Shark Fin, Plastic Bags and our Darling Earth

This is our future earth.

This earth is one of the MOST IMPORTANT THINGS IN OUR LIFE. Without earth = No life. SO TELL ME WHY IS EVERYBODY TRYING SO HARD TO DESTROY THE ONLY INHABITABLE MASS OF ROCK IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE??!!!

Take my brother for example. HE DOESN'T CARE AT ALL. He eats sharks (A soon-to-be endangered species) even after I've told him that sharks kill only ONE human being a year, and that's only if they're lucky. Humans on the other hand, eat like a hundred million (probably more) sharks a year, especially the Chinese with their shark fin soup.



Do you know how shark fin soup is made?!! First, you catch a poor innocent shark, then you use a saw to chop off its 4 fins.

There you go, fins! Now what? The shark is probably still alive, bleeding like mad. Its too cruel to eat the entire shark right? I bet it doesn't taste nice either. Oh and we need space on this boat for MORE FINS. So we should just throw it back into the ocean! Too bad the shark can't swim without its fin!!!! And a shark needs to swim to get oxygen!!! So what happens to it?? IT DIES!!!!! A SLOW PAINFUL DEATH!! IT SUFFOCATES TO DEATH!!!

Its bad because sharks take a long long time to reproduce. So if 100 million sharks die each year and only a handful are born... I wonder what will happen?! The number of sharks in the U.S. have declined by 90%. NINETY. PERCENT.

You're eating shark cartilage. The fin is boiled for a long time until it separates into clear noodle-like cartilage. It's tasteless. You gotta eat it with chicken broth and some other stuff. So what, exactly is the point of eating something that has no taste?!!! Is it because of it's supposed nutritional value?!! Well, the Chinese think that shark fin is a kind of tonic which helps do all sorts of magical things while other people say shark fin is a good source of protein and helps rebuild cartilage (you get shark cartilage!) but SCIENTIFICALLY, shark fin has little nutritional value. In fact, it may even be harmful to your health over the long term, as shark fins have been found to contain high levels of mercury. Anyway if you want protein, there are SO MANY OTHER sources of healthy protein. Go eat salmon, its a superfood - proteins, omega 3s, antioxidants - all in one! SHARK FIN IS BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD.

You do this:
To get this:
Put inside here:

aiyerr..



I think you got my point. NEXT, PLASTIC BAGS.


Environmentalists are always constantly forever hammering statistics and reasons why we should DO SOMETHING to save our dying earth. And we (well most of us) go "woah, wow, omg!!" when we realise that every single thing we do contributes to global warming or waste overload or air, water, land and even noise pollution. But we can't live without our air-conds or cars or toilet bowls..

But plastic bags.. of course we need plastic bags! They're so convenient, so versatile. They're one of men's most wonderful creations!! I want to buy a loaf of bread and 3 packets of twisties and 8 sticks of bubblegum and 4 cans of coke. Obviously I can't hold them in my hands and I'm too lazy to bring a big bag from home so I guess I'll use a plastic bag!! Oh and I want to bring my dirty shoes along with me to school, I can't just chuck them into my bag, they will dirty all my clothes and then I'll smell like feet!! So i'll put them in a plastic bag la.

Anyway all I'm trying to say is that we can't live without plastic bags but we can certainly REDUCE the use of plastic bags. It's not very hard! Get a big bag when you go shopping.

or something not so big:

Yeah so you can stuff all the things you bought into your bag. Its good also because your parents wouldn't know you went shopping. But more importantly, you save plastic bags!! Yesterday I went to ou to buy some stuff and I could have, but didn't, use 5 plastic bags. And the day before I went to buy a bag of chips. The lady put the bag of chips into a plastic bag. WHAT FOR!!!?? The chips are already in a bag right? Same goes with food like kaya balls and famous amos cookies and bread and bakery stuff and everything else - they come in a paperbag or their own plastic bag or whatever packaging already, so you don't actually need another plastic bag, just put it in your bag!

So imagine if I save like 10 plastic bags a week (which isn't really a lot), I'll save 520 plastic bags a year. Ain't that cool!!??? If you decide to join me, we can both save 1040 plastic bags a year! and if 8 more ppl join us, 5200 plastic bags a year! And if half the population of malaysia does this, we're saving 7 020 000 000 plastic bags! (sorry, i just loove numbers!) So as you can see, we can so easily save our earth from being wrapped and suffocated in plastic!! So easy la!!!

Before I go on, I'll talk some more about plastic bags and where they go after you're done using them. In a landfill, plastic bags take many lifetimes to decompose, and when they do, they pollute waterways and the soil. So the water you're drinking now might have some plastic bits in it. Or maybe not, since plastic bags didn't exist thousands of years ago. But most plastic bags don't make it to landfills. Instead, they're flying around in the air or clogging up rivers and lakes or lying in heaps at the roadside. You might be indirectly suffocating and killing endangered turtles and poor innocent birds and dolphins.

ANYWAY, 7 020 000 000 plastic bags.. is not a lot. It would be better if every Malaysian saves plastic bags. That would double the figure.. 14 040 000 000 plastic bags a year. And that's only in Malaysia. But thats okay. Imagine the amount of money and time needed to get rid of 14 040 000 000 plastic bags! Thats just scary.

All I'm trying to say is SAVE PLASTIC BAGS!!!

We can all play a part in saving the world!! :)

That's all!!


-CARYN