The smell of goats and cows fills the dusty air. Their bleating and snorting accompanies the slowly setting sun, which moves like a red fire ball towards the horizon. A loud “Moo” breaks the idyllic atmosphere. Georg Vermaak, who introduces himself as “Org”, folds his arms in front of his chest and lets his gaze […]
“From little date seeds, great things are born.” – Namibian proverb The airplane is making its landing approach around 10 am at the airport of Namibia’s capital city, Windhoek. Quite exhausted after the 10 hours flight through the night, I look up. Outside I can see dry grass, some bushes and a seemingly endless savannah. […]
Today, two members of the blog, Katharina and Leonie, are going to go on an excursion to Namibia. We use the term excursion because it is not a random holiday or something similar but a research trip from university. So, it’s not going to be lying around at the beach, roaming around in the desert […]
Have you ever heard of the Panamanian golden frog? Or the white-plumed antbird? Probably you’ll never hear about them because they are on the edge of extinction. Fragmentation, the excessive use of land and climate change are just a few of the factors that are causing a major extinction event. Right now. Right here. There […]
Being a school groundskeeper might not be the most dangerous job. Maybe this was also Dewayne Johnson’s attitude , when he accepted this job in 2012 in a suburb north of San Francisco. But this idea turned out to be wrong: In 2014, Johnson got ill, very ill. He was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, which […]
On this blog we have written quite some articles targeting the huge topic of waste: We wrote about the waste production in Germany, about a visit in a waste-to-energy plant, about plogging and the EU ban on single use plastic items. So, today I would like to show you several ways and items we use […]
Imagine this: you stroll through the supermarket, looking for cotton buds – but you can’t find the little plastic sticks. When you ask the shop assistants, they look at you as if you were coming from planet Mars and answer: “Don’t you know that plastic cotton buds are now forbidden?” This situation could happen soon. […]
Breathe in. Breathe out. Breath in. Brea – what is this? My breath stops, my feet – till one moment ago flying over the ground – get slower, my heart still races. Next to all these physical sensations, another sentiment blazes a trail into my body: anger mixed with sadness. What might sound like the […]
Mysterious castles, beautiful hiking trails and fabulous wine festivals: For an internship, I moved to the beautiful Palatinate region in the very West of Germany for three months. The office of the small company UDATA – Environment and Education is located in the idyllic town Neustadt an der Weinstraße, which is situated 30 km […]
By: Birgit Thies and Katharina Funk „If you could act, but you don’t, the whole world will hold you responsible. That’s why I give my best.” – Kisilu Musya In November 2017, the climate of our planet Earth was all over in the media: The “Conference of the Parties” (COP23) took place in Bonn, […]
