Activity 10: Tree Plantation Drive | Service

I have always been a cowardly, overcautious kind of a person, which automatically translates into caring A LOT about taking care of the environment, lest one day it stops taking care of me.

I enjoy and appreciate nature’s prowess and beauty, and through this CAS activity, I was able to give back to nature in a small way. We went on a tree plantation drive arranged by Nature Club Surat and planted trees in Kendriya Vidyalay School in Piplod.

I initially thought it was going to be quite a boring activity that I would do just for the sake of getting over with CAS, but the whole experience so much more than that.

Going to KV School, I saw the wild plants in the playground, and the tall trees on the perimeter of the campus, I realized how natural beauty can make even a seemingly desolate place (a government school, on a rainy Sunday, early in the morning) appear to be an oasis. Being among all that greenery in the centre of the city was a very unique experience, because it made me realize, that all over the world, places of great natural beauty are being transformed into concrete jungles to suit the needs of human beings, that we are destroying the plant for our convenience, and that this is highly unethical.

With this thought in my mind, when I actually started transplanting the bird-friendly trees into pits and then filling them up with mud, I felt like I was taking a step (albeit a very small one) towards making a difference with regards to an issue of global significance. All cities desperately need more green places: not just to serve as lungs for the atmosphere, but also because human beings often needs respite from the harshness of concrete and traffic and noise, and there is no better place for the respite than nature’s green lap, surrounded by the majesty of trees and the chirping of birds. I am glad I was contribute to taking our reality a step closer to this ideal.