Living with Less

close up photo of three sweatshirts — Photo by Daria Shevtsova on Pexels.com

amount of water needs;

to make a cotton t-shirt : 2,700 liters.

to make a jeans : 10,000 liters

don’t forget the wastewater from industrial textile. million gallons of water infected in chemical released in waterbodies. also the labours whom suffering from certain disease because of the side effect of the waste. (check: The affect of jeans toward enviroment)

Have you ever heard of polyester? polyester contains same materials found in plastics. a single polyester garment releases 1,9000 individual plastic microfibers. guess where these microfibers end up? in our oceans where they threaten ecosystems and end up in our food chain.

i became interest in this topic, since i study about wastewater and its impact towards enviroment. have you ever heard about minamata disease? it’s a massive mercury poisoning in 50s. a huge factory named chisso’s released their wastes into waterbodies (which is ocean). japanese people are well known for their love into fish, they often eat it raw. ironically, these fish already infected by mercury. also the corps they grew, they already infected as well.

all the industrial processes will give impacts in our daily lives. the scientists and engineers should colaborate to find a way to reduce harmful chemical in our ecosystem. meanwhile, we as a human being despite whatever field we master, what can we do?

sustainable-conscious living, 5R, minimalism, green lifestyle, zero waste, etc. these are concept that i’ve learn somewhere in college and internet. we can try one of them (if we want), but there’s lot of obstacle!

being a minimalism indeed hard, just try to implement zero waste concept into daily lives is difficult, but one thing that we as a human surely can do is… REDUCE. reduce by treasure, love, and care for our stuffs. reduce by RETHINK before buy.

til now, i still have that t-shirt that i used to wear in elementary years (fyi i still wear it), pants from my teen years (still fit!), bags and shoe from 6 years ago (still wear it to the college and everywhere else til now), and i don’t mind buying secondhand as long as it still in its fine condition and still has a longer lifecycle.

caring and handling our stuffs with love will increase its lifespam or make it last. just a few stuffs surely make you treasure them more. you can learn about your garments/appliance by read the information/label/caring instruction they provide, it’ll make your garments/appliance last.
i guess it’s totally fine to purchase something expensive, as long as its not just the brand, but quality speaks as well too. at least i can wear/use it for a longer time. it’ll be more eco to our environment and our wallet. less is better indeed..

but i agreed to disagreed that this concept doesn’t occur in purchasing books… because real books are so much different with the electronics (btw i haven’t try kindle)