Image courtesy of David Schiller's Zen Page-A-Day 2010 Calendar

In many ways this describes my experience of working on this project. I’d quit my job in Australia, taken a leap of faith in travelling to India and ended up on a new path – one more aligned with my values, with more creativity and freedom.

Challenging? Yes. Enlightening? Absolutely.

The simplest analogy I can use to explain how it felt, comes from an incident during the first week of my stay in Delhi.

I’d moved into a great flat with my own bathroom attached to the bedroom. One night I got up to use the toilet and found I’d unknowingly locked myself out of the bathroom.

Yes: 1am, a full bladder, and nowhere to go.

Fortunately, my housemate had been working late so I was able to use her bathroom and go back to sleep.

But I still needed my things – my glasses were in there.

The following morning my housemate asks her cleaning lady to bring a young man to crawl through a small window connecting our bathrooms, opening the locked door once inside.

I arrive home early to find the cleaning lady and her friend waiting for me. But there seems to have been some confusion about the ‘young man’ required for the job. They’d brought along her friend’s eight year old son!

I’m looking at the boy (those big brown eyes staring back at me), then up at the window, then back at the boy – think Old Spice Ad, only less amusing.

“Absolutely not,” I tell them. “Do you know how many international conventions on the rights of children we would be violating? Not to mention the extreme risk of skull fractures and spino-cerebral damage occurring? No, I will endeavour to resolve this problem myself”.

Given that no-one else spoke English, here’s what I really said: “No, me go”.

Bit of a stretch alright

So, with a chair and a lot of hefting and heaving from the two sari clad ladies, I found myself suspended halfway through the window.

My head and chest were hanging into the locked room, one leg swinging like a pendulum in the other room and my other knee wedged up under my chin.

For one very long moment……………………………………………………………..I was stuck.

Going forward felt impossible, yet it didn’t feel like I could go back, not without squashing the women calling out hindi advice below me.

In an adrenalin-fuelled split second I learnt a lot about myself – about risk taking, fear facing and trust. Would I fall head first in the toilet bowl? Would my insurance cover this? Was I wearing clean underwear?…

Image courtesy of David Schiller's Zen Page-A-Day 2010 Calendar

Taking a deep breath, I visualised my little arms lowering me safely down into the room and then…

I let go.

Next thing I know I’m standing in the room and unlocking the door. I’m shaken (and stirred) but unharmed.

The women and small boy are with me, touching my reddened arms and knees, making sure I’m ok. We’re laughing as they tell me it’s lucky I’m not mota (fat).

It felt good to be on the other side.

Image courtesy of David Schiller's Zen Page-A-Day 2010 Calendar

Project Start – 1st September 2010

Two weeks before the Games – 18th September 2010

Just after the Games – 17th October 2010

Project End – 29th November 2010

I learnt a truckload in all 5 areas and I did have a go at doing all the things I set out to do in the original post, some with more success than others.

For example, simply immersing yourself in a different country is a great way to pick up a lot of the history and culture of a place (and I did spend a significant amount of time watching Bollywood films!)

On the other hand, enhancing my creativity by buying some eco-friendly, Indian fashion items was trickier than I thought. Although I did end up with a couple of Conserve India’s fabulous upcycled bags, I frequently left Delhi’s numerous clothes markets empty-handed, going: “Yeah it’s cheap, but at what cost?”

But I want to focus this post on one particular area – health and wellbeing and my response to stress.

This was my most significant change.

We were trying to work with a very big, chaotic event in an unusual set of circumstances.  Corruption claims, flooding, disease outbreaks, tourist shootings, buildings and roads crumbling…there were so many things outside my control that this project became a lesson in letting go.

Around the time of the third spider diagram (straight after the Games) we hit a crunch point where it looked like we might not get any waste directly from the Games.

I was stressed.

My health took a nose dive.

I realised I had a choice: I could continue trying to push things, trying to convince the Games organisers to work with us or…

I could do nothing.

By nothing, I mean that I could stop stressing and trust I’d done enough in my role with Conserve India, that I’d talked to enough people, that synchronicity would reveal itself if I just sat back a bit and let it flow.

Choosing the latter path I intentionally stayed home and rested, instead of going out to chase waste across the city.

And because I stayed home, with ready access to the internet, I was able to quickly respond to a surprise call from the Times of India. It’s almost certain I would not have met the journalist’s deadline if I had been out.

The TOI article in particular, ignited significant ongoing media and corporate interest in our project. It also helped us leverage access to Games waste.

By giving up control and learning to relax more, the project took on a life of it’s own and I felt healthier and happier.

It was almost as if the project delivered me, rather than the other way round.

So, dear readers, we are nearly at the end of this project blog – one more post tomorrow and we are done!

Thankyou for following our journey. Interestingly, the ‘net’ that I wished would appear to catch my fall was literally a net – the internet. The support we received via your comments, emails, responses to our questions (many from total strangers) was truly encouraging.

I’m also grateful for the dozens of people we met in Delhi, who helped us in many varied and significant ways.

And, of course, I’m indebted to the team at Conserve India. For without them, there was no project.

Remember our objectives? How we aimed to:

• create new valuable products out of Commonwealth Games waste – establishing Delhi 2010 as the first Games to upcycle event waste
• enhance Conserve India’s capacity to improve the wellbeing of Delhi’s poorest communities by selling more of their upcycled products
• raise public awareness of waste issues and the benefits of upcycling, particularly  at major events.

We used a basic spider diagram as our evaluation and reporting tool. Click on the diagram and read the summary below to see where we ended up in several key areas:

The Delhi 2010 Organising Committee

Establishing a partnership with the Delhi Organising Committee (OC) was one of the more challenging aspects of this project. Although we did find supporters within the OC, who directed us to waste materials, we were unable to secure an ‘official’ partnership. At the highest level this entailed the OC formally and publicly acknowledging a commitment to working with us.

The Games Contractors

We had a lot more success approaching companies contracted by the OC to deliver aspects of the Games. We were offered a variety of waste materials by different contractors. A number of these companies were interested in working with Conserve on upcycling initiatives beyond the Commonwealth Games. The team at Conserve India now have new contacts and industry knowledge, positioning them well to continue working with event waste in India.

Conserve India’s Capacity and the Games Upcycled Products

These two aspects were so interrelated I thought it best to deal with them together. Essentially, the biggest challenge here was time – we simply did not have enough time to fully test samples, lock in buyer interest, modify samples to meet buyer requirements and secure a significant wholesale order.

On top of this, Conserve India was already busy meeting current production demands while transitioning to a entirely new factory. We were happy, however, with having made product samples in what Anita called ‘laying foundation stones’: that is, giving something a go and learning from it for next time.

Liz and Conserve India

This was about recognising that our relationship was fundamental to the project’s success. Again this was constrained by time. In three months we felt as though we’d only just got to know each other.

One of the main things we all learnt from working together, was there could have been more discussion in the months leading up to delivering the project. Although this is tricky where you’re in different countries, for a project to be fully participatory all the key players need to be involved in creating it.

The Awareness Campaign

This was our unqualified success. We all agreed that the media campaign we ran during the Games delivered some great results – including generating unexpected interest from big corporations.

The social media campaign was more of a slow burner, but we did increase followers and generate quality feedback and engagement with our supporters through these channels. The blog, in particular, proved to be a great way of documenting our project story in a far more interactive way than any monitoring or final report could do. We learned a lot here.

If we had to do it all again, the main thing we would have changed is to have someone connecting with the Games much earlier in their planning process. Starting the project only one month before such a mammoth event was cutting it a little fine!

Overall, we were happy with the project as it was. Because what it was, was pretty great.

Image courtesy of David Schiller's Zen Page-A-Day 2010 Calendar

I love this quote. It’s an ancient Greek version of ‘what goes up, must come down’.

Herakleitos, the weeping philosopher, argued our only permanent reality is that of change. (How’s that for irony?)

He viewed the world order as ‘ever-living fire, kindling in measures and being extinguished in measures’.

Over 2000 years later, I’m thinking he was onto something. Yep, just looked around me – change seems to be going on quite a bit. Tick.

But I keep wondering how? How does change, especially big change, happen?

In mid-2010 I was introduced to the Berkana Institute and emergence thinking by two insightful facilitators – Chris Corrigan and Geoff Brown.

The concept of emergence provides an elegant framework for contemplating change. As Wheatley and Frieze put it in their 2006 article, Lifecycle of Emergence:

In nature, change never happens as a result of top-down, pre-conceived strategic plans, or from the mandate of any single individual or boss. Change begins as local actions spring up simultaneously in many different areas. If these changes remain disconnected, nothing happens beyond each locale. However, when they become connected, local actions can emerge as a powerful system with influence at a more global or comprehensive level. (Global here means a larger scale, not necessarily the entire planet.)

These powerful emergent phenomena appear suddenly and surprisingly. Think about how the Berlin Wall suddenly came down, how the Soviet Union ended, how corporate power quickly came to dominate globally. In each case, there were many local actions and decisions, most of which were invisible and unknown to each other, and none of which was powerful enough by itself to create change. But when these local changes coalesced, new power emerged…

To me, the guts of the theory is that we can learn how to work with emergence by understanding living systems – how they ‘begin as networks, shift to intentional communities of practice, and evolve into powerful new systems capable of global influence.’

Based on this understanding, Wheatley and Frieze argue we can encourage positive influential systems to emerge through a four stage approach: naming, connecting, nourishing and illuminating.

Lifecycle of Emergence diagram courtesy www.berkana.org

I thoroughly recommend reading the full article to understand these approaches better. It’s quite short and, if you’re anything like me, it will chime inside your head for some time to come.

But how does this thinking relate to our project? Well, it helped clarify how we thought change might come about because of what we were proposing to do.

Basically, by creating an upcycling partnership between Conserve India and like-minded supporters within the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games organising system we hoped to:

• connect these pioneers and positively change how major sporting events are delivered by proving new, valuable products can be made with event waste materials

• nourish Conserve India with new contacts and knowledge about how to work with major events. We wanted to discover useful product materials; to make and sell new products and generate new income streams, leading to more benefits for Conserve’s staff  and the communities this social enterprise supports

• illuminate the pioneering work of Conserve India, and other upcyclers, by capturing some of the vast media platform dominated by these major events. We wanted to tell the project story in as many ways possible, and through as many channels as we could, to see if we could find new supporters who would buy the products we created.

We wanted to cast a few small droplets into the river of change we can feel is fast emerging…

Image courtesy of David Schiller's Zen Page-A-Day 2010 Calendar

To see our original full project plan, otherwise known as ‘Our Best Guess At The Time’, click on our program logic diagram below.

CD2010 Program Logic May 2010

So how did we go?

Tune in tomorrow, dear readers, and I’ll show you…

Joey had volunteered with Conserve India a few years ago and was dropping in to the office to say hi. We, of course, jumped at the chance to have an extra photographer for our planned photoshoot at Delhi’s Connaught Place shopping centre.

And here are the citizens of Delhi who graciously stopped to model our bags. Amazingly, these lovely ladies knew about the project because they’d read about it in the papers…

…and we thought our next model, Sujay, looked far more stylish than the United Colours of Bennetton mannequins we snapped him in front of (especially their hair arrangements…or lack thereof).

…We loved how Sumit’s dark clothing highlighted the bright colours of our Games messenger bag…

…and, finally, the very obliging Anyad and Mrinali, lending us their unique looks for this photo…

What was great about the shoot was that people got the idea quickly; they understood what we were trying to do.

We were overjoyed with their show of support (and the photos – thanks Joey and Jenna!)…

…like Shammi Kapoor (the ‘Elvis of Bollywood’) on seeing his true love…

…or Rahat Fateh Ali Khan mid-flight in song…

…Gold!

We rushed a small number of them back to the Conserve India sampling unit to start working on bag designs…

Conserve's design intern, Christina and the Conserve India sampling unit - Moksud, Inam and Sajit - discussing the Games design challenges

Conserve’s staff were incredibly busy meeting orders at the time so, to speed up the sampling process, we agreed to try modifying established designs with the PVC material. And here’s what the team created…

Sajit and the Commonwealth Games bag samples (on left)

I decided to get a few shots of the bags around the workshop…

Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games messenger bag (sample) made from athlete flags and wall wrap banner insert

Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games messenger bag (sample) made from athlete flags

Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games 'Breeda' bag (sample) - Games banners and tyre tubing

Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games 'Breeda' bag (sample) with denim lining

Look! It's a bird!...No, wait....it's Commonwealth Games waste...upcycled!

But would Delhi’s citizens appreciate these products?

Wait till you see who volunteered to model our bags in the middle of the city’s most exclusive shopping district…

Tomorrow, dear readers, tomorrow…

After news of the project broke in the Indian media we were contacted by Reebok, Aviva and finally, Dupont.

Dupont is a global science-based products and services company. They’re into…well…everything!

They were keen to work with Conserve India on an upcycling solution for their signage and banner products made from one of the company’s signature materials -Tyvek.

Tyvek is created with finely spun fibers of high density polyethelene. So it’s still a plastic derived from petroleum and could be viewed as ‘less bad’ rather than as a more sustainable alternative to the cheaper PVC signage materials.

But from an upcycling point of view, Tyvek is a very interesting material. It’s incredibly lightweight, strong, water and stain resistant.

Dupont sent us some sample Tyvek sheets (note the logo on the bottom – yep, they were ticket envelopes left over from the Commonwealth Games).

Delhi Commonwealth Games Tyvek ticket envelopes converted to a tote bag

With only half an hour to experiment, Conserve’s design intern (Jenna) whipped up a simple tote bag to show Dupont India staff.

Jenna and the sample Tyvek tote bag

The meeting was positive and, by the time I left India, both Conserve and Dupont were interested in developing an ongoing upcycling partnership.

The corporate interest in Conserve India was a fantastic unexpected outcome from our Commonwealth Games project.

I’m looking forward to sharing the final project results over the next few days.

Liz

My home 'office' in South Delhi

Note to all former SV colleagues: yes this is the metal name plaque from my old work desk. I figured no-one else was going to use if after I left…I’m not that replaceable!

Creative mind mapping of the Conserve Delhi 2010 project blog - old packing string, 3M post-it notes and a banyan leaf.

I can’t emphasise the importance of having your own comfortable space in a hectic city like Delhi. I used the accommodation pages of Craig’s List and double checked listings on Trip Advisor to find my apartment.

A few days after I’d moved into my apartment, I decided to treat myself at the local ice cream parlour. The icecream was great but, at 80 rupees a scoop, definitely pricey.

On my stroll home I passed my neighbourhood dhalao, or waste collection centre.

Kailash Colony, South Delhi neighbourhood dhalao

It was getting dark, so I was startled by something scrabbling through the rotting food scraps, crumpled packaging and broken bits of crockery.

It was a man.

He stopped his sorting and turned towards me. We looked at each other for a moment.

It would be weeks before I understood the vital role he played in recycling my daily domestic waste.

I didn’t yet know that my ice cream cost around the same amount of money he would earn on an average day.

It would also be some time before I would learn about the Delhi government’s plans to remove the dhalaos (and his workspace) from the city.

And I certainly would never have predicted that one day, a couple of months from that moment, I would smash a glass bottle in my kitchen, then fret about how to dispose of the shards.

Because I would know then that Delhi’s recycling is often done by people with bare hands and no protective clothing.

But I wasn’t concerned with any of this then.

I just glanced away from him and continued walking.

He turned back to his work.

And I ate expensive ice cream.