the adaption of economic performance to the nature

natural rhythm like the four seasons and day/night shown us an up-and-down-movement which is important for the natural creation and regeneration. An adaption for our economy?

in summer it is warm with long sunny days. the sun is shining up to 16 hours a day(central europe) and we humans are becoming the feeling that we cannot stay the whole day inside our houses. we want to leave and to do something. an inner motivation.

the same for the winter-season. coldness, short days, nothing grows outside. a stop of nearly every natural action. animals go to sleep for the whole period. We humans don’t want to leave our warm houses. an inner motivation wants to push us again back to sleep.

the nature shows us actually already how we should do. phases of regeneration like we have in winter and in the night to renew and stabilize the nature are necessary.

so the proposal is to adapt the idea of nature to our economy. cold and dark periods represents a regeneration or rather a break for our economic performance. people are staying at home and following their natural rhythm not to leave the warm houses.(or just to leave it for inevitable things)

the same in summertime. warm and light periods represents production and accordingly growth to our economy. People are going to work and to similar activities (sports, shopping, going out,…) as well as earning and spending money.

The reasons for this adaption are clear

a) unlimited growth is not possible. the period of regeneration brings for the economy a destruction of old. In the period of production we generate a replacement for the broken one. we don’t need to create a new need to extend our economic performance.

b) nature and humans need both. a period of production and a period of regeneration. In addition to the productive life we need the same amount of time for our health (physical and mental) and the time for biological decomposing of substances in our nature.

I am sure supporters of the present economy would say that you cannot stop or decrease the production of goods in winter and night. The machines in the factories are to expensive to not use them. We are in the competition with other companies in all parts of the world. We have to.

We just have to because we wanted to extend our economic performance through investment. we invested in new fabrics, new machines, new human capital and new needs.

Because the “society” decided somehow to go along this way of overproduction. The society also designed the structure. And the structure shows us that we have to invest otherwise we don’t survive.

See it like a game you are playing with friends. You play with predefined rules and you accept them because these are the rules of the game and you want to play.

The same here.

If the natural adaption is applied to our economy everybody would say: “oh it is clear that we don’t go to work in winter when it is cold and dark outside. we need some time to rest otherwise we would burn out from all that stress in summer. On top of that – the nature needs as well her time to regenerate.”

for me now it is still unclear why we are running on 120% in those cold and dark periods of the year

set of problems of our generation

it was strange to come back to the regular european/austrian way of living.  and still i am shocked.

when you are working on a task and you thought that you finished – then you go away for a while – then you come back and you still will find some errors in your task no? normally its like this. so you fix them.

so I want to give you a really short idea which problems I found in our generation.

a) we are living far away from reality. our daily thoughts mainly concern irrelevant things. opening the prospect from HOFER to see which offers they have this week, thinking about to buy a new mobile phone, planning what to do next saturday, which movie will be played tonight in the cinema, when the next ubuntu-release comes out,…

yeah maybe somebody will counter “david whats wrong with you. these are our daily thoughts. and whats wrong?’”

Unfortunately until now I cannot answer this question however I see it as problem to have nothing more important in our bright creative heads than those thoughts so fare away from reality.

b) culture is a very dangerous net. and with culture are coming predefined values. and again our generation mainly runs after those predefined values without analyzing them if those values are right.

again somebody can counter “david whats wrong to drink a little bit more saturday night? whats wrong to eat meat? whats wrong to deal with stocks to win money or to invest in a good business?”

as I can see people are not happy and as more they are running after those predefined values as more they become more unhappy. as more they are addicted. as more they are lost. as more they cannot feel themselves.

my values in life are different than those predefined ones and I feel happy. strange no?

c) a side effect is that the generations before us and now our generation have made a huge impact on our environment. on our basis of living no? we are living in our environment. we are what our environment is. we saw what happened with the nuclear power plant in japan. now it is impossible to live or benefit from this part of our earth.

we need a working environment to receive food, air, water,…

d) and maybe the most important fact. our generation harms herself and destroys the genetic material of us and of our children’s. living in a stressful polluted environment don’t help us to stay healthy.

now they found out that the male children’s from women’s which have taken the birth control pill continuously become infertile with around 30 years!

allergies, cancer, burnout,… as well came up more and more the last years. who knows which impact mobilephones have?

I am really sorry to write down this set of problems of our generation. I am not happy with them.

one year social service in a fresh healthy friendly openminded environment

the question is: who benefits from whom?

Somebody is leaving a polluted unfriendly bullheaded and uncommunicative environment to live one year in a fresh healthy friendly openminded environment (like in costa rica) to work there for free.

this is the question which i am asking myself reflecting to my year in the green costa rica.

Freiwilliger, Volunteer,… kostenlos Arbeiten und das im Ausland

Die Reaktion meines Professors auf meinen baldigen Freiwilligendienst trifft es genau “du verlierst ja ein Jahr!”. Zu diesem Zeitpunkt habe ich es mal so hingenommen. Nach mehreren schönen Erlebnissen durch meine Tätigkeiten als Freiwilliger im Ausland, tauchte die Frage auf “von was verliere ich ein Jahr?”

Dieses Jahr bedeutet auf die Länge meines Lebens wahrscheinlich nur einen Schluck vom Wasserglas. Ein unbedeutend kurzer Zeitabschnitt und dennoch wird dieses Jahr zu einem Eckpfeiler im Leben an dem man sich gerne erinnert. So wie der Schulabschluss und die Heirat immer Momente schöner Erinnerungen sind, gehört auch der Freiwilligendienst im Ausland dazu.

Wichtig dabei ist ,dass man die Zeit über im Ausland verbringt um abgelegen von bestehenden kulturellen Normen, des Freundschaftskreises sowie der Famile die Zeit verbringt. Um ohne Einwirkung der Gesellschaft mit all den ungeschriebenen Regeln ein kleines neues Leben zu beginnen ohne Zwänge und meist auch ohne eine vollständige Integration.

Wichtig hier ist das erstmalige Leben ohne das Geld ins tägliche Feld rückt. Das Auslandsjahr ist im vorhinein schon finanziell durchkalkuliert und ob man jetzt viel oder wenig arbeitet trägt nichts mehr zur wirtschaftlichen Situation in diesem Auslandsjahr bei. Man wird ja auch immerhin nicht nach einen Stundenlohn bezahlt und somit fällt der Leistungsdruck weg der durch den Gedanken “ich muss jetzt was machen ich werde dafür bezahlt” aufkommt.

Eine viel bedeutendendere Eigenschaft taucht jetzt auf → die Selbstinniative verbunden mit der Selbstverantwortung für den Tag.

Ob und wie der Tag genutzt wird hängt von der Person ab. Einen ganzen Tag in der Hängematte zu verbingen, nur herumzuschlendern nicht wirklich mit etwas zu beginnen drückt sich auf die Stimmung. Hingegen eine Schule zu bauen, Unterricht zu organisieren und zu sehen wie Kinder etwas erlenen erfüllt einen.

Welcher der beiden Tage wurde mehr aufgewertet? Und auf welchen blickt man eher zurück?

Verantwortung für den eigenen Tag zu haben kann sehr lehrreich sein & auf jeden Fall schwieriger als seine 8 Stunden im Beruf einer vorgegebenen Tätigkeit nachzugehen. Die Motivation zur Leistung muss man selbst finden und dieser Weg kann verdammt steinig sein.

Vorteilhaft ist, dass die Freiwilligenarbeit selbstdefiniert ist – das Thema interessiert einen und man sieht sich als wertvolle Bewegung gegen unzufriedene Umstände. Mich interessiert Umweltschutz und ich sehe meinen wertvollen Teilbeitrag in der umwetltbewussten weltoffenen Erziehung im örtlichen Kindergarten.

Hinterher ist die Tätigkeit für mich eine Selbsterkenntnis, ob diese soziale Arbeit verbunden mit Umweltschutz das Richtige für mich ist, dass heißt man reflektiert seine Interessen, hat Spielraum kreativ zu sein und Dinge auszuprobieren, die nicht als Beruf in der Jobanzeige aufscheinen und trotzdem wertvoll sind. Somit gelangt man durch try & error zu der Antwort, was man im Leben ,außer die alltäglichen Dinge wie Geld, Macht & schnelle Autos, überhaupt machen möchte.

Viele Freiwillige kommen zur Erkenntnis, welchen unbewussten Weg sie die letzten Jahre entlang gelaufen sind – eine Selbstreflektion in welche Tendenz man sich entwickelt, um falls erforderlich seinen Kurs noch in eine andere Richtung zu drehen. Ohne meine Zeit im Ausland hätte ich wahrscheinlich dem gesellschaftlichen Kodex gehorcht und wäre ins ratternde Getriebe der Industrie gefallen um meine junge Lebensenergie an die wachsende Wirtschaft zu verkaufen.

Interesse für globale Themen entwicklen sich – man merkt ,dass die Welt doch nicht so fair funktoniert wie man gemeint hatte. Ideen sprießen und Ansichten ändern sich. Meist auch bekannt unter dem Sprichwort “Horizont erweitern”. Jemand der seinen Horizont erweitert versteht was darunter gemeint ist – grob gesagt ensteht eine umfangreiche Sichtweise von Dingen. Neue wichtige Aspekte kommen dazu. Als Beispiel beim Kauf eines Produktes zählt nicht immer der Preis sondern auch soziale Umstände bei der Herstellung, Umweltstandard und ob es vom Nachbarort oder aus einer Diktatur kommt.

Alles in Allem fördert das Volunteering ,neben dem positiven Einfluss auf die Umgebung, die eigene Entwicklung in Richtung eines neuen Menschen. Die Triebkraft für eine bessere Gesellschaft, die qualitatives Leben, selbstbestimmte Lebensweise und eine breite Sichtweise auf ihre Fahnen schreiben wird.

Als junger Mensch sollte es üblich sein die Chance zu ergreifen ,vor dem endgültigen Einstieg ins Muster der Gesellschaft, einen kurzen Stillstand einzulegen bevor es auf das Ziel losgeht.

banana communism in costa rica

costa rica is a democratic and capitalistic country!  but for all that still has an abnormality -> the so called BANANA COMMUNISM!

maybe some more details. banana palms are for some people here like a desease. they are everywhere and produce all the year round a hill of fruits in every garden. so there are more than enough in costa rica and in every garden are a few.

even when you go on the market of the farmers. you buy 2 kg of mangos and you get 4 kg of bananas for free. or even when you have a nice face they give you them as present on the way home.

still everybody eats bananas every day. you can make a great desert out of them or you can eat them directly.

but unfortunately you cannot have in your garden enough banana palms to feed just your family all the year round uninterrupted because maybe the bananas in your garden are ready in january, february, july, august, september, november and then you have more than enough and you could feed the half village but you would suffer in the months march, april, may, june, october and december!

so the big question. what are the people doing?

you get the bananas from your neighbours as present in those months when they have more than enough. and you do the same way around when you have suffiecient bananas.

and because there are enough bananas in the village – nobody needs to have fears that he or she will not get bananas. because there are enough!

best regards from the banana communistic costa rica,
david

costa rica – first impression

costa rica ranks first in the happy planet index (happiest country in the world), costa rica don’t have an army, costa rica wants to become CO2neutral until 2021 and apparently costa rica is the greenest country in the world!

amazing no?

on the 23th of august I came with the plane over the dominican republic to costa rica. i was excited – my dream to visit this country become true. so the plane decreased height and in the process of going down and to approach to the airport i saw an vulcan which had an erruption in that moment so with fire, smoke everything what was necesarry to make a nice erruption of a vulcan. so you can imagen the first real impression was this vulcan (arenal). at that moment i thought it was a fireworks for my time in costa rica

totally tired i took the bus to longo mai – finca sonador. a 4 hour busride from san jose (the capital) over a huge mountain. and incredible but i was freezing. in a tropical country near to the equator I as an austrian I had a goose skin (gaensehaut). yeah somehow clear the mountain has an altitude of 3400 Meters

after getting of in the busstation of longo mai i walked up 2 kilometers with my 35kg bag. the day with my precurser anton passed good and on the next day i was heading of to la gamba, the rainforest of the austrians, my new home for the next 6 months.

the bus stopped in a small city palmar norte for a few minutes to remove and load luggage. i thought it is enough time to go to the toilet. so i left the bus payed 200 colones and when i was entering i saw that the bus was already on the street again and of course with my luggage! i was running like i never runned before and i got the bus jumped in the open door during he was driving

one hour later i was in the entrance to la gamba in the middle of the day. and as you know me i thought cannot be so hard to walk to the station and save the money for the taxi. so i started to walk with my 35 kilo luggage. it was written 6 kilometers to the station.
again i was exhausted – didn’t know the way, in the plazing sun, it was beginning to rain,…

1,5 hours later i was in the station, my destination and of course everybody wanted to speak with me. tired, hungry, thirsty and then you have your new collegs whose are speaking a local dialect with you and you understand nothing. so mainly i just answered with “ahhh nice” or “fine”. i fell into the bed and slept!

CORI – a success

the international youthexchange CORI in the rural (home)village was a fully success. without blowing to much our own horn we succeeded on all lines. however we used up nearly all our available energy. i am speaking from my case. everything was fine during that week. the mainthought i will always relate to the youthexchange and which always will come into my mind is the huge input of energy during this 168 hours!

so some facts about CORI:

4 countries, each country with 5-6 participants, included countries austria, latvia, romania & spain, one week in august, in a rural conservative village called riedau in austria, living together in groups with local families, ongoing topics: environment, sustainable development, energy, using non-formal and formal methodes to work out the topics, intercultural night, tractorride in the energyvillage Dorf a. d. Pram(30% energy autonomous village) , amazing workshop with reinhard steurer about sustainability, going out in peuerbach ins AufLauf, daytrip to schaerding, ride to the windmills,…

if you wanna read more about the exchange google for it, television and newspaper were visiting us -> soon we have a homepage

there is also a book about CORI – send a mail

–> video in german(deutsch) on http://www.lt1.at/  with suchbegriff cori

and some pictures:

just 3 days at home -> spain,portugal

those days were crazy. arriving at home after 7 months away and leaving already 3 days later. i was sure if it were possible for my mother she had killed me. and you know actually i was just in austria to do some paperwork for my next one-yeartrip for the social civil service of the austrian government abroad in central america.

so i left again by train. my heart was beating the whole last days long. i had fears about my health. in the train i came down – the heart normalized and it was again possible to breath deeply.

the train was fast I loved it to pass all the villages and cities. with 250 km/h to frankfurt. from frankfurt down to switzerland. my first time in switzerland. the couchsurfer picked me up at the trainstation. i fell in love with the town. bern imbedded in the mountains around, full of forest and so friendly people.

the night passed and i went on. bern – barcelona was the idea. picked up in barcelona by a friend of a good friend Oscar. again a faboules afternoon and night in barcelona. sleeping in a flat in the center of barcelona. the weather was nice and already warm. the salty smell in the air symbolized that i am again travelling.

at that point it was still unbelieveable for me to live such a life. full of energy and with the deepest blueness i had in my eyes i went to madrid.

picked up by a close friend. again an amazing long weekend in madrid. unfortunately the last time we met for a long time. the life is like a trainstation. trains are arriving in your station and waiting there for a few minutes ,others for hours and as well some of them don’t even stop.

on the way to portugal picking up the original part III for the youthexchange from our spanish partner ADENEX. pleasent day.

portugal. my real reason for that journey. porto in the north of portugal was the venue of a training about transnational youth inniatives. the training was fine. at the same time the vulcan from island threw up a lot of dirt. when he is right, he is right. after thousands of years everybody would like to emit some trash no? but all people were complaining about him

anyway. back to lisboa to visit a close friend. i felt like in summer. walking around in the streets, drinking coffee & beer. still a cool weather and sunny. after an accident with the neighbour and a fork i left portugal to come definitly back to my home! but before visiting some friends in vienna

finally back.

last days in latvia – brief review

fontain palace burned down, the snow melted, the spring arrived, the sun become stronger and the days longer, behind the computer writting on the application form for the youthexchange CORI in august, preparation of the journey to portugal,…

and of course the classes (englisch, german, photographie,..)

that was the image I had the last weeks during my EVS in Latvia.

actually I was sad about to leave the country those days. You know I was the whole winter in that country and I am sure it was the coldest freezing time in life. And you have the image that in that country it only can be cold – you believe it and then suddenly spring is coming and the people wake up, you see many people walking on the street, many of them smiling.

After that hard period of 4 months below 0°C now recharging with the energy from the sun.

Ahhh. I had that image in my head that latvia is always cold so I wanted to leave as fast as possible that I don’t need to change the definded “map” in my head.

So I left by ferry from klaipeda to luepeck in Germany. In the cabine with 3 lithuanians which were drinking heavy wodka with me that night and some great homemade food from their wifes (they were on a trip to denmark to leave their families for one month to work there 14 hours a day on the field collecting stones) .

After a few hours back in a german speaking country I bought my interrail-pass. Next train to hamburg and afterwards to BERLIN. In Berlin I meet Laura and it was an incredible week. One of those weeks which i will always remember.

Berlin is cool. I will visit berlin soon again.

From berlin down to passau (border to austria) in 6 hours! From passau just 20 minutes to my village Riedau. My familie was of course waiting at the trainstation

letzten Tage in Liepaja

Übungsschiff der Fischer

Der Freiwilligendienst ist vorbei und der Frühling erreicht Liepaja. Massen von Menschen auf den Straßen die im Winter nie zu sehen waren.

eindeutig Wetterabhängig diese Menschen hier!

Vogelschwarm in Formation

Strandszene

in "einem" Teil des Wohnviertels

ganz Liepaja kommt raus aus den Wohnungen

österreichischer spanischer Tortilla als Geburtstagsessen um 3:00 am Morgen