From watching Australians trying to break their beds to the Ukrainians going all out for buzz cuts- being stuck on the ‘Olympians side’ of TikTok definitely has been the highlight of my week. I think every Gen-Z kid can agree that the hype of the timeless Olympics has definitely died down this year, but through TikTok, we are certainly starting to see a different insight into the event. We feel closer to each of the athletes and we normalize them instead of only viewing them as sporting icons on national television. Before going on- yes, it is still the 2020 Olympics- not just to honour the sacrosanct time interval, but mainly because everything had already been printed.
The most popular videos take viewers on a day around the Olympic Village. The Tokyo Olympic Village is a constructed peninsula in Tokyo’s Harumi waterfront district. It’s essentially a city made from scratch, for the athletes, their teams and the organizing workers. Eating, sleeping, training, recreation, haircuts, shopping- you know name it, it’s there. And the whole village is practically a bubble, a full proof antivirus bubble. Now creating a whole village, that barely will have life for three weeks, sounds pretty much like a major waste of resources.
So how did Japan make the Olympic village as green as possible?
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The famous ‘cardboard’ beds were made by the company AirWeave, in hopes for comfort without compromising eco-friendliness. The mattresses are made from polyethylene fibres that can be repurposed multiple times.
The Olympic medals themselves were made from precious metals collected from over 70000 tonnes of used mobile phones donated by the public. This yielded 32kg of gold, 3500 kg of silver and 2200 of bronze needed to make over 5000 medals across 33 sports and 46 disciplines in the official Olympic program.
All the podiums and stages for the ceremonies and awarding events were made from tonnes of plastic waste collected from Japan’s water bodies. The plan for the plastic post-Olympics is to be reformed into P&G packaging for consumer durables.
Aluminium waste from temporary housing after the Great East Japan Earthquake has been reused to make several ceremony ornaments, including the Olympic Torch. The materials that were once used to help rebuild lives will now be used to spread a message of hope and recovery after a tenuous period of uncertainty brought by COVID-19.
Donated timber from local Japanese communities has been used to make the plazas in the village. After the event, the timber will be returned to the communities as amenities for public parks and schools. In this way no excess demand for resources was created, rather a compromise that suits every one was made.
Home to Japan, the auto-giant Toyota has designed the greenest Olympic transport fleet to date. The self-driving and the electric e-Palette vehicle was designed to transport athletes around the Olympic Village without generating emissions.
Athleisure company Nike has sponsored the jerseys across several sports including skateboarding and women’s football. In addition to the jerseys being stylish, they are made from recycled polyester made from plastic bottles and recycled nylon as well as rubber and yarn waste from the company’s factories.
All in all, with the rate at which environmental degradation is occurring, it is really a hopeful sight to see big organizations taking steps to prioritize the safety of the earth. Let’s hope I’m stuck on Olympians TikTok, and will probably be inspired to write a whole other article on just the dining hall.