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Gwangju Abroad
www.gwangjunewsgic.com
October 2020
GWANGJU ABROAD
Volunteering in the Kubuqi Desert
Caring for the Environment Written and photographed by Kim Da Jeong
W
hen I was in the second year of university, I started searching for extracurricular activities and became interested in volunteering abroad. Through this interest, I got the chance to go to the Kubuqi Desert in Inner Mongolia, an autonomous region of northern China. Full of anticipation, I left for the Kubuqi Desert curious about the environment in which other people live and wanting to both get away from the familiarity of home and help others while exploring a corner of our global world.
I had always thought that planting trees was hard work, but I found it to be several times harder than I had imagined. We were told that it was necessary to dig at least 130 centimeters into the ground to increase the chances of the plants surviving. Of the planted trees, less than half would make it. It was so painful to think that the vegetation I had planted would die. Until the last day of my volunteering there, I gave tender-loving care to the young trees I had transplanted so that they would be able to survive.
I spent the first day in Beijing. Our volunteer activities were related to preserving the environment. To do this, we had to know what environmental conservation is and what role it plays. We were divided into teams and had to pretend to be at a UN meeting representing our team’s interests. At the time, I thought I was caring about the environment and was familiar with its preservation and issues. However, while preparing for the simulated UN meeting, environmental problems that I did not know about were hidden everywhere. The preparation process was difficult, and I was not used to discussions in a group, but I think it was a good experience for me.
In the desert, the sunlight is really strong during the daytime. We had to plant the trees in that direct, strong sunlight. As you can imagine, it was extremely hot with no place to chill. We had to drink a lot of water to stay hydrated, but the water we had was warm – even beyond lukewarm. In a normal environment, I would have complained, but in that situation, being able to drink water was something that I was grateful for. We also had to bring our own lunch and eat it all so that no food waste would be generated. In this way, I learned how precious our daily life is. Since leaving food is a part of environmental pollution, I now try as much as possible not to produce food waste.
Our volunteer activity mainly consisted of planting trees in the desert to prevent desertification, which is progressing rapidly. Even if trees are planted in the desert every year, desertification will still proceed, but we were trying to slow it down as much as possible.
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We had a bonfire late at night to rest after a day of hard work and to enjoy our time there. The campfire was really fascinating, not to mention the endless sky with countless stars shining brightly in the night. It was the first time
9/23/2020 11:05:08 AM
