CULTURE
AS IF PONDERS WHAT COVID-19 TEACHES US ABOUT OUR PLANET
APRIL 23, 2020
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PHOTOGRAPHY
COURTESY of PEACE PHOTO
INTERVIEW
by KRISTOPHER FRASER
@krisfashion1
The word “caremongering” might be new to many of you, but it has turned into a global movement that has shown the beauty of altruism and humanity during this time of crisis. Mita Hans, a resident of Toronto, along with the help of her friend Valentina Harper, set up a “caremongering” group to help people in their community who are in search of help, and those who want help others in need during this time of quarantine and the global coronavirus pandemic.
What started off as one single Facebook group has now expanded to hundreds of Facebook groups around the world from Canada to South Asia. Hans wasn’t expecting the movement to take off at the magnitude it has, but she’s certainly glad about the difference she’s been able to make. Her organization has been featured on BBC, The Washington Post, and the New York Post. Caremongering even got a shout out from President Barack Obama on his Twitter account.
As a disability support worker at a special needs adult care facility, Hans is an essential worker at risk of contracting COVID-19 daily, but her focus remains on helping others. On the 50th anniversary of Earth Day she managed to speak with AS IF Magazine about how we can continue to change the world and leave a better earth for the future.
AS IF: Let’s talk about Earth Day. How do you think we should consider Earth Day in the middle of this global health crisis?
Mita Hans: Right now, there is a meditative pause on the planet. When we pause our busy lives, we open ourselves up to so many more possibilities and introspection. This is a planetary pause we are going through right now.
Definitely. I think 90 percent of the countries across the world are on lockdown.
Yes, and some really beautiful changes are happening because of this planetary pause. I’m watching what's been going on globally. I was watching an Indian news channel and saw that the Ganges river is flowing clean for the first time in 60 years. You can see the Himalayan mountains from my ancestral homeland in Punjab. The waters are cleaner, the air is cleaner, we dropped nitrogen dioxide levels and carbon dioxide levels globally, we can breathe easier, and you can hear the birds.
I’ve been telling my friends; mother nature was sick of us, and she just sent all of us to our rooms to think about what we did.
Exactly. I was talking to a young person in their thirties, and they said for the first time in their lives they can experience this level of quiet. Some of us older people have experienced this, or people who have traveled and gone out into the mountains or the desert have experienced this level of quiet, but people living in cities have never experienced this quiet.
Caremongering in action, photography by Katherine Fleitas
How else do you think we can use this time to think less about the self- quarantine selfie, and more about the planet and society as a whole?
We need to reassess ourselves so that on a larger scale we can look at how our actions affect the life and planet around us. What changes can we make to keep this sense of stillness and reflection happening in a sustainable way? Now that we have felt how beautiful things can be if we just take that time to pause, maybe now we can make this happen on a more permanent basis after this particular crisis has passed. A lot of people are realizing that the frantic constant activity is not good for the planet, and that we don’t really need all of that motion that we thought we did.
We need more green spaces, because that’s what we’re craving more than anything else being locked up. People need sun on their faces, people need wind in their hair, people need to feel the outdoors, they need to feel spring coming alive. Now that you’re hearing birds you don’t realize that you hadn’t been hearing them before. We really need to push for a systemic change that ensures that we don’t go back to the old status quo. That old normal was a terrible normal, we should never go back to that. It wasn’t good for any of us. COVID-19 closures are ensuring a huge hit to oil and gas, so the fracking industry is taking a huge hit, which is great for the planet’s good health.
