September Scavenging

Maybe the rain is still scarce for spring but in Students’ House cleaning has been the order of the day in the past few days. As some organizations switch offices, others plan to enter their first one but whatever the case the lower storey of the building has been buzzing with activity.

JEF- an organization that will be moving to a new office in the next scholastic year- thought of an innovative yet brilliant idea. Offices would be ceiling-full of stuff gathered from last year’s activities and events. While most of this stuff is only worthy of recycling, some is most definitely in a good enough condition to be reused. And JEF proposed to organizations cleaning up their offices to put their unwanted stuff in the corridor while other organizations scavenge for things that might be useful for them this coming year.

And lo and behold! Boxes filled with all sorts of crazy stuff filled the narrow corridors while the offices breathed a sigh of fresh air as their empty spaces were re-found.

Greenhouse members visited the activity and, being an organization with its first office, found a plethora of stuff that where considered handy. Throughout the time Greenhouse members spent going through the boxes of unwanted stuff, JEF and MUSC were clearing out their offices.

Greenhousers were scratching their heads (and washing their hands) handling all the brimful boxes.

Among the things that were recovered by Greenhousers were cutlery, banners, ropes, crayons, a cupboard, a fridge and much more. We had more capital than we ever had throughout the organization’s history! And all this would have ended up being thrown away in a skip!

Greenhouse members also gave a helping hand sorting out the materials in the waste boxes and separating them into paper, plastic, metal and other waste. The former three were disposed of in the bring-in site containers while the other waste was thrown away in a skip brought over for this clean-up event. One sided paper was placed in WINK/Greenhouse’s rough paper stand in front of canteen.

And thus we sorted all our newly acquired items in our new office satisfied that we reduced the amount of waste that would have been generated and content that we now had some useful stuff that might come in handy come next October. We commend JEF for the initiative and all organizations that participated.

Student house gets a Camera Revamp

It was a late and dark winter evening when some Greenhouse members were walking down the quadrangle on campus. We noticed each and every corridor and room in the Students House was switched on and we thought there were still some activities going on. We tried to push open the main door but it was locked. So we wondered why, for sanity’s sake, were all the bulbs and tubes in the building switched on when the building was obviously empty. We took a couple of pictures, sent them to KSU and enquired about the situation.

The CCTV cameras in the building needed illumination for them to capture good images. Hmm….And CCTV cameras are vital in the building which has numerous commercial entities and which has a history of break-ins and burglary. So what was the alternative? Infrared cameras! These cameras do NOT require illumination for them to work and hence the lights can be left switched off during the night. These cameras use another range of the light spectrum, specifically infrared radiation, and not visible light as was the case with the other cameras.

We suggested this alternative to KSU with the full understanding that this would require a major investment and would not happen overnight. KSU found the suggestion useful and embarked on a project to replace all CCTV cameras in the Students House with Infrared cameras. All cameras have been replaced and the Students House is not left switched on during the night. This saves substantial amounts of energy and therefore cuts down on greenhouse gas emissions.

We commend KSU for this investment and augur that this will be one of many energy conserving initiative to be undertaken in the future.