I fully understand the question that I am being asked, but if I am to be honest, this will not be a hopeful story of success of how I aligned my placement to be as sustainable as possible. Instead, this is a story of someone who may have realised too late the impact that they were having on the world. The endless online shopping and overconsumption, which I even did for this trip at the time, were fun. Until, near the end of my placement, when I visited the Kerala backwaters and realised the real-life repercussions of my actions. In Kerala, nature is not a luxury; it is simply a way of life. Acts such as fishing, harvesting fruit and vegetables are passed down through generations. However, due to actions such as my overconsumption, I watched as people tried to row through piles of washed-away plastics. I was struck as I watched a father and his child have to navigate their way through this environment all to catch fish and earn enough money to provide for themselves. I was watching them navigate through the plastics and torn-up clothes, which I had seen as a luxury, but one that I would throw away once I got bored. I am ashamed to admit that even though I fully understood the theory of what I was doing to the environment, I was not truly aware of my actions until it was too late. I know that I am meant to answer how intend to/have promoted eco-friendly travel however to do so on the whole would be a lie. Instead, I want to discuss what I could have done differently. To acknowledge that despite the books telling me theory, that in a way it is okay to learn from my mistakes and use what I have lived to make a change. In a truly honest moment, I realised how selfish I had been in my actions, and I came to realise that I did not have to overconsume and buy all new clothes for my study abroad. I could have taken the time to understand the public transport system, because despite how scary it seemed, it really was not so bad, and I actually began to enjoy it. These simple individual acts could have helped so much, alongside taking the time to learn people’s stories to understand just how much my actions, even on a small scale, could have impacted them.
