I am so excited today

Because my family has come to visit me

For the first time ever

This is my brother Jonathan who came from the U.S.

He is 2 years older than me

Are you ?

I'm 2 years older

2 years smarter

Behind me is my cousin Nati

Who came all the way from Israel

Hi everybody

This is my editor A(@£ùé

I cannot pronounce your name

Aurélien

This is Aurélien from France

He's behind the camera

You can't even see him

No you don't see me

He's invisible

What is your impression of Taiwan so far ?

I really love it, especially the food

I'm sending pictures of all of the soups and fruit home

To my wife Megan, to make her jealous

That she didn't get to come

So basically, we've been eating non-stop

Because it's been raining non-stop

But finally, today is a beautiful day

And we're finally going out to travel

The theme of today's video is actually

Ecological tourism and different ways

That we can reduce our carbon footprint

And the pollution we make while we're travelling

So you guys are not off to a good start

As flying really uses a lot of emissions

I considered coming by boat

You would have come halfway across

And then you would have had to turn back

I'm not doing so well neither

I'm driving quite an old car

We do have 4 people in here

Which is a little bit better

But all the things I added on the side

The large mirrors

And the lights I've put on

All those things reduce aerodynamic efficiency

Anyways that was too long and drown out

That's why we have an editor

In my head, I'm already editing you all out

Traveling less far consumes less carbon

So do the slower forms of transportation

Like your feet

Which makes hiking and outdoor sports

A great low impact form of tourism

Suspension bridges like this

Are very common all over Taiwan

There are really amazing bridges

I know you're a bridge guy

I love bridges

You like bridges and trains

That's a good combination

Yeah, you'll feel really at home in Taiwan

Wow ! Look at that

Yeah

The scenary is really amazing

It feels prehistoric

You could put a dinosaur here

And it would look in context

Yes

It wouldn't be out of place

These are Aboriginal costumes ?

Yes, these are the Aboriginal clothing

Be careful, these rocks are slippery, okay ?

小飛嗎？ Are you Xiao Fei ?

欸，你好 Oh hello

你是哪裡人？ Where do you come from ?

美國 America

哪裡？ Where in America ?

北卡羅來納 North Carolina

How come you don't have a Red Neck accent ?

Whacha talkin' bout ?

Aw Man

You can go around this way

This way ?

Your hair is so interesting in the green forest

Yeah

I wear it for camouflage

You were very excited

About the garbage trucks here in Taiwan

I was, they sound like ice cream trucks in the U.S.

When I first got to Taiwan

I was just hungry for ice cream all the time

It's like a background feeling

You just hear it and you want ice cream

In Taiwan, there is quite high levels of recycling

I'm was thinking about that actually

Because the quality of recyclable materials

In the U.S.

Is quite low

Because Americans just won't separate it

A lot of things that should be recycled

Can't be recycled

Because of the contamination within the recycling bin

You're saying they have a recycling bin

And a trash bin

And they put everything in both of them

The recycling in Israel isn't done very well

But...

Because Israel is a very dry country

We try to be very smart about our water

Either by the way use it or how we do irrigation

For agriculture

We use the dripping system

But also for public awareness

About not leaving your tap open all the time

Yes, I think it's quite impressive

The way they do it in Israel

We need to do it all over the world

Because the more water we use

It's not just about water

The treatment of that water takes a lot of energy

How do they get people to conserve water in Israel?

How did that come around?

There's a lot of advertising on television

We really don't have anything like that in the U.S.

But it sounds like a good idea

Actually they are doing stuffs like that here

This video was actually commissioned by the E.P.A.

To call attention to their new app

Green Points

Green Points is a way to keep track

Of the products that you buy

And which ones are certified by the E.P.A.

As taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint

And that way, you can also earn discounts

And save money

It's a pretty cool app

There's a link in the description

And we'll get to the details

About how to use Green Points

In a minute

But first

It's time to cool off

At Triangle Lake Water Slide

We're in Miaoli now

This is Miaoli County

We were already in Miaoli before

But now we're in the south part of Miaoli

Near Taichung

And we're going to a resort

That is one of the few resorts in Taiwan

That has 4 certifications

From the E.P.A.

For low energy consumption

And low waste consumption

high recycling

All of this stuffs

So it's pretty cool

I've never been to it, I heard a lot about it

Lots of things are made out of recyclable materials

That sounds pretty cool

Beautiful, beautiful weather today

Miaoli weather

Nice and sunny Miaoli

While we checked in, the rain finally stopped

And we were able to go check out the park

Please, walk on the grass

I think what they did here was pretty nice

They just took this whole area behind me

That forest there

And they just closed it to human entry

And made it sort of an ecological park

Then, during firefly season

Because that area is relatively undisturbed

The fireflies will just come out

And you can view them here

They turn on the special lights

You can see all the fireflies here from April to May

So in order to increase the ecological awareness

And encourage people to use less CO2

And buy greener products

The E.P.A. has created a new app

Called Green Points

I'll put a link to where you can find it

Down below

With this app, you can keep track of the products you buy

And then, you can get reward points for them

Which you can then redeem at convenience stores

For discounts

And free products

To participate

Just look for this logo

For the ecological footprint

And this logo

For Green Levels

Which you can find on the back

Of any product in Taiwan

Here is a list of the stores that are participating

In this program

In order for companies to participate in this program

What they have to do

Is measure the entire ecological footprint

Of their product

From manufacture to use of transportation

And then, finally, disposal

And then, they have to take steps

To reduce that amount

You can find all these informations

On the E.P.A. website

Where they have a list of which product

Did what to reduce their ecological footprint

This process has to be repeated every 2 years

So it's important that when we purchase products

We choose products

That have taken he steps to reduce their footprint

To encourage more companies

To reduce the waste that they create

And to also reduce our impact

On the environment in general

As humans

In addition to products with these labels

The points are also accumulated

By public transportation

Just swipe your Easy Card or MRT Card

And the points will automatically be accumulated

In your account

Another way to reduce your ecological footprint

Is to eat at restaurants

That use locally sourced food

So now, let's check it out

We're gonna go to the West Lake Restaurant

And eat food from local farms

It was so great to have my family here in Taiwan

For the very 1st time

We took the long way around

And my brother identified

All the plants in the forest for us

So they have educational programs ?

Yes, they have educational programs here

Yesterday it was full of kids

They take them around

And basically give them the tour

That you, as a non-Taiwanese person

Are somehow giving me

Because you could recognise all the flowers

And plants, and stuffs

This is Blood Flower

This is an annual milkweed

Plant from the milkweed family from South America

It's not native to Taiwan

It's native to South America

Look at this guy

Look at him, just look at him

This is wisteria

Which I knew

I definitely didn't need Jonathan to say it first

Before I knew what it was

But he's very good with the plants

Because he is a firefighter

I'm not sure why it makes him good with plants

The guy here from the hotel was telling me

That the white flowers over there

Attract different kind of butterflies

The purple butterflies really like this flower

I think you're the only person I know

Who could ever say

"Oh look at all these butterflies"

"Oh it makes perfect sense, those are eupatoriums"

I'm very impressed

With how much of the Taiwanese food

Is locally produced

By local, I mean on the island

Yes, basically all the vegetables

And I'm quite looking forward to a meal

Prepared from local ingredients

And I think that's one area

Where the U.S. can really improve a lot

Americans always want to have everything all the time

Oh right !

That's why things don't taste fresh in my opinion