Smiles, full tummies and many “Oh, I don’t know what to write”. Those, and many more emotions and exclamations have made up the first Metropolia World Week in Myyrmäki campus today.

Students from the Business and the Technology department came together in the spirit of “Global Citizenship” and Education. For the first time business students had the opportunity to explore the vivid world of technology.

Even though the shower reusing the water, wanted to shower all of us, the invention is rather clever, and don’t we all know the process of trial and error? Let’s see whether some more weeks of fixing and refining the shower can fix the  leak. Who will be the first to try the shower, maybe this summer?

But not only the shower is a step into sustainability, even the food prepared by the various cooking teams was environmental friendly. Unlike the past years events, this time the food choices were all about finger food. The idea was to minimize the amount of paper plates, plastic cups and plastic forks to the bare minimum to reduce the amount of waste produced. For most of the cuisine prepared napkins had been sufficient, those students who had run missions on grabbing food, had been smart enough to get a real plate and fill it with all the delicious offers.

The hardest part of the event was to make a promise on how to live a more environmental friendly life. It was nice to hear how students and teachers are planning to do go about their daily while making a positive impact on the world. From biking or walking to school to better recycling to insulating the garage we collected all kind of promises. Hopefully, most of them will be kept. Although no one will ever control whether anyone is doing their promise, knowing they are realized would be really commendable.

On a last note, I want to mention the guest lecture of Dirk Cilliers on “Conservation planning in the South African context”. The ideas he presented to us gave us more diverse and deep insights into the topic. And we all had the chance to walk out after it, and think about what he told us.

In general, we hope all of you gained an understanding of how important sustainable living, or at least being aware of the environment and world around us, is. Even tough, our time on earth is limited be don’t want to leave it a garbage dump.

Finally, we have to thank the cooking team for preparing all the foods and the team organizing the event. They have done a great job. Nevertheless, giving them feedback on how it went, will make the next years event even better. So don’t keep your opinion to yourself but share it using the comment function at Metropolia World Week, the Faceboock event or using Twitter at #MetropoliaWorldWeek.

As soon as we get a hand on some of the pictures of the event we will show them too you.

Hope to see you all at the next Metropolia World Week. And remember:

Everyone who considers themselves a realist will be forced to justify their behavior in light of their contribution toward the preservation of the environment.
– Ernst von Weizsäcker (German Politician 1882 – 1951)