yellow dust closes schools..

and you thought smog warnings were bad.. today, "yellow dust" warnings were issued for much of south-eastern korea. originating in china's gobi desert, the sand or 'dust' sweeps south enveloping the korean peninsula and parts of japan every spring. it gathers heavy metals and carcinogens such as dioxin as it passes over chinese industrial regions before hitting korea and japan. the korean environment institute reports that this yellow dust causes around 165 deaths per year, with about 1.8 million people becoming ill. it also estimates the damage this dust causes to be upwards around ($5.82 billion). this time of year has become widely accepted as "yellow dust season". the streets are nearly empty, but those who dare to be outside are wearing masks specially designed to cope with this season.
it disgusts me that we simply choose to cope with this problem rather than work toward fighting the source of the problem. humans seem to be able to adapt rather well in many different circumstances, but perhaps rolling with the punches isn't the best answer. we as a population need to stand up and stop buying cheap crap from china; stop buying so much stuff that has been shipped from other countries (buy local); stop supporting the big businesses; stop buying crap we don't need.. (i'm kind of tired and whiny- sorry bout that)
recently I've come to the realization that major changes in the world comes either comes very slowly (because the generation in power is often quick to educate, but slow to learn), or a little bit faster than very slowly because of the urgency of the situation.
although we all know that changes need to be made to clean up this world, it seems like we are never too worried about it. maybe it doesn't effect us directly, or we have ongoing projects that don't need finite due dates - but it seems that we are so slow to turn ourselves around when we've come down a wrong road.
i don't know. if we could educate (both the older and younger generations) about the many sustainable ways to live, maybe that would make a difference..

partially inspired by no impact man
yellow dust info gathered here.