No Impact Week - Day 4: Food

Wednesday was food day! The instructions asked us to note down where we'd be eating and to figure out whether the food was locally sourced or came from further away. Since we'd already bought most of the food for the week though, this information came a bit late (I'd read over the manual but it's 17 pages so some details slipped through the cracks.)

We decided that since sticking to none packaged, in-season foods, this was a worthy effort. Also, the within 200 miles rule would work great in places with lots of seasonal variety, like New York or the San Francisco Bay Area but much harder to stick to in Finland. What grows within 200 (320km) of here? That's why if we'd do it right next time, we'd probably decide that whatever comes from Europe (not necessarily the EU's definition but actual Europe, would be legit.)

Otherwise, it wasn't hard not to buy anything, not to create any waste, not to drive anywhere (since we don't have a car)...but it also felt like somehow I wasn't trying hard enough either. I've been doing a fair bit of reading about perceptions and social pressures for my thesis and it seems that once you put something out there (ie. I AM DOING NO IMPACT WEEK) you're more likely to stick to it since you blabbed to all your friends that that's what you're doing. So in a way you start to feel dishonest if you're not putting your best effort in. But as I said in my last video, the difference between taking and bus and riding my bike, didn't really feel like it'd make a difference in impact (since you save so much time by jumping on whatever bus comes by, but that bus is running because of demand and it is burning fuel... but it'd still be running anyway since that's better than all the people on it driving cars instead.)

SO - any thoughts on that? It took me awhile to bring this up because I don't feel great about it (and other shortcomings over the week) but didn't want to make it seem like I was doing everything perfectly and effortlessly.