The themes of this film have begun to align themselves thusly:

1. China’s environment is bad but there is cause for optimism.
2. Most of the positive change is coming from “bottom-up” institutions like NGOs.
3. The “bottom-up” institutions can only operate within the Chinese political system because the government (“top-down”) has allowed them to. It is still very hard to start NGOs
4. This opening-up of Chinese institutions to be creative in solving environmental problems has tremendous potential for the future of China. Environmental Education in primary schools is a perfect  example of “top-down” investment in a “bottom-up” approach to solving the county’s problems.
5. Will what the government allows to happen in this fashion be enough to stem the tide of environmental degradation in the country? Things are slowing but not stopping.

All of these items are yet to be proven completely to me – but it is a start for us in creating a coherent narrative of what is going on around us. One of the big problems inherent in this project is that understanding such an emerging concept as environmental education in such a constantly changing society such as urban China, it is hard to get much more than conjecture about the future, even from specialists and professionals. Talking to officials in the CCP would perhaps be our best chance at an anchor for the factual verisimilitude that I crave in telling this story. This project is bringing to my attention the interesting tension between experts and actors. I think constantly about who has the right (or the perceived right) to tell the audience that which is fact. Unless an expert is a participant of that which she speaks, a record of her speaking is still just that: a record of her speaking — not a statement of fact.