Thursday, August 9, 2018

Day 9 - Shambhala Center, Boulder

Today was our first relaxed day of the journey thus far. Nowhere to drive or hike to. The morning kicked off nicely with the airing of my radio interview with Nevada NPR as well as the featuring of our project in a article written up by the Huffington Post. How exciting! After a couple hours of work and email catchup, we took to the street. We decided to spend some time canvasing the public, asking them about climate change, and distributing our climate change survey. Given the progressive nature of Boulder, I was expecting to be met with quite some interest, brandishing our 3 by 4 foot banner “On the Road for Climate Action.” 


To my surprise, virtually nobody paid a visit to hear about our tour or efforts. We passed out a number of flyers to passerbys, but were overall feeling a bit discouraged by the end of the hour. It was nonetheless an interesting experiment, if nothing else came of it. After a quick falefal sandwich lunch, we made our way home to prepare for our evening event at the Shamala center. It could not have asked for a better pick-me-up after our discouraging canvasing efforts than the enthusiasm we were met with at the event. This marked our first truly interactive event, in which a large part of the 2+ hours was focused on Q/A and team discussions. People had a lot to say about climate change. One activity asked people to trade ideas about how to reduce their carbon footprints. I was excited to hear that a couple people made commitments such as only eating meat twice per week, etc. The event was filled with positive energy! The event concluded around 9:30PM, and by 10 we were on our way to meet a Native American community leader, to whom we passed our “parachute for the planet.” His community would leave their artistic mark. Fortunately, we found a sub sandwich restaurant that was still open at 11PM, which offered a variety of tasty veggie subs. I had the tofu bbq sub! It was a great conclusion to one of our longest days of climate action! 


Click here to learn more about "On the Road for Climate Action!"

                                                                              Dr. Shahir Masri
                                                                     


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