Charting a sustainable, green future<\/p>\n
Marco Kusumawijaya, Contributor, Bellagio, Italy, marcokw@centrin.net.id<\/p>\n
Bellagio, two hours drive up the hill from Milan, Italy, is a
\nperfect place to do green mapping. But the 22 green mapmakers
\nfrom 14 countries -- six of them from developing countries,
\nincluding this writer from Indonesia, were not there to do
\nexactly that.<\/p>\n
Instead, they were there staying at the Rockefeller
\nFoundation's 50-acre hilly estate by the highland lake, from Dec.
\n2 to Dec. 6, to chart ways to move the world toward sustainable
\nliving with an ancient tool: map-making.<\/p>\n
Green map-making is a process that involves ordinary people
\ncharting the interconnections between nature, culture and society
\nin a built environment. They do this by spotting places of
\nenvironmental and cultural significance and marking them using
\n125 award-winning universal icons developed by Green Map System.<\/p>\n
In the process of producing the 119 green maps published so
\nfar, some local icons have also been invented by, or adapted to,
\ndifferent places. The latest map, which coincidentally is
\nJakarta's second green map, for example, has local icons for
\n\"traditional\/ethnic food outlets\" and \"water-level watch places\",
\nas well as a \"bike repair shop\" icon adopted from Kyoto's bicycle
\ngreen map. The map also enjoyed the privilege of being launched
\nduring that first global meeting of green mapmakers. Former
\nminister of settlement and regional development Erna Witoelar was
\namong the first prelaunch buyers of the 119th map.<\/p>\n
The founder of the green map movement, Wendy Brawer, said she
\nwas moved to turn \"green\" when an orangutan in Yogyakarta's zoo
\ntossed her a stone in 1989. She said she suddenly felt her life
\nhad a mission, and decided to focus on ecological activities from
\nthat point. Her lifestyle changed. She now rides her bicycle
\neverywhere in New York and piles her garbage only in a composting
\nunit in a community garden in her neighborhood.<\/p>\n
Despite the inspiration it provided, Yogyakarta had its own
\ngreen map published only in July 2002. The map charted the unique
\nplaces in Jero Beteng, the walled surroundings of the Yogyakarta
\nSultan's Palace.<\/p>\n
The green mapmakers who gathered in Bellagio are self-driven
\nand autonomous people who became amateur cartographers because
\nthey believe that global-scale problems should not overwhelm our
\nability to respond and take actions locally. Their backgrounds
\nand actual professions are diverse: philosophy, architecture,
\ncommunity workers, product designers, agriculture, tourism
\nmarketing, urban planning, eco-design. It seems that, trying to
\nbe optimists, all of us somehow have to turn into activists.<\/p>\n
It took 13 years from Yogyakarta to Bellagio, but green maps
\nhave been used by people around the world to guide them to better
\nquality of lives, sustainable futures and cities and towns. The
\nmaps guide citizens to outlets for responsible social action,
\nhelp them live more culturally rich, ecologically literate lives,
\ngiving them stronger connections to diverse communities
\nworldwide.<\/p>\n
In Kyoto, hotels expressed a willingness to be part of a
\nbicycle rental system in order to get onto the bicycle map. In
\nToronto, a green map has proven to be a big success with tourists
\nlooking for something besides conventional destinations. In
\nTamagawa, 500,000 green maps were distributed as centerfolds for
\na lifestyle magazine. Jakarta's first green map was actually the
\nfirst to be published as the centerfold of a magazine, in this
\ncase AIKON.<\/p>\n
But how do we assess the impact of these maps? That was among
\nthe questions discussed during this first global get-together.
\nAlso discussed was how to work together as a group of several
\nhundreds green mapmakers around the world to better impact the
\nplanet through sustainable living. Ambitious tasks to be
\naccomplished in the years to come include a first Global Green
\nAtlas, a revamped green map icon system and an impact assessment
\nsystem.<\/p>\n
Those tasks justify the green mapmakers being the privileged
\nguests of the Rockefeller Foundation's Study and Conference
\nCenter in Bellagio. Their names were recorded along with the
\nnames of distinguished scholars such as Peter L. Berger and
\nSamuel Huntington, who were both the center's guests in 1999<\/p>\n
There could not be a better place than Bellagio to host the
\n\"green people\", as a member of the board of trustees called them.
\nBellagio is in a way a typical Italian village: expansive lake,
\nmountains of rocks with snow on the higher peaks, villas with
\nbright-colored stucco and plenty of evergreen plants.<\/p>\n
And the Rockefeller Foundation estate is a star in the area. A
\nnarrow gate surprisingly opens on a narrow village street, which
\nis completely lined by buildings, leading us to a hilly
\npromontory protruding into the elongated lake. The 50 acres of
\ngreen space are only sparsely dotted with eight main buildings,
\nconnected by winding roads and steep traversing paths. Some
\nbuildings date back to the 17th century. The remains of a church
\nbuilt in 1080 have become part of the main Villa Serbelloni. The
\nwhole property was donated to the foundation by Ella Walker,
\nheiress to Hiram Walker, the famous whiskymaker. She bought it in
\n1928 and lived there for the rest of her life, dying in a room
\nthat is now the library.<\/p>\n
The Romans were already firmly established in the area by the
\nfirst century A.D, with their villas dotting the edges of the
\nlake. Pliny the Younger wrote about his own two villas in
\nBellagio: \"One is set high on a cliff -- and overlooks the lake,
\nsupported by rock, as if by the stilt-like shoes of the actors in
\ntragedy, I call it Tragedia. It enjoys a broad view of the lake,
\nthe ridge on which it stands divides in two -- from its spacious
\nterrace, the descent to the lake is gentle.\"<\/p>",
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