Last Saturday, the Kopernik team had the privilege to attend the 5th annual TEDxUbud!
What is TEDxUbud? Unless you’ve been living under a rock, I’m sure most of you know about TED, but let me explain. TED, short for Technology, Entertainment and Design, is a non-profit organisation that promotes ‘Ideas Worth Spreading’ to encourage conversation. What started as a four-day conference in California 30 years ago has now transformed into a huge global movement of thinkers and doers who get up on stage to share powerful ideas.
In a nutshell, it’s a gathering of the minds. An event for intellectually thirsty people.
TED invites insanely inspiring people - world leaders, activists, artists, comedians, experts, entrepreneurs, philosophers, famous or unknown - to speak. Their short talks are then made available, free, at TED.com.
Created in the spirit of TED’s mission, TEDx is known as the ‘local-level’ version of it’s parent. TEDx events are run by local communities themselves allowing organisations and individuals the opportunity to share their ideas. The ultimate aim being to not only to speak to their community, but to take advantage of TED’s network to hopefully communicate those messages to a global audience.
TEDxUbud 2016 brought an inspiring lineup of speakers with a theme of ‘Small Things, Great Things’. We heard from young pioneers of a biofueled bus from the ‘greenest school on earth’, Green School, a famous foodie instagrammer whose mission is to turn Indonesian street food “warteg” meals into high-end cuisines and Indonesia’s first female Muslim stand-up comic. TEDxUbud was a full-day brain spa for us!
But you see, TEDxUbud is not only about watching people on the stage. It may be a small event with around 300 guests, but the event organisers were conscious of not adding unnecessary waste to beautiful Bali. They aimed to make this a ‘zero waste’ event! One of the ways they did this was by asking attendees to bring their own water bottles along. Why? Because they didn’t supply any plastic-bottled water during the event.
Then how did everyone keep themselves hydrated during the day? Well, just like the last TEDxUbud event, we helped the organisers reach their zero waste goal by providing Nazava water filters! As one of the sponsors, Kopernik prepared four water stations around the venue to provide fresh, clean drinking water for the enthusiastic crowd. And what an impressive venue it was. The stunning Fivelements Wellness Retreat was even once named amongst the top 14 best TEDx venues worldwide!
So the four of us from Kopernik had a huge mission; it was to ensure everyone stayed well-hydrated throughout the day. It was indeed a challenging task. Imagine yourself carrying around buckets of water in such a huge venue. Well, for me, at least it was good exercise for my arms. Luckily, there were four of us, so we took turns going around the venue and check on the stations.
But here’s an interesting thing. My colleague Saras, who attended the last TEDxUbud in 2014, explained that the interest in the Nazava Water Filter had changed. Previously, the team was faced with difficult, technical questions about the water filter. But this time, many of the attendees already knew about the filters and it’s great benefits! A few people even told me that they are huge Kopernik fans and they have been using the water filter in their houses. Others asked where they could buy it, or needed only basic facts about the safety of the water.
Clearly news of this technology was out there. The idea was spreading.
Then to my surprise, we got some interest from the local Balinese people who worked at Fivelements. They asked many questions and raised concerns about the safety of the water.
“IS IT SAFE TO DRINK? CAN WE TRUST THIS FILTER?”
I understand where this attitude came from because in Indonesia it’s very uncommon to drink straight from the tap without boiling it first. Most Indonesians are heavily dependent on branded plastic-bottled water which is considered the freshest and the cleanest. Water filters and water purifier technologies are considered relatively new technologies in this country, and due to poor awareness and education, many are doubting their effectiveness and hygiene. Despite this, and with our explanation some of the locals actually became interested in buying the water filter!
You know what? This event taught me so much - not only from the inspiring TEDx talks, but also about how we can communicate simple ideas better and how they can spread over time. Just like the water filter technology. And this is something that you can do too! By spreading ideas about how these technologies work and how they’re making positive impact for the environment, you’re already a part of change.
‘Small things, great things’, right?
PHOTO CREDITS: FEBY RAMADHANI/KOPERNIK; TEDXUBUD 2016
