Jiwon Lee
Divsion of International Studies
When we think of international problems, we tend to think that adults are the hero to solve them. Some say that politicians should act more vigorously to stop the war, and some say that they have a dream that they would solve hunger problems when they become a diplomat. But, there are some problems that we can tackle and solve, even when we do not have a job, and sometimes, even when we don’t think ourselves as a decent member of the society.
This year was my second year of Daedong Festival, which is the official Ewha spring festival. It was as cheerful and exciting as last year’s festival, but something different this time – I was working as a booth member. Working at a booth does mean that you cannot participate as much as you want in standing in lines and going to popular booths at a very early time, but it is far from saying that it is impossible to enjoy the event. Selling things is as much fun as buying them, and since my booth sold self-signed merchandise, selling items was a completely different experience. Meeting many different people, having a little chat with them, and having my friends from other schools visit the stand where I worked was a delicious experience.
During the set-up of the booth, I noticed that there was a joint purchase of dry ice, ice and cups. What really intrigued me was the cups. Because the stands were for profit, using the same cups would cause a loss of differentiation, so I wondered why they were making joint purchases. Unlike dry ice and ice that were hard to get as they melted, cups were easy to get and had different options to choose from. Curiosity led me to search for why, and that’s when I discovered “PLAY- CYCLE”.
“PLAY-CYCLE” is a campaign that was closely related to this year’s single-use plastic cups at the festival. They were the ones who were jointly buying, and they were trying to collect and recycle as many cups as possible. They had a “PLAY- CYCLE” station where people can empty their beverages and put cups that should be recycled in slots according to their schools. They had also organised a small event where they exchanged plastic cups with small candies, to reinforce their campaign to collect plastic cups. The cups were also special because they were made from a single ingredient, which can draw the recycling percentage to a completely different level. The collected mugs would be delivered to TerraCycle, a global recycling company.
This campaign came as a great shock because it seemed that this campaign would really help the environment. Many campaigns, such as offering a discount when using cups, have helped with the use of single-use plastic cups, but this has been done by companies and the government. And some student events were very creative, but they did not give a good result. But this event seemed realistically effective, and it was at that moment that I thought that we, the students, are also people who can change the world.
From this event, I decided not to postpone the issues that seem big and unable to be done to my future self, but to address them as much as possible in my current state. We, the students, are the ones who have the creativity or a child and the power to act of an adult, which means we can do anything. Yes, just like the famous saying, ‘Girls can do anything’.