Ride Planet Earth

I never planned to come to Vienna. But life doesn’t work out how I planned it. Despite my best efforts.

I should have, because Vienna is a beautiful place, an obvious stop between Bratislava and Prague and it is basically on the way. Its been freezing cold though, and the days of cycling through the cold, getting hot from sweating under 2 jackets, then cold again from the wind catching the moisture on my skin, day after day, has given me a cold. I’m all mucus right now. Happy I am writing this and not saying it.

Today we set off to leave Vienna and start the slow climb up to Prague, but the effort proved unsuccessful. I had two fruitful meetings with local guys active in the environment and cycling fields and looks like they will be able to put on a Ride Vienna. But by the time we set off it was already a quarter to 2. An hour getting lost in the Viennese backstreets, chasing Euro Velo signs, led us to a cheap Chinese buffet with hungry bellies. By the time we had taken our share of the all -you-can-eat the sun had set. So we went back to Markus and Claudia’s to wait out the cold night and we will leave tomorrow.

Leaving Budapest was a similar non-event at the first try as Rich had disappeared for a couple of days only to re-appear at 5am the morning after our planned departure.  But eventually we got out, hitting the first hills in more than a week, led by Adam Bodor, of the European Cycling Federation, with whom I had been staying the proceeding week.

A few quick days through flat Slovakian farmlands brought us to Bratislava. We had crossed the Danube into Slovakia a day out of Budapest and the absence of a passport check had been striking. This is the EU. It is hard to continue to describe the differences between countries now, the farms and villages in Hungary and Slovakia look basically the same to me. Billboards pronounce which washing detergent to buy in a different language bt the houses are all little boxes, with steep roofs, manicured little gardens, from Hungary, to Slovakia to Austria. The tribes are different, the history and patriotism fierce in each small European nation but from my foriegn eyes the generalities all look pretty damned similar.

In Bratislava I caught up with Aisulu, a friend I had made during a brief encounter in Kazakhstan. How strange, to meet her again in the freshly whitened and renovated streets of an old European capital. Sometimes life throws me into situations that don’t seem like they could really be real.

But we only stayed a night before heading to Vienna. So far as I could tell there was no border between the two countries, but everything was suddenly written in German. I am not complaining, its much better without the border guards, much easier and I hope it will be like this everywhere some day. But it is just in such stark contrast to the challenges I have faced crossing borders for so long. I am used to the hard stuff. Maybe Europe is too easy. But there is the cold. And making it to Copenhagen on 5 Euros a day is as hard a challenge as I’ve ever faced before.

The Ride Planet Earth event continues to expand, now linking over 30 events world-wide. It looks like being a significant event contributing to the ever increasing voices from across the planet demanding action on climate change. These voices are getting louder, stronger and more urgent as every day passes. But we all face a very, very difficult challenge to influence the outcome of COP15.

Over the course of the past 15 months I have been riding a very steep learning curve. Learning to cope with new languages, new surroundings, new cultures. Learning to fix a broken frame, navigate the Gobi desert, talk to television reporters and survive in solitude. But the most difficult thing to learn, and to do, is to motivate other people to act. I’ve been trying to do that for years, as a youth worker, then a social worker, it was my job to encourage addicts to go rehab and offenders to go straight. That was bloody hard, almost impossible, but this task, the one that we have before us in Copenhagen looks even harder. We need to urge, encourage, demand and convince our leaders, our elected officials, that it is in their and our interest to make this agreement.

I have thought countless hours about how to best motivate action amongst everyday citizens and political leaders. I cannot and will not stand by and watch as our society lets itself burn away the future of our planet. As far as I can figure it we all need to be doing at least 3 things. 3 things that I think can change the world. Three things that everyone of us is capable of doing, and I believe, will be willing to do, once they understand what we are up against.

The first is making personal choices, every time we act, that will have the least negative impact on the environment around us. Letting this principle guide us. Just as we make choices not to harm the people around us we must do the same for the environment. From choosing what to buy at the market, when to turn the heating on, and where to go on holiday.

The second is fundamentally linked to the first. Ethical consumption. We must consume to live, but we, certainly those of us in the developed world, can choose to buy something that has destroyed the environment in its production, or something those production is sustainable.

Finally the third is our actions that can directly influence our politics and our laws. We need to realise that we are important, and each individual voice is important. Some people tell me it is not, but I firmly disagree. Change starts with one. Then there can be two, and three. But each of us has to believe that our actions are important. Believe me they are. I urge everyone to influence the political actors around them just as the rules, regulations and laws unavoidably influence their lives. Write to your elected officials, call them, take part in actions, petitions, demonstrations, manifestations. Be an actor, not part of the audience.

Together I believe these 3 things will bring about change. Each influences the other, and each of us influences others around them. Change is always happening. To stop climate change we need this change to happen faster. Address this issue now. Contact Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, WWF, Oxfam, the local Greens Party. They will tell you a list of things you can do. If it doesn’t happen in 5 weeks in Copenhagen it must still happen.

I have a new nephew, Leo, who was born 5 days ago. I haven’t seen photos of him yet and I won’t get to see him in real life for a long time yet. But I am doing this project for him, for Jilly, my niece and all the children like them. The children who will have to deal with the consequences of the resources we burnt to fuel the luxuries of our lifestyles today. Take action. Start Cycle Change. Stop Climate Change.