NATURE & US

ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABLE DESIGN ARC 1413 PROJECT 2: NATURE & US WRITTEN BY: CHUAH WEI HONG 0310900 KRISTINE YONG XI WEI 0311297 TUTOR: MR. SANJAY

BACHELOR IN SCIENCE (ARCHITECTURE) DEGREE YEAR 1 SEMESTER 2 – MAR 14 ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABLE DESIGN GROUP ESSAY – CHUAH WEI HONG AND KRISTINE YONG

Technology has become so essential to our society that there have been studies conducted on the effects it has on socialization and interaction between individuals (Orlikowski 398). Nowadays, technology has taken an important place in our society.

Can you imagine a life without technology? After visited Taman Negara in Pahang, I experienced life living with the nature. The more I understand the natural forces the more comfortable to live with the nature. Orang Asli that we met in Taman Negara not just living without technology, they enjoy their relationship with the nature.

However, human living in the city never stops removing themselves further and further away from the nature. They are starting to forget themselves as part of it, but thought that they are separated individual, outside the kingdom of natural world.

After all the problems created by us, we started to find out that we are not as separate from nature, but a part of it. Humans are a part of nature.

Nature includes all living things on the Earth and excludes all things that were created by mankind. To maintain human populations, we created an environment that is mostly protected from the natural world, the concrete forest. We think of ourselves are special as we are the only living things that can control the environment. In recent years, the separation between human and nature has increased intensely causing by the development of technology. We forget the importance of Mother Nature that brought to every single living thing on Earth. We all depend on the Mother Nature so much. It offers us the basics of life, which keeps us healthy, wealth and also gives us happiness.

Meanwhile, we got a lot from the nature such as resources and raw materials. The ocean is one of the most treasured natural resources.

The ocean provides food and used for transportation. It provides sources of minerals such as salt, iron, copper and most importantly crude oil. The ocean is also playing one of the important roles in removing carbon from the atmosphere and transforms it into oxygen. It controls the climate of Earth. Furthermore, we rely on renewable resources that can be replaced and reused too. For example, air, sunlight and soil. There are also nonrenewable resources,

Malaysia's increasing water consumption (2005-2009)

which is exhaustible and are extracted more rapidly than the rate at which they are created. Most of the metallic resources and fossil fuels are nonrenewable resources.

If they are exhausted, they are exhausted forever. Sometimes, if we extracted them too fast, renewable resources can be depleted too! If a land goes through severe deforestation, that might leads to rapid soil erosion. The plants cannot grow back as the fertile topsoil needed to support plant growth has been depleted. It will affect the land, air and water if vegetation is removed without being replant. Beside that, fresh water is a renewable resource too, but due to overpopulation, water supply needed increased. Without water conservation and pollution of the water source may cause it insufficient for the demand. Follow with the problem, it also affect agriculture and other living organism in the area.

Greenhouse Effect

After knowing the importance of nature, let’s see what we have done to our Mother Earth. One of the main problems created by human is the increase of green house effect on earth. Green house effect is a natural process that occurring every seconds on Earth. During the sunlight and heat reach our atmosphere, some of them are reflected back into the space. The Earth warm up itself by absorbing the heat that created by the sun. At the same time, the natural greenhouse gases in the atmosphere trap some of the heat to keep the Earth warm enough to sustain life.

Unfortunately, over the past 50 years, we have done too much damage by producing extreme amounts of pollution to our nature. Anything that harms and degrades the natural environment is termed pollution. We pollute the air essentially by combusting fossil fuel.

Greenhouse gases produced by human activities are the major driver of climate change. Compare to greenhouse gasses that released to the atmosphere by natural processes such as volcanic eruption, we produced 10 times greater the amount of it. The industrial evolution Greenhouse gas emissions by source sector 2010 caused the rise in air pollution and now it is more serious than we thought.

Pollution of atmosphere also caused by agriculture, construction, and mining. As

greenhouse gases produced by human activities increase, the layer of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere trapped extra heat and warms the climate. It caused many other changes in the atmosphere, on land, and in the oceans.

The enhancing of Greenhouse effect, leads to the increasing in average global temperatures. Even minor increases in average global temperature create massive result. The ice caps on the North and South Pole are melting faster than usual is the biggest, and most obvious effect of increased global temperature.

Glaciers and ice caps cover about 10 percent of the world’s landmasses. They hold about 75 percent of the world’s freshwater. If all of this ice melted, sea levels would rise by about 70 meters (230 feet). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states that the global sea level rose about 1.8 millimeters per year from 1961 to 1993, and 3.1 millimeters per year since 1993 (National Geographic, n.d.). The ice melted and flows into the ocean and caused the rising of sea levels around the world and could flood coastal cities. Greenhouse gas releases cause more than just temperature rises. It includes the changes in the climate, such as rain. As climates change, living organisms from a certain place that have a certain climate may become endangered. We depend on specific plants for food, dressing, and trade. If the climate changed, the people are not being able to grow the plants they depend on.

Flora and fauna, plants and animals, we cannot survive without them. Plants produce the oxygen that is breathed by the animals and other organisms and in turn, they exhale the carbon dioxide that the plants need. One cannot live without the other, and we cannot live without them. The air we inhale, the food we consume, and the medicines that cure us would not exist if any of them never exist. The existence of one may change on the health of another, such as the relationship of rainforest to orangutans. The importance of plants and animals in the oceans are important too, many of them are endangered or extinct due to pollution. Air pollution is also damaging the ozone layer that protects us from the sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays in the upper atmosphere. Man-made gasses produced by coolants, foaming agents, and fire extinguishers are increasingly damaging it. The ozone layer becoming thinner and thinner caused the increasing amount of ultraviolet ray to reach the surface of the Earth and that leads to increasing of skin cancer and other diseases.

Those gasses also caused greenhouse effect, as the atmosphere appears to trap more heat and causing the rising of Earth’s temperature, which is a phenomenon known as global warming. Global warming harms agriculture, water resources, forest, wildlife and us, human. Toxic chemicals in the environment can impact wildlife by causing health problems like birth defects and disease in animals.

Whatever happened to the world, mother Earth will be fine, and we will be the ones that destroy ourselves. Open your eyes to preserve and create a better Earth, to enjoy and embrace the beauty of the natural world. We need to think more about

the ways we can take to make our homeland a better place and to appreciate what the world gave us. We must get back to nature as well as get nature back to preserve the balance of the ecosystem of nature. If there is no nature there is no us.

So to save our mother Earth, we should solve the problems of green house effects.

There are many ways to do to benefit both human and nature which will makes life better. Therefore, we should be taking out the responsibility towards the action, attitude and behavior. 'Plant More Tree' should not remain merely a slogan but become the message to call attention to each of us. Plants and trees are connected with our life and well being intimately. The benefits and significances of planting trees or green plants is to absorb carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere and release oxygen (O2) in the presence of sunlight which known as photosynthesis. This will keep a balance of oxygen with other gases and the atmosphere was clean. So, people should be aware unto this matter by planting more trees in housing area or city area. Plants can be beautifying the courtyard or play with the landscape. This can improve the relationship by interacting between human and nature and family members. On the other hand, trees also provide shade to protect the animals and prevent soil erosion. Hence, social forestry should be taken on a large scale and trees should be all filled up where there is a space for them. (Preservearticles.com, 2014). Without trees or forests, it would be desolation and deserts around us. We should protect forest as well like Taman Negara, Pahang, Malaysia. Although it only left 10% from total forest in the world but never giving up to protect a forest to continue the habitat.

Instead of using non-renewable energy such as continue burning the fossil fuel for industry, transport or electricity purposes which will increase the green house gases, it is more wise to use renewable energy. The uses of renewable energy are more sustainable and will never run out. (Renewableenergyworld.com, 2014).

Renewable energy facilities require less maintenance and the fuel derives from natural and available resources which reduces the costs of operation. It also produce only little waste products such as carbon dioxide or others chemical pollutants. Most renewable energy comes from the sun. Solar energy can be used directly for heating and lighting houses or building, for generating Diagram 1.1 Statistics of Malaysia’s Climate electricity, etc. According to statistic, the climate in Malaysia maintain between 22 degree Celsius to 30 degree Celsius. (Diagram 1.1). People should be encouraged to generate solar energy in their homes to reduce the emissions which drive climate change. Natural lighting can be used to shine in a building with a hole or window. But not just merely for lightning purposes, it also an architecture element which create light and shadow and make interesting and mystery for the space.

Furthermore, the sun's heat also overtakes the winds, whose energy, is captured with wind turbines. The winds and the sun's heat cause water to evaporate.

Diagram 1.2 Advanced Renewable Tariffs and Targets When the water vapor turn into rain, this energy can be captured as hydroelectric power. Hydropower functions by converting the energy in flowing water into electricity. Along with the rain, sunlight causes plants to grow. This organic matter known as biomass can be used to produce electricity, transportation fuel or chemicals.

(Renewableenergyworld.com, 2014). The uses of biomass of these are call bio energy. Hydrogen, as well as water is the most abundant element on the earth. But hydrogen is combined with others elements, for instance, it need oxygen to make water. So once it is separated with one another, it can be burned as a fuel or converted into electricity. (Renewableenergyworld.com, 2014). Renewable energy technologies are clean sources of energy which have lower environmental impact. In addition, it helps to improve public health and environmental quality. The air and water pollution emitted by coal and natural plant gas will linked to various diseases.

(Renewableenergyworld.com, 2014). To protect our nature and our own country, we should be encouraged to use renewable energy. Malaysia's parliament has approved a sophisticated system of feed-in tariffs to develop its renewable energy resources. It adopted a system of Advanced Renewable Tariffs and renewable energy targets differentiated by technology. (Diagram 1.2).

Nowadays, transportation holds for around 14% of total Malaysia green house has emission. (Diagram 1.3). So we need to emphasize to go green with technologies. It is better to reduce your personal impact, buy a more efficient vehicle, drive less, or car pool, use public transport or walk and bike. (Moll, 2014). There must have a group of people start to do this to spread this habit and duplicate more people to participate and get used Diagram 1.3 Total Emission of Malaysia to the public transport or Greenhouse Gasses car pool. In fact, the need for driving through travel efficient measure has to reduce. As it is a high technologies era, by using advanced technologies, design, and materials to develop more fuelefficient vehicles such as hybrid vehicles and electric vehicles which can store energy from braking and for power. In this way, the materials use to build this vehicle will spontaneously reduce the weight and aerodynamics resistance for vehicles through better form in design. Furthermore, fuel can be replaced by using natural gas rather than gasoline or diesel for mostly the buses. Electricity come from solar energy and wind energy which can help to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

Everyone should adopt himself or herself by practicing to minimize the fuel use, for

example, driving sensibly. Speed need to be observed and control to avoid rapid acceleration and braking.

To get back to nature, environmental law should be strongly enforced concerning the environment and protecting the natural resources. Environmental law brought in two categories which is pollution control and remediation on the one hand, and conservation of natural resources on the other. The environmental enforcement agencies or other bodies administer the laws designed to protect both human health and natural environment. In this case, they usually have the authorities to pass regulations on environmental issue and enforce the regulations through the imposition of fines, legal action or institution of criminal proceedings. For instance, open burning will get penalty, provide a smoking zone to prevent smoking everywhere which can help to reduce the amount of smoker. For those who smoke in the non-smoking zone will get warning and penalty. Increase the price of petrol can solve growing traffic and encourage using public transport or car pool. Also, increase the price of car which lead less people to drive. By this restriction of law will help to improve both human living and natural environment.

To conclude, people should fall their responsibility towards nature and be aware for the green house gases. It is easy to reduce the gases if you are willing to do so. People should be wise to use natural lighting, sun's heat, wind and water for the renewable energy to generate our daily needs. Malaysia is a country with a tropical rainforest climate which is suitable to use the renewable resources. We need to influence more people to get on their right trek and be environmentally friendly, especially to those juvenile. They need to be influence on the positive side and learning the natural environment from a young age. So, parents play as an role model towards their children to be the pattern and duplication of their children. Thus, to prevent and stop the green house effect, climate change and global warming, we should have be part of these people to contribute ourselves in this flow of saving the mother Earth.

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Preservearticles.com, (2014). 139 Words Paragraph on planting More Trees. [online] Available at: http://www.preservearticles.com/201107309435/139-words-paragraphon-planting-more-trees.html [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

Renewableenergyworld.com, (2014). Why is renewable energy important?. [online] Available at: http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/tech/home [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

Taman Negara Pahang. [online] Available at: http://www.tamannegarapahang.com/ [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

Bromley, A. (2013). A Part of Nature or Apart from Nature? New Professors Explore Human Responses to the Environment. UVA Today. Available at: https://news.virginia.edu/content/part-nature-or-apart-nature-new-professors-explorehuman-responses-environment [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

ODonnell, L. (n.d.). Why Is Our Environment Important?. LoveToKnow. Available at: http://greenliving.lovetoknow.com/Why_is_Our_Environment_Important [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

Wilkinson, J. (2011). The Ecosystem & The Importance of Flora and Fauna To Human Existence. Bright Hub. Available at: http://www.brighthub.com/environment/science-environmental/articles/61556.aspx [Accessed 25 Jun. 2014].

BACHELOR IN SCIENCE (ARCHITECTURE) DEGREE YEAR 1 SEMESTER 2 – MAR 14 ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABLE DESIGN INDIVIDUAL ESSAY – CHUAH WEI HONG

The amazing trip that we had to Taman Negara has absolutely left a beautiful memory in my heart, as it gave me a chance to live with nature and learn something from the nature. This trip somehow created a great deal of values for me to learn from it.

The night before Taman Negara trip, I waited patiently in my room. It was hard for me to fall asleep while thinking of the trip that will bring me to a new place that I have never been. I am an over-thinker. I overthink everything and that makes problems more and more complex in my mind. I find myself spending a huge amount of time thinking through something or looking through problems around in my head until I have seen it from every perspective and possibility. I am scared of insects, thus I imagined all the scenes of me killed by insects. I thought this trip is going to be terrible. However, I didn't aspect the trip could be so much fun. Through this experience, I learnt to see through things using positive perspective. I learnt to change overthinking into action to make forward progress.

I learnt so many treasured lessons during the trip, mainly in terms of teamwork. The jungle night walk certainly showed me the importance of teamwork.

Through this experience, I have found my true friends. It also brought out many personalities that I have never seen of my friends. Courageous, adventurous, understanding, curiosity, all of those are the lessons that my friends thought me. I have learnt to face my fears. A night in the jungle that full of my greatest fear, darkness and insects. I found so many striking creatures, dancing and singing in the darkness. The only way to find those beautiful creatures is to go in deeper into my fear to see another part that I have never seen before. I have learnt and will appreciate this experience for the rest of my life.

It was definitely new for me to see how these creatures form the small ecosystem in the woods and interact with each other. It is impossible to take away any species from that ecosystem.

I read this from an article long time ago, it says: Man would only have four years to live if the bee vanished from the surface of the Earth. It shows how important each species play a very important role in this world. Moreover, I found that we are so similar to the moths that trying hard to camouflage into the woods. We try hard to blend in and get recognized by everyone we know and we do not know. However, the truth is we are all unique in different way no matter wherever we from. We must learn to be a butterfly, dancing and letting people know how unique we are. Even though I always act as a moth that camouflage into the woods, I know that I have something unique inside of me. There is so much that I can do and help the society.

The next morning, we went for the daytime jungle walking. With sunlight, the forest showed me a completely different view, the surrounding act so differently during daytime and nighttime. The trees are so refreshing and the colors of nature created a breathtaking drawing. The crowns of the trees form beautiful shadows under our foot. The deeper I go, the more contrast I found between the views created by day and night. I learnt that light is so important in creating different feelings. Most of the architects play with the light to construct a beautiful architecture for humans. Light is the most interesting elements in architecture, yet it is free.

After the tiring jungle walk, we reached the point for us to have a canopy walk. I might scare of darkness and insects, but I enjoy the feeling standing on as unstable plank. It was very inspirational to walk among the tree crowns, I saw the best view that people with acrophobia cannot see. We didn't know where is the ending point of the journey, we didn't know where we were walking towards, but we enjoy the journey so much. The memory with my friends during this journey is way more important than the destination. As our lecturer told us, the most important thing about design is not the final product that you created so beautifully, but the process that brings you to this point. That goes the same concept with the journey we had in the jungle.

After that, we visited the Orang Asli Village. They use what they found around them to make their needed appliances and houses. How they stay harmoniously with the nature gave me an idea about sustainability and ecofriendly. We are not as separate from nature, but a part of it. Nature includes all living things on the Earth and excludes all things that were created by mankind. I was motivated to open my eyes to preserve and create a better Earth, to enjoy and embrace the beauty of the natural world. I started to think more about the ways we can take to make our homeland a better place and to appreciate what the world gave us. We must get back to nature as well as get nature back to preserve the balance of the ecosystem of nature.

In conclusion, all the experiences we had during this trip are very precious. I had realized so many things that I cannot see in daily life. I found that we have to go deep in to actually see the true beauty but not just looking at the surface.

Written by: Chuah Wei Hong

0310900

BACHELOR IN SCIENCE (ARCHITECTURE) DEGREE YEAR 1 SEMESTER 2 MAR 14 ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABLE DESIGN INDIVIDUAL ESSAY - KRISTINE YONG XI WEI

Nature is the world around us which gives importance especially for man and animals. We are not able to survive out of natural world of air, earth, water and life. But human tend to be poor leader in the "hierarchy" of animal life. We do not have much understanding towards nature. I have heard it but never listen to its sweet calls. We should have really experience it because nature is serene, beautiful, unique and it is a gift to every one of us. Hence, experiencing it should be a port of our lives. Taman Negara in Pahang, Malaysia would be one of the best places to get involved with nature.

There will be some activities which help us to understand better about nature and the living creatures. There are night jungle walk, jungle trekking, and visit to Orang Asli Village to explore the environmental circumstances.

During the night jungle walk, it was adventurous and full of curiosity what is inside the darkness. It is thoroughly dark and we only can follow the narrow pathway as our leading. It is a good experience to get ourselves involved in the nature and get the intimate contact with all the plants, nocturnal insect, animal, etc during the night time. There were a lot of insects which I have never seen before. I realized many insect or creatures use their body shape and skin color to protect themselves. Camouflage helps animals hide by blending in with their environment. The more colorful the skin is for a creature is considered bringing poisonous to protect them from attack. Some have spikes on the outer layer of their skin which normally is hard shell for their own protection. Whereas some of the creatures will pretend to be dead, for example, millipede, beetle and others. They certain kinds of method to protect themselves from harm. From this point of view, I found out that living creature does not need someone to take care or to feed as a pet. They can survive by their own if there is sufficient natural environment.

While we are having jungle trekking in the morning, I have heard a lot of sounds of the insects and birds chirping. I realized that they have their own way to communicate among their own species from different area. Just like human have their own way to communicate to each other. This is how we live, we need to communicate and we need to have a shelter to carry on our life. Same goes to the insects and animals. They are living things, living creature. Therefore, nature is important for them, it is their habitat and where they can only survive. Hence, I realized human are very selfish for taking off the nature to build their own shelter. It needs to be balance between human and nature. So throughout this jungle walk, I been enlighten that we cannot just merely think about building, the skyscraper, improve the level of human living and others. If nature does not exist at the first place, we will not be survived until today.

In addition, I can clearly see the species of the plants. All the plants are so greenish, rich and scents of fresh air, clean and pure. Moreover, there are Aquilaria Malaccensis

several herb trees which can heal the illness that others medicine could not.

Such as the leaves can cure and stop the blood from bleeding for woman who is giving birth. And the fresh colour berries contain poison and cannot be consume. The brilliant colour is the Herb protection with its false appearance.

Aquilaria Malaccensis has medicinal uses. It used for angina, fatigue, gastritis, HTN and others. Furthermore, some will produce fragrance when the branches been burn, and there are also some fruits can be consume. From Taman Negara we can still find a lot of herbs trees or plant with medical use. They are all still under the protection. This is how creatures survive with nature. They have their food chain and food web which will control the habitat. Natural balance in an ecosystem is maintained.

We also visited Orang Asli Village in Taman Negara.

"Orang Asli" means "original people in Malay language which refers to aboriginal tribes who was the first human occupants of Peninsular Malaysia. They continue to live a nomadic, hunting life style which call themselves Batek.

They are a gentle race of people, short in statue, tight curly hair and with dark-skinned. Their population estimate at 2,000 people but there are less than 500 people along Tembeling River. They live in a palmthatched shelters which made up of simple basic structure. The way they survive in the village is to hunt in the surrounding forest, fishing and build their own shelter. Due to the influence of modernization, the now trade with urban people by selling products such as knives, axes, and salt.

According to the tour guide, man should go out hunt for food whereas woman will knit the roof with rectangular bamboo huts on stilts with traditional leaf-thatched and pick fruits and vegetables. The forest is their "grocery shop", therefore it is very important to them because they obtain their daily needs in the forest. Man hunts by using bows and arrows before but now they use blowpipes and darts. To hunt their food in advance, they dipped some poisonous sap of the Ipoh Tree (Antarsia toxicaria) for the dart. They usually hunt birds, squirrels and monkeys. Besides that, to get their meals ready they will still use the traditional way to blaze up the fire by rubbing the wood with rattan to produce friction. They actually have a rule of not mixing vegetables and meats while cooking. They usually will share food and eat together because they believe the food belongs to the forest and similarly they believe the land does not belong to them.

The Batek tribe have unique culture and traditions.

Before marriage, man should learn how to hunt for food, fishing and thatching. So, when a man found out to be interested in a woman, he will shows his marks of accomplishment on the blowpipe. This shows his strength

and readiness to take care of the family. To understand each other, they will sleep for one night to observe their behaviour. In the morning, they have the rights to call off or proceed the engagement. To complete the marriage ritual they will sleep for another night. They get married at a very young age which is around 15 years old because they are less busy and have few things to do. Moreover, most of them are animists who believe in spirits. When someone passed away, the body will be wrapped using the bark of tree and tied with long rattan, then brought into deep forest and hung a 50 meter high on a "tree-house". They believe that the deceased's flesh will be taken away by nature and the bones will return back to the ground. They will burn the house of the deceased and certain or whole village will move to avoid bad luck.

This is how they live with and maintain their own culture and beliefs day by day. This is how they live in a place without any social network, which everything is simple and leisurely. This rural area and living environment is totally in contrast with the urban area.

Therefore it should be preserve and retain to be a pattern and influence more people to get back to nature to have a fresh air and natural environment. There is nothing been polluted. It is a good idea to give a try by staying there to experience and live together with them and learn how they survive.

In conclusion, by going through all the activities in Taman Negara, Pahang, I learn and experience the natural environment and the habitat. I appreciated with the splendid views and landscapes of the nature which grow perfectly natural and fit in the site which blends the colour and the context graciously. It is a good exploration in nature which has no end. There is always something new will exist in nature which we unexpected and startling us. We should take out the responsibilities to protect the nature instead of taking it away from where it belongs to. In order to maintain the nature, we should experience more to get intimacy relationship and to get involved in the living and bring the idea back to urban area. We may no longer living in a natural environment but we should have balanced existing structure with nature.

Written by: Kristine Yong Xi Wei 0311297

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