Introduction

I am a champion of sustainability. Or at least that's where I seem to be headed.

It all started with an undergraduate degree in 'Tropical Environmental Science'. I had grand ideas of one day becoming the medicine man of the new millennium. Sean Connery eat your heart out... 


Then I had my head turned by a module in Latin American politics. Deforestation, over-fishing, pollution, corruption and politicians all seemed to be closely related and by gum I was going to be the one to expose them all. I still would have talked like Connery though...

To accomplish this, I knew that I needed a masters degree. For that I needed money, so I went out to South Korea to teach for a couple of years and earn the cash required to progress to the next level. During this interlude, I started thinking less about exposing corrupt politicians and more about sustainability and the eco-tourism industry. So many tourist operations claim to be 'green', or 'eco-friendly'. My goal was to separate the truly altruistic from the dirty fraudsters.

I wanted to spend time with my family during my studies, so the only university that was really an option was Queen's University in Belfast, NI. All geared up, I got onto their website to see what kind of courses were on offer. At first I tried to get myself onto a research masters program, but I was told that no-one in Northern Ireland was really interested in eco-tourism. My optimism train made an unscheduled stop at the deflation station. However, I quickly picked myself up and decided that doing a taught masters degree might not be so bad after all. Who wants to spend all their time analysing data anyway, right? So I checked their courses and one immediately jumped out and slapped me across my smiling face. Would anyone like to do an MSc in Leadership for Sustainable Development? Eh, yes please!

So here I am. My course started last week and it's all good so far. Updates will follow...