‘Lights, camera, action’ are three words I have become used to in my professional career. If my stint at Charminar is anything to go by, then ‘Arrested ‘is going to be a new phrase I will become accustomed to as an activist with Greenpeace India.
My first Greenpeace police detention or arrest came on Monday afternoon when I joined a team of activists who had organised a banner-drop to mark the opening of a major United Nations conference on biodiversity, on one of Hyderabad’s most iconic land marks, the Charminar. The demand: Indian government, hosts of the UN conference, needs to stop their wanton destruction of the forests with their environmentally flawed mad dash for coal. Continue reading
We spent this morning in a round table discussion in the shade. It was a meeting with breakfast as a side note. We covered nearly everything from risk awareness and assessment to planning the world record run and accounting for the most evasive and difficult variable in this trip: the wind. Test runs on the boats and an errand to the event site were in order early. Alex, Matt and Tripp drove with Phil to the event site, while I went with the Greenpeace crew on their two boats: the 20ft long Patrick Grech and the Billy Greene. Each boat is named in memoriam of fallen Greenpeace activists. We did test maneuvers with both boats and shook the grip of winter off the Greenpeace crew. Alex, Matt, and Tripp paddled out on Stand up Paddleboards and carried their new kites to shore Tahitian style.