Maybe you’re one of those elite travelers who’s mastered packing for an entire trip using only carry-on luggage. If so, you’re likely haughty and won’t stop crowing about the convenience of hopping off the plane and jetting to your destination.
We know: The airlines lost your bag in 1986 and you vowed never again. So, now you roll three garments, one pair of shoes, a tiny bottle of 5-in-one body wash, and a Kindle into your backpack, and you’re good to go.
For the rest of us mere traveling mortals, especially those with kids, checking bags is a necessary evil—a necessary and costly one.
If it seems to you like checked bag fees have been steadily climbing, that’s because checked bag fees have been steadily climbing. According to this article, bag fees on American Airlines rose 33% just last year from $30 per bag to $40 and 5 of the 6 biggest carriers raised their fees last year.
Why is the entire industry upping their checked-bag fees? There’s a specific reason involving an arcane bit of tax code, which accounts for why the fees are tacked on separately versus rolled into the price of the ticket.
Jay L. Zagorsky, a business school professor who studies travel, says 7.5% of every domestic ticket goes to the federal government. Airlines dislike this, claiming it raises ticket prices for consumers. But as long as the bag fee is separate, it is excluded from the 7.5% transportation tax.
Estimated bag fees for 2023 topped 7 billion. By making the bag fees separate, airlines saved themselves about half a billion dollars. If that savings has been passed down to the customer, then we all got a bit of a break, too.
Perhaps you automatically dislike the separate fees because you’re Gen X and remember a time when a ticket was all-inclusive. Now, it feels like you’re paying for stuff you used to get for free.
Turns out that more and more travelers actually like the separate charges.
“One thing that our research has shown,” Henry Hartevedlt, president of travel industry analytics firm Atmosphere Research told USA Today, “is that more than two-thirds of U.S. leisure airline passengers now feel that the unbundling of the coach product and letting people buy what they want and need on an à la carte basis is actually something they like because it helps them stick to their budget.”
This is a positive way to look at something that’s undoubtedly here to stay. And now if you hear someone complain about bag fees at the airport, you’ll know why it’s done the way it’s done, which is really sweet satisfaction in itself.
Of course, there’s always this unusual workaround courtesy of Reddit user Old_Man_Withers, “I Fedex my luggage to the hotel and carry nothing on the plane but my laptop for work. It doesn’t matter if it’s 2 days or two months, I ship it. The hotel has it waiting in my room when I get there and I ship it back home from there when I’m done. No random inspections, no chances of loss without recompense, fully trackable… I see no downside that isn’t worth the 50-100 bucks it costs.”
In a small village in Pwani, a district on Tanzania’s coast, a massive dance party is coming to a close. For the past two hours, locals have paraded through the village streets, singing and beating ngombe drums; now, in a large clearing, a woman named Sheilla motions for everyone to sit facing a large projector screen. A film premiere is about to begin.
It’s an unusual way to kick off a film about gender bias, inequality, early marriage, and other barriers that prevent girls from accessing education in Tanzania. But in Pwani and beyond, local organizations supported by Malala Fund and funded by Pura are finding creative, culturally relevant ways like this one to capture people’s interest.
The film ends and Sheilla, the Communications and Partnership Lead for Media for Development and Advocacy (MEDEA), stands in front of the crowd once again, asking the audience to reflect: What did you think about the film? How did it relate to your own experience? What can we learn?
Sheilla explains that, once the community sees the film, “It brings out conversations within themselves, reflective conversations.” The resonance and immediate action create a ripple effect of change.
MEDEA Screening Audience in Tanzania. Captured by James Roh for Pura
Across Tanzania, gender-based violence often forces adolescent girls out of the classroom. This and other barriers — including child marriage, poverty, conflict, and discrimination — prevent girls from completing their education around the world.
Sheilla and her team are using film and radio programs to address the challenges girls face in their communities. MEDEA’s ultimate goal is to affirm education as a fundamental right for everyone, and to ensure that every member of a community understands how girls’ education contributes to a stronger whole and how to be an ally for their sisters, daughters, granddaughters, friends, nieces, and girlfriends.
Sheilla’s story is one of many that inspired Heart on Fire, a new fragrance from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection that blends the warm, earthy spices of Tanzania with a playful, joyful twist. Here’s how Pura is using scent as a tool to connect the world and inspire action.
A partnership focused on local impact, on a global mission
Pura, a fragrance company that recognizes education as both freedom and a human right, has partnered with Malala Fund since 2022. In order to defend every girl’s right to access and complete 12 years of education, Malala Fund partners with local organizations in countries where the educational barriers are the greatest. They invest in locally-led solutions because they know that those who are closest to the problems are best equipped to solve and build durable solutions, like MEDEA, which works with communities to challenge discrimination against girls and change beliefs about their education.
But local initiatives can thrive and scale more powerfully with global support, which is why Pura is using their own superpower, the power of scent, to connect people around the world with the women and girls in these local communities.
The Pura x Malala Fund Collection incorporates ingredients naturally found in Tanzania, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Brazil: countries where Malala Fund operates to address systemic education barriers. Eight percent of net revenue from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection will be donated to Malala Fund directly, but beyond financial support, the Collection is also a love letter to each unique community, blending notes like lemon, jasmine, cedarwood, and clove to transport people, ignite their senses, and help them draw inspiration and hope from the global movement for girls’ education. Through scent, people can connect to the courage, joy, and tenacity of girls and local leaders, all while uniting in a shared commitment to education: the belief that supporting girls’ rights in one community benefits all of us, everywhere.
You’ve already met Sheilla. Now see how Naiara and Mama Habiba are building unique solutions to ensure every girl can learn freely and dare to dream.
Naiara Leite is reimagining what’s possible in Brazil
Julia with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura
In Brazil, where pear trees and coconut plantations cover the Northeastern Coast, girls like ten-year-old Julia experience a different kind of educational barrier than girls in Tanzania. Too often, racial discrimination contributes to high dropout rates among Black, quilombola and Indigenous girls in the country.
“In the logic of Brazilian society, Black people don’t need to study,” says Naiara Leite, Executive Coordinator of Odara, a women-led organization and Malala Fund partner. Bahia, the state where Odara is based, was once one of the largest slave-receiving territories in the Americas, and because of that history, deeply-ingrained, anti-Black prejudice is still widespread. “Our role and the image constructed around us is one of manual labor,” Naiara says.
But education can change that. In 2020, with assistance from a Malala Fund grant, Odara launched its first initiative for improving school completion rates among Black, quilombola, and Indigenous girls: “Ayomidê Odara”. The young girls mentored under the program, including Julia, are known as the Ayomidês. And like the Pura x Malala Fund Collection’s Brazil: Breath of Courage scent, the Ayomidês are fierce, determined, and bursting with energy.
Ayomidês with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura
Ayomidês take part in weekly educational sessions where they explore subjects like education and ethnic-racial relations. The girls are encouraged to find their own voices by producing Instagram lives, social media videos, and by participating in public panels. Already, the Ayomidês are rewriting the narrative on what’s possible for Afro-Brazilian girls to achieve. One of the earliest Ayomidês, a young woman named Debora, is now a communications intern. Another former Ayomidê, Francine, works at UNICEF, helping train the next generation of adolescent leaders. And Julia has already set her sights on becoming a math teacher or a model.
“These are generations of Black women who did not have access to a school,” Naiara says. “These are generations of Black women robbed daily of their dreams. And we’re telling them that they could be the generation in their family to write a new story.”
Mama Habiba is reframing the conversation in Nigeria
Centre for Girls' Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura
In Mama Habiba’s home country of Nigeria, the scents of starfruit, ylang ylang and pineapple, all incorporated into the Pura x Malala Collection’s “Nigeria: Hope for Tomorrow,” can be found throughout the vibrant markets. Like these native scents, Mama Habiba says that the Nigerian girls are also bright and passionate, but too often they are forced to leave school long before their potential fully blooms.
“Some of these schools are very far, and there is an issue of quality, too,” Mama Habiba says. “Most parents find out when their children are in school, the girls are not learning. So why allow them to continue?”
When girls drop out of secondary school, marriage is often the alternative. In Nigeria, one in three girls is married before the age of 18. When this happens, girls are unable to fulfill their potential, and their families and communities lose out on the social, health and economic benefits.
Completing secondary school delays marriage, and according to UNESCO, educated girls become women who raise healthier children, lift their families out of poverty and contribute to more peaceful, resilient communities.
Centre for Girls’ Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura
To encourage young girls to stay in school, the Centre for Girls’ Education, a nonprofit in Nigeria founded by Mama Habiba and supported by Malala Fund and Pura, has pioneered an initiative that’s similar to the Ayomidê workshops in Brazil: safe spaces. Here, girls meet regularly to learn literacy, numeracy, and other issues like reproductive health. These safe spaces also provide an opportunity for the girls to role-play and learn to advocate for themselves, develop their self-image, and practice conversations with others about their values, education being one of them. In safe spaces, Mama Habiba says, girls start to understand “who she is, and that she is a girl who has value. She has the right to negotiate with her parents on what she really feels or wants.”
“When girls are educated, they can unlock so many opportunities,” Mama Habiba says. “It will help the economy of the country. It will boost so many opportunities for the country. If they are given the opportunity, I think the sky is not the limit. It is the starting point for every girl.”
From parades, film screenings to safe spaces and educational programs, girls and local leaders are working hard to strengthen the quality, safety and accessibility of education and overcome systemic challenges. They are encouraging courageous behavior and reminding us all that education is freedom.
Experience the Pura x Malala Fund Collection here, and connect with the stories of real girls leading change across the globe.
Even though Americans and British people share the same language, there are a lot of figures of speech that don’t make a lot of sense when they go from one side of the pond to the other. The British have some unique turns of phrase that are head-scratching to Americans, such as “Bob’s yer uncle” and “Taking the Mick.”
Laurence Brown, a Brit who moved to the midwestern U.S., documents the differences between U.S. and U.K. culture on the Lost in the Pond YouTube channel. Brown created a fun video in which he explains why some American figures of speech make absolutely no sense to most British people. In the video, he explains how he first encountered each phrase and what they actually mean.
1. “It’s not my first rodeo”
“The thing is, rodeo isn’t really a common competitive sport in the UK. And so, if we are aware of it, we’re only aware of it through American movies and clips on the internet of bat crazy things that Americans do for fun. So while we can probably figure out what it means, we have absolutely no idea what it means.”
2. “As American as apple pie”
“I was baffled by the phrase ‘as American as apple pie,’ because if we have them in Britain, what’s so American about this apple pie? Well, as I’ve pointed out on this channel, nothing. Because apple pie has its origins in England.”
“Americans like to use the term “hit” metaphorically, hit the gym, hit the books, hit the gas, hit the skids. … But in hindsight, even though I was quite confused by the phrase ‘hit the books’ at first, I sort of prefer it to what we’d say in Britain, which is ‘I’m doing revision.’”
4. “The boonies”
“Anybody who’s followed this channel for a while will know that I’ve lived in Indianapolis and Chicago, the two largest cities in their respective states. But often we find ourselves driving between the two cities, where there is nothing other than farmland. In the early days of living in the US, I remember somebody referring to these parts as ‘the boonies.’ This itself was a confusing phrase at first, because I had never heard this word before.”
The phrase“Boondocks” appears to have entered the American lexicon from Tagalog, one of the languages of the Philippines. In Tagalog, bundok means “mountain.” The U.S. military began using the term and changed it to “Boondocks;” then, shortened to “Boonies” to describe the Vietnamese back country.
“‘Wazoo’ is an American slang term for the buttocks or anus. I see. So when you’re talking out of the wazoo, you’re literally talking s**t.”
6. “Get behind the eight ball”
“It is a billiards term in the UK. Billiards is not really all that popular, and so the phrase, as far as I’m aware, did not really catch on over there. Well, what does the phrase mean, Laurence? Well, it turns out that it means don’t get yourself into a sticky situation. In other words, don’t be thwarted by it.”
7. “Don’t mess with Texas”
“When I first heard it, I thought it was the state of Texas telling everyone else, ‘If you bring a fight to us, we will absolutely destroy you.’ It’s part of the reason that I haven’t properly visited Texas yet. I think a lot of people find this tagline funny because of that weirdly provocative-sounding threat. Well, British people, and anyone who’s genuinely confused by this phrase, might, depending on your perspective, be thrilled or distraught to discover that the phrase was just part of a successful anti-littering campaign.”
The phrase “Don’t Mess with Texas” comes from a 1985 anti-littering campaign by the Texas Department of Transportation. The first commercial, featuring blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughn, was a massive success, and the phrase soon entered the lexicon of Texans and the world beyond.
An interaction between a 4-year-old boy and a Cast Member at Disneyland highlights the importance of inclusion and shows that learning American Sign Language (ASL) can have an incredible impact on deaf people and their families.
Callie Foster, 38, and her husband, Leonardo Silva, 39, were recently at the park when their son, Luca, came across Disney Cast Members dressed as Jessie and Woody from the Toy Story series. The parents were taken aback when, for the first time at the park, the boy initiated a conversation in ASL with Jessie.
Jessie from Toy Story communicates in ASL
“Because we go to the parks often, we really try not to put that expectation on anyone. We never assume a character will know ASL, so usually we’re the ones interpreting for Luca; we’re used to stepping in to help facilitate those interactions,” Foster told People. “This time was completely different. Luca initiated it on his own. He signed to her first, and there was this split second where we all kind of looked at each other like, ‘Wait… did that just happen?’ And then she recognized it and started signing back to him.”
When Jessie and Luca first met, she didn’t know that he was deaf. Then, he looked up to her and signed, “What’s your name?” to which Jessie responded in ASL, “Name, J-E-S-S-E.” She then asked Luca, “Your name?” to which he responded, “Luca.” Jessie then said, “Nice to meet you,” and “Thank you.”
“Watching your child be included in their language… It’s a kind of magic you don’t forget,” Foster concluded the video.
This isn’t the first time Luca has gone viral for interacting with a character at Disneyland. Two years ago, when Luca was just 2 years old, a Cast Member playing Bo Peep communicated with Luca in ASL. When Luca approached Bo Peep, his mother signed, “This is Luca.” Bo Peep returned the greeting with, “Nice to meet you,” in ASL.
Bo Peep then knelt down to Luca’s height and signed, “You’re our friend.” Excited, Luca then tried to tell Jessie that her friend, Buzz Lightyear, was nearby.
Disney is committed to ASL inclusion in its theme parks
The fact that many characters in Disney Parks know ASL isn’t an accident. Since 1997, Walt Disney World Resort and Disneyland Resort have offered ASL interpretation at many attractions and shows. Sign language interpretation is a service that is available in parks for guests with hearing disabilities.
“When a show or new attraction that warrants Sign Language interpretation is being developed, my team at Walt Disney World Resort and the Disneyland Resort Accessibility team are included in planning conversations and rehearsal process. We work to ensure appropriate interpreter placement and lighting are being considered and to share show scripts and videos with the fantastic theatrical interpreters who do work for us,” Mark Jones, Manager of Accessibility and Services for Guests with Disabilities at Walt Disney World Resort, told Disney Parks Blog.
The passing down of stories, memories, and keepsakes is important in many families. But how to do that isn’t always so simple. A lot can get lost over the years, both figuratively and literally. And younger generations don’t always want or appreciate physical heirlooms. One woman shared a brilliant heirloom that belonged to her grandma,…
The passing down of stories, memories, and keepsakes is important in many families. But how to do that isn’t always so simple. A lot can get lost over the years, both figuratively and literally. And younger generations don’t always want or appreciate physical heirlooms.
One woman shared a brilliant heirloom that belonged to her grandma, which solves some of these problems. It’s called a perpetual calendar, and it keeps the whole family’s major memories in one spot. Essentially, it’s a ring of index cards that each have a month and day on them, but no year. As events happen in the family, they get written on the day they happened, with the year written next to them.
Watch Jenn Perez Miller explain how her grandma’s perpetual calendar, which she started in the 1970s, works:
The beauty of this idea is that it doesn’t take up a huge amount of space. If the cards eventually fill up, they can be stored physically or digitally and replaced with new ones, making the calendar filled with family memories essentially eternal.
Another plus is that people can decide what they think is important to document. Will your great-grandkids care if you replaced your carpet 60 years ago? Maybe, maybe not. But not all memories have to be monumental. There’s something special about seeing the everyday events our loved ones felt were worth noting.
A sample of what a perpetual calendar card might entail. Photo credit: Canva
People loved the idea:
“Brb, gonna go put a perpetual calendar on my wedding registry and start this from our wedding day.”
“If I came across something like this in an estate sale I’d immediately sit on the floor and read every single one.”
“My boyfriend’s grandma did this and we were cryinnnnng laughing…. She talked about diarrhea a lot.”
“This is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.”
“This is some serious matriarchal behavior and i am sooo jealous that you have something like this!!!”
“I just love how women bring the family together in simple ways. 🥰”
“I love the idea of seeing the major and insignificant things that happen on the same day years apart. Puts things into perspective.”
“Genuinely this is such a treasure, future archeologists would lose their minds finding something like this.”
You can make a perpetual calendar yourself with index cards. Photo credit: Canva
The concept is not only simple, but it’s pretty easy to make yourself. All you need is index cards (one for each day of the year, including February 29th for leap years), a hole punch, and large binder rings. You could also use an index card box with dividers for each month instead of the rings.
Some of us might see this idea and love it, but wish we had started earlier. But it’s never too late, especially when you think of it as something to pass down through the generations. Someone has to start sometime.
Snoopy, everyone’s favorite beagle from the mind of Peanuts creator Charles Schulz, is the joyous gift that keeps on giving. So, when content creator Patrick Ferguson took the time to rank each and every one of Snoopy’s relatives, it’s no surprise fans were delighted.
Ferguson does this by playfully spoofing a popular “ranking” system commonly used on YouTube and Twitch. The idea is to put pop culture phenomenon (often movies or video games) and rank them in “tier lists.”
Standing below an initial shot of all the animated beagles playing instruments, he begins by stating, “Snoopy is the best thing ever drawn or animated, and his siblings are pretty cool too. So I thought I would introduce you to them all and place them on a ‘tier list’ as I count them down.”
He confirms where his references will come from: “I’m mainly discussing them from their role in Snoopy’s Reunion, but I will briefly mention the comic strips as well. And yes, ‘S’ tier does stand for ‘Snoopy tier,’ even on tier lists outside of this one.”
Snoopy family tiers
He begins with “Rover,” who he admits has a “cliché name even by today’s standards.” We see Rover, his light brown ears bouncing as he plays the resonator guitar. “Love his collar choice too. S tier.” From the Snoopy Town Tale fandom site, it’s reported that Rover only appeared in the TV special Snoopy’s Reunion, but never in the actual comic strip.
Next, we see Olaf, a pudgier dog in a red hat. He blows dust off a jug, which happens to be his instrument of choice. Ferguson insists that Olaf “deserves every good thing in life that comes his way. S tier.” A site dedicated to learning about the Peanuts characters confirms that Olaf is “warm and sensitive, with a big, gentle heart.”
We then see Molly, wearing a blue dress that Ferguson points out is similar to fellow Peanuts cast-mate Lucy’s signature style. Molly plays the mandolin and has some “really good, iconic Snoopy family qualities to her. I think I’ve gotta put her in S tier.” Like her brother Rover, Molly also only appeared in Snoopy’s Reunion.
Then there’s Spike, who Ferguson points out has the “second most iconic look in the Snoopy family. He plays a mean fiddle.” He also notes that Spike isn’t the only S-tier dog with that name in the animated TV lexicon. Ferguson is most likely referring to the bulldog from Tom and Jerry, or quite possibly the bulldog from the Looney Tunes universe.
The Peanutssite shares that Spike lives out in the desert: “He prefers a quiet, solitary life. His closest friends are the cacti and tumbleweeds. Spike is thoughtful and, at times, melancholic.”
Next up is Belle. “She should have her own plushie. I think I have to go with S tier on this.” It’s stated on the site that Belle “lives in Kansas City with her teenage son. Snoopy and Belle reconnected when Snoopy hopped the wrong train on his way to Wimbledon and ended up in Missouri.”
Up next is Marbles. The Peanutssite describes him as quiet and “weary of cats, often checking for them before entering a new place. Marbles is smart but lacks the imagination of his other siblings. He always finds himself confused by the games Snoopy plays.”
Lastly, we can’t forget the drummer. “Then we arrive at Andy. And this is the Snoopy sibling I want to pick up the most—but only after he and his scruffy fur are done jamming on the drum set. S tier.” Andy is described by the site as “a good traveler.” He “is always up for a walkabout, but his sense of direction is terrible.”
As if that wasn’t adorable enough, Ferguson wants to give credit to both the guardian of the Snoopy gang and his own mother. “And could we forget the woman who raised the entire Snoopy family? Missy. One of the few S-tier moms, aside from my own.”
Meet Patrick
Upworthy had the delightful chance to chat with Ferguson, who shares that he’s a huge Snoopy fan. “Some of my earliest memories of laughter involve watching Snoopy as the Red Baron. I wouldn’t call myself the biggest Peanuts fan, per se, but I’ve always called Snoopy the greatest thing ever drawn.”
He also further explains why he chose the tier system. “I made the video both to celebrate a character I love but never made a video for, and to poke fun at the idea of doing a tier list (a video concept I don’t see myself revisiting). The irony of having everyone at S tier plays into that.”
The best part was the online response. “I’m surprised how many people commented on the wholesomeness of the video, if for no other reason than I was being very silly in every aspect of making it, albeit in a way that was also pretty sincere.”
Snoopy appears alongside his friends in the Peanuts comic strips. Photo credit: Unsplash
The comments were definitely supportive and wholesome, indeed. The Reel has over 160,000 likes and nearly 500 comments. One Instagrammer shares, “Grinned so hard watching this. 10/10. No notes.”
A few people argue over which instrument the puppies are playing. “95 percent sure Rover is playing a resonator dulcimer and not a resonator guitar,” one person notes. “10/10 video, though!”
Another has thoughts on Spike, writing, “I’m kind of suspicious of the Snoopy with the mustache.”
This commenter sums up what many seem to feel quite nicely: “I want to cuddle all of them.”
Every week, Dana Chitucescu grabs a bag, walks around her home in the Transylvanian village of Pianu de Jos. She’s collecting something her neighbors happily hand over: empty bottles and cans.
The 51-year-old brings them to her local shop, drops them off, and walks out with 40 brand-new Romanian leu in her pocket, about $9 USD. She uses it to feed her seven cats.
It’s a small thing, nothing, really. But it also, somehow, encapsulates the story of how an entire country is changing the way it thinks about trash.
From zero to hero: Romania used to be Europe’s worst recycler
The secret to Romania’s success isn’t complicated. – Photo credit: Canva
The European Environment Agency even flagged Romania as being at serious risk of missing its recycling targets for years in a row. It looked like a problem without a solution.
Here’s how RetuRO works: when you buy a bottled or canned drink in Romania—water, soda, beer, anything—you pay an extra deposit of .50 Romanian leu. That’s about 11 cents in US dollars. When you finish the drink and bring the empty container back to the store, you get your money back. Voila!
That’s it. That’s the whole idea.
On top of that, Romania has made it ridiculously simple for citizens to recycle. Supermarkets have automated reverse vending machines that scan the container, crush it, and then credit your deposit on the spot. Smaller shops handle returns manually. And crucially, the program accepts plastic, aluminum, and glass; the latter, which most countries’ deposit systems skip altogether because glass is heavy and expensive to transport.
RetuRO launched in November 2023 as a partnership between the Romanian government, beverage producers, and retailers, meaning everyone had skin in the game. Everyone had a reason to want to make it work.
What happened next was remarkable
Within months, something shifted in Romania. The recycling numbers, of course—those went through the roof—but also, something deeper. The way people regarded bottles and cans changed. Containers stopped feeling like garbage and became, instead, money left on the table.
In the peak summer months, 94% of beverage containers were being returned. Later, in January 2026, the return rate hit 108%. That meant Romanians were returning more containers than were even sold that month, as people dug old bottles out of storage. Nine out of ten Romanians have used the system at least once. Six in ten do it every single week.
Since launch, over 9 billion containers have been returned.
Yes, Romania’s story is impressive. But not because of the infrastructure or the statistics alone. It’s the way RetuRO has fundamentally changed Romanian citizens’ views on recycling.
Grandparents who never recycled in their lives have found a new weekly routine (and a small but real source of income). Parents use their trips to the return machine as a chance to teach their kids that taking care of the planet doesn’t have to be a sacrifice; it can just be Tuesday. Young Romanians in their 20s now describe recycling as part of their identity.
Dana Chitucescu’s brother lives in Spain, a country without a comparable system. Apparently, he’s jealous. “He says it’s one of the few things Romania does exceptionally well,” she told The Guardian. “He’s right.”
Not to mention, the program has also added over $346 million to Romani’s GDP and created more than 2,000 new jobs: all within its first year of full operation. Romanian recyclers no longer need to import plastic raw material, because for the first time, there’s enough good-quality recycled Polyethylene Terephthalate (or PET, the clear, lightweight plastic used to make the vast majority of beverage bottles) being collected domestically to meet industry demand.
The rest of the world is paying attention
Government leaders from Poland, Turkey, Bulgaria, and beyond have traveled to Romania specifically to learn how to replicate this recycling scheme. In the European Parliament, Romania serves as the benchmark model for deposit-return programs.
The secret to Romania’s success isn’t complicated. They made the recycling incentive real and immediate, simplified participation by creating a universal system (every retailer who sells drinks must accept returns by law), and trusted its citizens to do the right thing.
What could this look like where you live?
Romania’s recycling journey is proof that a recycling revolution doesn’t require a perfect society, unlimited funding, or decades of gradual habit change. It requires the right system, one built around real human behavior, not wishful thinking.
Sometimes, all it takes is a bag, a short walk to the corner shop, and eleven cents.
Or, that’s how it starts, anyway. That’s how nine billion bottles get returned.
Like it or not, AI technology is almost certainly here to stay. While that might bring new conveniences we never thought possible, it still causes many to stress out over range of topics from our careers to existential level threats.
In a segment for New Normal entitled, “Is Human Connection the New Job Security?” for BBC Global, journalist Katty Kay delves into the idea of job security in this new age. She first recalls a chat she had in 2023 with her old pal, Dermalogica Skincare founder Jane Wurwand.
High touch vs. high tech
In just two words, the corporate mogul had the antidote to “high tech,” and it was really quite simple. She told Kay, “The equal and opposite reaction to ‘high tech’ is ‘high touch.’” She explains that it’s “service-oriented businesses where humans are doing things that humans do best. Cooking. Caring. Touching. Kindness. Compassion. Talking. I’m not just in the business of skincare products. I’m in the business of human connection.”
Kay reconnects with Wurwand over a video chat a few years later to find out if she still feels the “high touch” concept is possible now that AI has advanced. “It’s not confined to physical touch, your concept of high tech/high touch. It’s also about this broader idea of just having a human voice when you call.” (Kay gives the example of having to call tech support if your Wi-Fi has gone out.)
The human being industry
Kay then asks, “Give us some tangible thoughts on which are the high-touch jobs and areas of employment you think survive this rapidly growing technology that may take other jobs away?”
Wurwand replies confidently, “The jobs that I see that are going to be booming…and really can’t be replaced. Hospitality. Travel. Anything in the human being industry.”
She discusses the importance of true empathy, something that can’t be substituted by a robot. “If you are receiving a cancer diagnosis, goodness forbid, an AI bot might have found or detected that rogue cell, but you certainly don’t want that bot talking to you or giving you that diagnosis. You want someone with kindness, empathy, and to hold your hand and literally say, ‘We’ve got a plan. We’re going to execute on it.’”
A doctor consults with his patient. Photo credit: Unsplash
Wurwand gives other examples, as well, essentially suggesting “high touch” can be applied anywhere, including tech jobs. “Whether you’re working in retail, whether you’re working in an industry that is full of technology, what we can bring as humans that makes the workplace, that business, that space kind, empathetic, that you feel seen, you feel heard, that you matter, that somebody knows a little bit about your life so that you can chat and talk.
A new social contract
Kay brings up the insightful point that many, especially younger people in today’s society, feel threatened and disillusioned. “Many felt there was this kind of social contract, where you get educated, you pay an enormous amount of money to go to a university or tertiary education, and then you come out and actually there aren’t jobs because the jobs have been taken.”
She also points out the frustration some might feel from having been told if they’d only learned to “code” they’d be fine. They then entered the workforce to find out lots of those jobs have been taken over, as well. Kay asks, “What do you say to the graduate who has a degree in accounting or coding?”
Wurwand reiterates that “high touch” is still important, even in accounting or coding jobs. “You’re not gonna compete with a robot. We don’t have those same skills. We don’t have that ‘code’ in our head. You have everything else that is needed by other humans. So we have to take the strength and move with it.”
She points out that we shouldn’t be so quick to label. “We shouldn’t box things into that’s ‘tech’ and this is ‘human.’ There has to be this connection.”
Genuine empathy
They both agree that those interpersonal skills—the ones that only human beings can truly have—must be nurtured in order to survive this AI flux. Wurwand gives the example: “Your first message of branding is that voice that answers the phone. And it doesn’t have to be in an office at a desk. It can be obviously remote. However, it has to be a double-down, delicious sort of person who sounds great and is kind and genuinely has empathy because we can hear or spot a fake in 30 seconds.”
Of course, the idea of good customer service isn’t exactly new. But it seems extra important right now given it’s seemingly being forgotten by so many major corporations.
In the article “9 Examples of High Touch,” for Simplicable, writer and IT tech John Spacey writes that it comes down to simply being human: “High touch is any business process that requires extensive human attention. These are typically areas where automation reduces the value of a process because humans add significant value to it.”
Aside from the aforementioned client services, Spacey also discusses the importance of having “personalized attention with every customer.” This includes, of course, listening to their needs and tailoring the experience directly to them when possible.
Everything old is officially new again after mathematicians determined that trends tend to resurface “every 20 years or so.” So, while a de-cluttering organizer might tell you to pitch those low-rise skinny jeans, these researchers might say, not so fast!
The team of mathematicians, led by Emma Zajdela at Northwestern University, took a look at well over 150 years of women’s clothing styles and determined that they could calculate trends resurfacing about every 20 years, calling it, “the 20-year rule.”
In an article for Popular Science, Andrew Paul writes, “Clothing trends come and go, but in some cases, they don’t stay away for too long. For decades, both the fashion industry and its devotees have referenced the so-called “20-year rule,” which suggests society is liable to see certain styles return at semi-regular intervals. However, without any hard data to back up the claim, that “rule” has long remained more of a hypothesis.”
This is where the research comes in. Zajdela shares, “To our knowledge, this is the first time that someone developed such an extensive and precise database of fashion measures across more than a century.”
The research
Here’s how they did it. The Northwestern research team took a look at runway collections dating all the way back to 1869 and combined those trends with information from the commercial pattern archive. Explained on their site, “The Commercial Pattern Archive (CoPA) at the University of Rhode Island is both an extensive collection of commercially produced paper sewing patterns and a unique scholarly database used by costumers, fashion designers, museum professionals, scholars, and vintage aficionados the world over.”
What they then were able to do is measure waistlines, pant legs, skirt length, etc., to determine the formula. Paul writes that the study found the pendulum is always swinging. “Basically, the fashion industry is constantly fluctuating between originality and tradition. Once a clothing style is too popular, designers begin changing their new apparel just enough to stand out while still remaining desirable to potential wearers.”
Fashion is evolving
Plenty of Redditors have weighed in on the topic. On a thread entitled “Fashion stopped evolving 20 years ago…what do you think?”
A commenter proves that perhaps we’re about to shift trends. “Yes and no. 20 years ago was the last signature defining aspects of fashion that characterized it, but otherwise no. Fashion is still evolving as normal, we just haven’t hit a point where we get a shift that makes past fashion seem alien, and we shouldn’t expect it to happen anytime soon. No one walks around in a Victorian wardrobe today, and Victorians wouldn’t walk in ours. People keep craving a shift that makes the fashion landscape itself change, which simply isn’t going to happen.”
This person shares, in part, that indeed everything comes back in style. “There’s been actual change though, with tons of ebb and flow. The 90’s / early 00’s was really influenced by the 60’s & 70’s as well. 2010’s felt very 80’s with their own twist. I feel like we’re in the 60’s again (as in what people actually wore in the 60’s, not the media), with clean girl, beige, minimalism, whatever. But if you follow trends, you’ll see there’s been a lot of pushback against that now, especially since fashion is political. Give it a few years and we’ll be in the 70’s / 80’s. That whole (The) Devil Wears Pradaspeech about fashion trickling down is true.”
Even though Americans and British people technically speak the same language, there are some major differences in our English vernacular. For instance, if you were to give someone from the United States and someone from England this prompt:
Draw a kid in a jumper eating chips, biscuits, and flapjacks while watching football.
You would end up with two very different drawings. The words jumper, chips, biscuits, flapjacks, and football all have completely different meanings in American English vs. British English. Most of us know the football vs. soccer difference, but the others may be unfamiliar.
Football is soccer, except when it’s football. Giphy
Words in the same language having different meanings based on geography can be confusing for English language learners, especially when they’re learning how to order food in a restaurant. Here are some differences just with foods alone:
Chips
In the U.S., chips means potato chips. As in Lay’s, Ruffles, etc. In the U.K., those are called “crisps,” while chips means french fries. Hence fish and chips meaning fish and fries, not fish and Ruffles.
Biscuits
When Americans talk about biscuits, we’re talking about fluffy, flaky baked balls of dough smothered in butter and served with either soups or meat and mashed potatoes, generally. Buttermilk biscuits are an American staple. Not so in the U.K. where a biscuit simply means “cookie.” What we call a biscuit, they call a scone. We have scones in the U.S., too, but our definition is generally more limited to the triangular, sweet kind. British scones also cover what we think of as biscuits.
A flapjack in the U.S. is synonymous with pancake—the breakfast staple. A flapjack in the U.K. is a baked oat bar, almost like a granola bar.
Pudding
If you order a sticky toffee pudding in the U.K. and expect to get a custard-like substance, you’d be disappointed. Pudding is a general term for a dessert in the U.K., whereas it specifically means a custard dessert in the U.S.
There’s also the opposite issue, where we use different words for the same foods as opposed to the same words for different foods. In the U.K., a zucchini is a courgette, an eggplant is an aubergine, cilantro is coriander, a grilled cheese sandwich is a toastie, and Jell-O is jelly.
Clothing also can be confusing for folks learning English from an American vs. a Brit. Here are some words:
Jumper vs. Sweater
In the U.K., a jumper is what we call a sweater. In the U.S. a jumper is kind of like a mix between overalls and a dress—a sleeveless garment generally worn over something else.
Pants vs. Underpants vs. Trousers
What Americans call pants, folks in the U.K. call trousers. (Americans know the word trousers, but we don’t use it much.)
This one is super counterintuitive for Americans. A “vest” in the U.K. is an undershirt, like a thin t-shirt or tank top. What Americans think of as a vest, the Brits call a waistcoat.
Braces vs. Suspenders
This one is also counterintuitive for Americans. For us, braces are either the orthodontia that straightens our teeth or a supportive apparatus that stabilizes a body part (a leg brace, wrist brace, etc.). But braces in the U.K. has another meaning, which is what we call suspenders. In the U.K., suspenders don’t hold up pants—those are braces—but they do hold up stockings, which isn’t the way we use that word.
Bonnet and Boot
A bonnet is a head covering in both the U.S. and the U.K., but the Brits also use the word for the hood of a car. Boots are shoes that go above the ankle in both countries, but a boot is also the trunk of a car in the U.K.
That’s not the end of the list of words that differ between American English and British English, but it’s a good start. For folks learning English as a second language, it’s at least good to know that some things you learn will really depend on where your teacher is from so you don’t end up disappointed when you order pudding or biscuits at a restaurant and get something totally different.
This article originally appeared last year. It has been updated.
