Is the world about to stop existing?

Frightening right? But the thing is, it really should not be a surprise. I could talk about one out of the many experiences I had that supports this but any one, in one way or another, also already had those experiences. The real question is “Do we even bother to care?”

Signos is a documentary that raises awareness in order to motivate people to say yes to the previous question. It is highly effective since it concentrated on what’s happening in the Philippines. It discusses the what and why and the what will be if none of us will take any action.

The discussion in Signos covered a lot and the most alarming for me is what it said about the Mayon volcano. The said volcano was known for its beauty but with what’s happening, it’s becoming something far from being the nation’s source of joy and pride. Rather, it’s becoming a source of threat and fear. It’s starting to be viewed as an unpredictable killing machine who will take the lives of many in just one eruption, as it did recently. Just the thought of this is heart-shattering.

Another thing that’s really distressing is actually the existence of Signos. A lot of us already have seen or heard of Al Gore’s ‘The Inconvenient Truth’ and it already had shown all cases and possibilities that should have already pushed us to do something. Yet, as I have been repeatedly saying, nothing has been done. And the need to have another documentary like Signos just proves the lack of action and disappointingly, the lack of concern. When will we be inflicted with the ability to care for our environment? When, as pointed out in Signos, the warnings have already come true? Is that when we’ll do something?

Signos should have not been the sign we needed in order to realize that we should be more cautious with the way we are living. The signs are actually all around us. The events featured in Signos were also seen in the news before. It’s not the first time we have heard of them. It has also been very apparent that our health and some natural resources has already been sacrificed. So why are we not worrying? Is it because they seem to be occurring in minute amounts? This is very poor reasoning. We should remember that, as was also mentioned in Signos, problems, as little as they may seem, still adds up to previous existing problems. All of us should really start caring. After all, all aspects of our lives are affected.

Having presented all the reasons why we should be concerned, here are three ways which I think I or all of us can do in order to help in stopping or at least preventing the problem to be worse:

1. Participate in government projects aimed to improve the environment’s status. An example of such is the Gawad Parangal sa Pagandahan ng Barangay held in my province, Batangas, last December 2006. The said project was a competition between barangays wherein they have to design Christmas decorations using recycled materials, have an MRF station where other recycled materials will be turned over to according to their classification, and have all parts of their barangays cleaned and planted with plants. I was one of the many youths who participated for our barangay and we placed second out of 104 barangays. This year, another competition is being held, only it’s concentrated on vegetable and crop planting. I will aslo try to participate in this one.

2. Practice the known and simple ways of improving the problem. These are recycling, proper waste disposal and using environment-friendly tools. A lot of information regarding them are all over the internet and looking them up will not be much of a hassle. This may not be as enormously effective as the previous one, but it will still help.

3. Try to make the best out of how you can help with your chosen profession. As a civil engineering student, there will be things that I’ll study that can help our environment. Learning them and trying to apply them upon entering a job, is surely one way in which I can and would want to help. As Ma’am Sandy had said, engineers should serve their country. And looking out for the environment is surely one way to serve, or more appropriately save the country.

Let’s prevent the world from ceasing to exist.
Let’s prevent our own extinction.