Eco Trip Info

This weekend 28 MS and HS students will go to Kaeng Kachan National park. Trip includes hiking, rafting, mt. biking, boat tour, tree planting, etc.

Departure date: Friday, Jan 15. Leave ISB 2:00 pm
Return date: Sunday, Jan 17. Leaving site approximately 3:00 and should be back around 6pm.
Housing: Bring own tent or share with a friend. Let me know if you really need one.
Transportation: Montri Bus
Participants: we have approximately 28 students
What to take: Please see below for my general checklist for all trips and things to remember.


General Camping Checklist

· Tent or partner up with someone with a tent. - If you can't get a tent email me to let me know. I can get you one if needed.
· Sleeping bag
· Flash light
· Sun cream, hat, and sun glasses
· Reusable water bottle
· Washing kit (soap, towel, toothbrush & paste)
· Clothes for getting wet and/or swimming
· Clothes for hiking: proper shoes, small back pack
· At night it could be hot or cold so be prepared for both.
· Be prepared for rain
· Snacks (reduce packaging)
· Spending money (about 500 baht)

To be more eco-friendly:

· Flash light without batteries
· Reusable water bottle
· Biodegradable soap
· Non toxic bug spray
· Little to no packaging/litter. We will not use a trash bin. You will keep all of your trash with you throughout trip! So keep it to a minimum.


Other things you can bring:

· Camera
· Phones and iPods are allowed on the trip but can only be used when in the tent and bus.
· No video games please. Use this time to socialize and take a break from technology.
· Pillow


Most important things to remember:
· Positive attitude. Remember you volunteered to go on this trip so enjoy it. Also remember others paid to do this and they want to enjoy it too. Get the most out of the experience.
· Some of you may have never done anything like this and you might not be comfortable with the changes such as sleeping in a tent, being away from mom and dad, different style showers/toilets, different food, getting dirty, etc. Remember it’s all a part of the experience… enjoy it.
· You are a Green Panther. Take some pride in that. You care about the environment... RIGHT? Therefore, don’t just say it; show it in your actions. Clean up after yourself. Pick up trash, clean your dishes, etc. The teacher should not have to remind you to clean the bus or anything else.
· No Mae-baans on the trip. You will have to take care of yourself and show some responsibility and independence. The teachers are there to help when you really need it, but try to do things for yourself first.
· Most trips are new and it is also new for the teacher, thus, we don’t always know what is happening next. Be patient. Sometimes the plan changes and we will inform you when we know. Do NOT keep asking the teacher the same old questions they don’t have the answers to; such as, when will we arrive? Why aren’t we there yet? Remember we want to enjoy the trip too and answering 100 unnecessary questions is NOT fun.

Thank you and please call me if you need any information.
085 837 6825
kerryd@isb.ac.th
Kerry Dyke


Student list

1. Justin Hathaway
2. Kira Reau
3. Julie De Meyere
4. Prairie Yooprasert
5. Alex Hill
6. Roni Bar
7. Liam Daly
8. Omer Bareket
9. Regina Durst
10. Kayla McEwen
11. Sarah Corning
12. Maya Ben-Yaacov
13. Ella Peled
14. Mark Huistra
15. Devon Lonigro
16. Angela Lutz
17. Claudia Lutz
18. Natalie Kang
19. JJ Erpaiboon
20. Katie Henderson
21. Cha Patra-Yanan
22. Andy Real
23. Raimy Shin
24. Brian Woo
25. Isabel Francisco
26. Eric Hsiao
27. Jayna Milan
28. Grace S

Itinerary

January, Friday 15,

14:00 Leave ISB for Kaeng Krachan Park
17:00 Arrive the park and camping

January, Saturday 16,

06:30 Get ready to go into THE PARK, 3 pickup trucks will come picking up the group
07:30 Have breakfast
8:30 Leave for the park
09:30 Arrive the park then set up the tents
10:30 Go hiking in Baan Grang Park
12:00 Have lunch ( lunch box)
13:00 Leave for where you are camping
15:00 Free time
16:30 Do some fun activities with the leader/s or tour guide/s from the park
18:00 Have dinner
19:00 Campfire
21:00 Go to bed

January, Sunday 17,

05:00 Get up to get ready
06:00 Bird and nature watching
07:00 Have breakfast
08:00 farewell.
09:00 Leave for the place that do rafting and biking

- Rafting

- Biking

- Tree planting

Villa Bans Plastic Bags

Crossed linked at Mr. Dyke's Blog


I just had my second meeting with Villa and it was a good one. I found out that they have 18 Villas in Thailand and the smallest one is in Nichada Thani. However this Villa alone uses 500,000 bags per year.
They were very impressed by the # of people on Facebook supporting this cause and were encouraged to do more because of it.
They have not committed to charging for plastic bags. Instead, they went with the plan and have agreed to BAN all plastic bags at Villa (in Nichada). As well, they will do the same for Villa (in Phuket). This is a giant leap forward, as only a couple years ago it was hard to get anyone to consider this topic. If these two locations are successful, then naturally they would look to expand this to all 18 stores. They are even thinking of maybe having a battery return station at their stores and are looking to alternatives to foam. So Villa has made their commitment and many parts of the plan are already laid out. They will launch this either late January or sometime in February. They actually had a set date, but I couldn't make it... opps ; )

Where do you come in? This is the MOST IMPORTANT PART. All you need to do is... are you ready for it? You need to SHOP! That's it, however, it is absolutely crucial that we support this. When the day is chosen to launch, we MUST have as many supporters there as possible. We need to put our money where our mouth is. That means showing up and buying your groceries for the week. Show Thailand that going green is actually good for business and is a win-win situation. I plan on getting as much media coverage as possible, so if you have connections let me know. I have some already. This will be a major flop if only 80 people turn up. I am setting a target goal of 1000 people. Hopefully we can get more. If we make this a HUGE success with a HUGE turn out then the rest of Thailand will listen and it will make future projects more possible. Remember Villa is only project 1.

When the date is set I will send out an invitation and hopefully you can commit to it. It should be on a weekend.

Join up on Facebook. Over 900 people joined in 4 days!

Excellent videos also on the Facebook site about this topic

PS - keep spreading the word.
Step 1 - success!
Step 2 - up to you...

Post is crossed referenced at Mr. Dyke's Blog



Students learn to recycle by collecting items at home and then earning a little money when we take this trip. They also learn about the neighborhood composting program that is a win-win for farmers and the community. All this is done on an eco friendly solar bus which Nichada kindly provides for us.

Bangkok Police Going Green?

Over my 6 years in Thailand I have seen this country slowly become more green minded. From increase in tree planting, to shopping malls hosting green events and starting to consider reducing plastic bags, to more sky trains, and even having buses switching to natural gas fuel. But I was pleasantly surprised to find this video about the police department. 3 cheers for the cops!



Want to see Bangkok go even greener? Keep your eye on Carrotmob. Coming soon.

No More Bottled Water

The HS Green Panthers selected one of their project this year to be trying to stop the sale of bottled water at ISB. We are in the beginning stages, but there is movement happening. There are many concerns and issues with the move, so it is not as simple as it might seem. We would need to supply more fountains around campus, we want to provide every student with a water bottle, and people need to be educated about this issue. These are only some of the main concerns.

We have narrowed it down to two bottles; Vapur, which is the anti-bottle and has some unique characteristics, such as rolling up when empty; and the Water Geek. Both are BPA free and have other qualities we are looking for.

Samples will be here soon. What would you want to use?

I know other schools out there have gotten rid of bottled water. Please send us any information you might have that can help us.

Pammy and the United Nations

I'm a little late reporting this one, but back in September we took 10 ISB students (5 MS and 5 HS) to the U.N. building to help in a worldwide conference on Climate Change. It was called Seal the Deal and was hosted in Korea, but we were video conferenced in as were others from Brazil, Canada, South Africa, China, and more.

We were 10 amongst 1000's of youths collaboratively working together in real time around the world on a common cause. Together we helped form the proposal for Seal the Deal. This proposal will be taken to the Climate Change meeting in Denmark in December.

The last major meeting on this cause before the Copenhagen talks were held in Bangkok. We were honored to have our very own Green Panther, 'Pammy' selected as guest youth speaker for the United Nations. Congratulations Pammy!

Stuart Scott

In October we were fortunate enough to have a visit and presentation by Stuart Scott about Climate Change. Stuart has been trained by Al Gore on the subject. He spoke with students from grade 5-12 and also met with the ToK class. Stuart is is Thailand to discuss this topic with as many influenced people as possible. A colleague of mine, Robin Bulsza, also wrote a class blog about this.

I would like to thank Stuart for giving us his time and sending the message of action loud and clear. Recently Stuart has been granted an audience with Pope Benedict. Let's hope something positive can come of it.

To find out more about Stuart and what he is doing go to Interfaith Declaration.