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Green pens, orange alerts: simple means of bringing cheer

Meet the woman who breathes new life to sustainable living
Author
Ernakulam, First Published Aug 14, 2016, 10:50 AM IST

Last year, a school in Kerala collected used pens from students. Within a matter of two months, they gathered 9325 plastic pens! The exercise was not aimed at the Guinness records, but to make students aware of the environment cost of the use-and-throw culture. 
 

 Nearly one lakh plastic pens would be discarded every year from one school, the students calculated!  Yes, we have a real problem here; but do we have a solution?


Lakshmi Menon, a designer cum eco-evangelist from Kochi in Kerala, has a doable alternative-- paper pens that can grow into trees!

Handcrafted from waste paper, each pen has an Agasthya tree seed buried in it. Once thrown out, the seeds can grow into the beautiful flowering tree with various medicinal properties.

  


However, Lakshmi says paper pens resolve the plastic menace only to some extent, for the refills are still non-biodegradable. In order to 'quantify' the issue, she is planning to make an art installation using disposed ballpoint pens collected from schools in Kerala. The creation would be in the form of a 'tree' that would be displayed in the next Kochi-Muziris Biennale, an international exhibition of contemporary art. 
 

It is all part of an artistic effort to create awareness and to seek new possibilities. Hence, she named her paper pen project ‘Entree’: it denotes one’s initiation into a new sensibility and a new entry into responsible living. It is also  a mix of Malayalam word ‘En’ meaning ‘my’ and tree. 

 

Founder of 'Pure Living', an organisation launched four years back to promote sustainable living, Lakshmi started with 'Wicksdom' a successful project that launched ‘grandma wicks’ made by old age home inmates.  The latest is ‘Orange Alert', a mix of silent protest and a road safety project. Lakshmi makes it a point that she gives back something to nature and society.

 ‘Orange Alert’ is an orange triangle painted on roads to warn of potholes in roads. It alerts the motorists of the danger ahead. And it also marks the citizens’ protest against the authorities who blink at the sorry state of roads.


"I want to turn this campaign to a mass movement from Kasaragod to Thiruvananthapuram,” Menon told Asianet Newsable. “We plan to draw orange colour triangles on roads with local participation to warn drivers and motorists of potholes and craters ahead. This is also a silent protest to invite the attention of authorities,” she adds.

 

 The orange triangle would be drawn on either side of the road, 50 feets away from damaged spots so that vehicles can slow down. “I am getting very good response from authorities and the public. The campaign would also enable the authorities to evaluate the work of each contractor working for them, it would be like a social audit," said Menon.

 

 

“None of these initiatives are pre-planned,” she said when asked about her next. “It’s just a coincidence that one followed another.”

Because she enjoyed each project; each paper pen and every bunch of wicks gave something back to her. You may call it contentment.

 

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