per year more (multiply that by the Los Angeles population that uses CPUs!), and such displays dump approximately 1,000 + pounds of C02 in the air, per CPU. It would take more than 300 trees to offset just one CPU; we have millions of CPUs in Los Angeles. Turn off that monitor!
3) Go take a hike! Ok, I'm not trying to be mean, but take a jog around the block instead of using a treadmill or exercise bike. These machines take electricity to use. I have been a member of my fitness club for many years and going there is like social time for me as well as exercise and I love it and the people there are fun. However, I now go less (because it takes a car drive to get there, plus I use machines), and started jogging around my neighborhood. I have found two great things: 1) when I go to the gym now, I get more done, and have less days of bad workouts from gym burnout, and 2) I have found that jogging to be rather enjoying and gives me a timeout that I don't even get at the gym. I'm not recommending to quit your gym membership, just find other ways to get workouts in, and when you do go, you just may get a better workout also!
4) Go to your local Farmers Market – Just about every city has a Farmers Market near them. The food and produce in the grocery store probably has traveled thousands of miles before it reaches the shelf (burning of energy, oil consumption, etc.). Farmers' Markets are local growers, many of them are certified organic, and food just tastes better fresh. Farmers' Markets are fun, social and great for the entire family. You can find me at my two favorite markets: Tuesdays at Culver City and Saturdays in Irvine.
5) Bring your own bag! I believe many of us do not know that we are addicted to plastic bags – they are all around us and its hard to avoid them, i.e., store, fast food, market, etc. I have been struggling, just like all my fellow Eco-Americans to break this plastic bag addiction. Typically a plastic bag is used for less than 10-20 minutes, yet takes thousands of years to break down into toxins. Meanwhile, such bags create litter, so much that we now have a plastic bag island twice the size of Texas in the Pacific Ocean in between San Francisco and Hawaii! Therefore, although it is hard to remember, we need to bring our own bags and break our addiction and dependence on plastic and paper bags. My company makes an "eco-cool" bag called the inconvenient bag, which is one of many choices for the eco-consumer.
We are in this together, making conscious decisions to change our lifestyle. We do not need to wait for our government to make laws or force us to change – we do it out of love. I believe in you and in our great city. Until we see each other again, God bless and be inconvenient – paper nor plastic!
Thanks Marc!
The Inconvenient Bag
Original Post: http://laist.com/2008/05/01/5_tips_for_bein.php