My journey seems ever winding, Through the foliage of despair, "The light will be there" they said, "Just keep on going" But when will the journey end? They say everyone has a hero's journey, A story to their life, Yet it seems as though I'm stuck in this normal world, A repetitive mundane wash, Nothing left to do here, Nothing left to crave, Tell me the easiest way out of this Monotone tasteless world. For a thrill I desire, But all I have is hubbub, Chaos is the norm, Nothing is unusual, Like a barren shadowland. All I see, All I hear, Is a life lived over and over. Can I see the light, Or is a decoy approaching.....

Pollution is a big word; not only in letters but in meaning too. It can be understood in a plethora of different ways, but (especially in recent years) it’s just boiled down to the planet and global warming. But let’s go down to the roots of it all: to pollute something is simply to contaminate it. For example, water pollution is to dirty water to the point where it is undrinkable. And if we let that happen to the whole planet, it’d become unliveable, and the clock is ticking, new ways to pollute made every day, and an overlooked one is becoming a bigger and bigger issue by the minute. Light pollution. This form of hinderance is one you might not think of. Its where the darkness of the nught is penetrated by by light, resulting in nocturnal wildlife being disturbed and habitats destroyed. But its not only animals suffering, when lights are on at night (which is when its most noticeable) sleep will be thrashed, whether that would be bad mental health os decreased concentration, it certainly has an effect. Energy is also a big problem. It would take so much electricity to light up a single street, imagine how much it would take to light up the world. Humans often forget that we too are a part of nature. We act selfishly and use our apt thinking to override the rules of nature, bringing down more and more down with us. For illumination for us could be destruction for them. #futureofus

Gluten free diets have been gaining popularity in the past few years, typically in order to loose weight or even just to improve one’s health. Stores have all sorts of foods in gluten free, which is a dream for people with Celiac disease (a severe allergy to gluten) but this begs the question- why did this start? Well, gluten in a protein exclusive to the wheat and barley plant: it lets baked goods have a chewy yet airy texture. You might have thought that yeast does this, and you would be correct. The difference is that gluten holds it in place, and lets the air bubbles stay in that position. Yet the mystery still remains, what is this trend all about? To see where it all started, lets go back to 2010, where the majority people who consumed gluten free were people with Celiac. Now, as I said its a severe allergy, but how does it work? The villi (small ridges in the intestines that absorb the nutrients in food for the body) get damaged and the person gets malnourished, leading in extreme weight loss, which is where the misconception started. But after someone with Celiac stops consuming gluten, they put on weight, which is a good thing as they are underweight! Urban legends like this spread really fast, so always consider what you share, and if you don’t have enough information to make a decision, then seek it out before passing it on. #futureofus

Our galaxy is huge. At over one hundred thousand light years in diameter, its seems to be huge, but when compared to other galaxies (like Andromeda, which is over 220,000 light years across) it seems small. And, well, the entire universe is over 93 billion light years across! So, with all these planets, and potentially habitable planets, why have we found no other forms of life that aren’t native to Earth? Frank Drake (American astronomer and astrophysicist) formed an equation in 1961, titled “the Drake equation”, which would supposedly tell us how many inter-galactic civilizations there are; although there is a problem. The last 4 terms are estimates no one has solid numbers for, although Drake theorised that there should be 50 00 detectable civilisations in our universe. 11 years prior to formulation of this equation, Enrico Fermi -Italian physicist- often thought about whether or not we were alone in the universe, and it proceeded in him thinking about space empires (a civilisation that has permanently inhabited another planet). Fermi thought that it would only take 10 million years to inhabit every life sustaining planet, and considering the universe is 14 billion years old, 10 million is a flash! And this gives rise to the Fermi Paradox. If everything could be inhabited, then why haven’t super intelligent aliens gone there yet? Maybe aliens think we aren’t worth their time, or we’ve received signals, but we aren’t smart enough to find them. But since 1960, Drake and others have been emitting radio waves in hopes to find aliens. Or maybe civilisations don’t survive long enough to explore the galaxy; after all, it was the same Enrico Fermi who invented the atomic bomb. Perhaps the conditions for life have only just become present, and the first life will be us...

In times gone by, We would be surrounded by freedom, Engulfed by endless possibilities, But were oblivious, Oblivious to the horrors, To the pain, To a the lifeless earth, To the lifeless us. In times gone by, A odd situation emerged. We were at significant crossroads, Stay in or stay ill? Give up or just give? Agony and uncertainty Showed us the wrong way, Follow them, Or follow you? Be the one you are, Or the one you want to be? In times gone by, A rhythm began, An endless cycle of the same old things. Our education became different, You were at a desk In your desolate room, The window was there, But it didn’t suffice. A longing started burning within. “Go outside”, It whispered, “Be free,” It sighed. You ignored it still, But to your own demise. In times gone by, Hope showed its glory, Hope showed its pride, Hope told us it was going to be all right. Our eyes widened, We believed her still. After much time of yearning, We finally stepped outside. We mounted our bikes, And peddled hard, To an endless chain of glee. In times gone by, We had set ourselves up too high, For a crippling disappointment was in to shock. A year has passed now, And we are back inside Inside our own vessels, So secluded from society. But this was everyone’s case, We were all inside. So why not help, Why not interact, Why not be a free heart, A free spirit, And who cares if our bodies are stuck inside? We’ll just have to bring outside inside. In time now here, We have appeared to be done. A long lasting fight has appeared to be done. A few battles were lost, But we won the war. I salute everyone who perished to this frightful enemy, I salute all who worked in these treacherous times. I salute all who cared for the sick and wounded. And I salute you, For caring and withstanding this, For choosing to continue the fight, For being strong in the face of adversity. In times to come, The definition of normal will change. Rudimentary things will come to a halt, Dine in and cinemas might just perish, To delivery and streaming services. We will learn and grow from this. We will not yearn and groan again. For we have learnt to be grateful for the little things again. -Siya Nagar

Dead Gravity Imagine floating weightless in a huge tube, 408 kilometres from earth. There are only 6 other people with you and the food upsets your stomach. The experience used to be reserved for astronauts who had to go through an extensive education system, train for weeks and weeks in unusual circumstances (such as living underwater), but nowadays, private companies will be able to send “space tourists “ to the ISS for £35,000 per night. As you might be able to tell, using money to go to the International Space Station is only for the wealthy but getting all of those qualifications won’t be easy and paying for the tuition would cost the same as going up with cash. But there is one crucial difference that could make or break your stay : the reason you are there. Aeronauts employed by NASA, SPACEX, CSA or ISRO all take people to in-orbit satellites to do some type of research. In 2013, when the famous Chri Headfield was aboard the ISS from the Canadian Space Agency, he recorded himself doing seemingly ordinary things( brushing your teeth, cutting your nails etc.) which might seem pointless, but in fact , he was educating millions of people by his experiments along with the huge one saving lives every day. Space tourism took off in 2006 when Anoushen Ansari went to the station; she said”I would give up my life for this.” And although space tourists aren’t contributing to the big things they are exciting future generations of Astronauts!

Condensation, precipitation, Falls with no hesitation, Drops in tiny crystalic balls, No doubt water is master of all! Flows on vast sandy beaches, Home of many marine creature, Fishes, turtles, saltwater eels, Gives me none of the jittery feels. Still no clue? It is water, silly you

Way of the pen-  By Siya Nagar The way we write is evolving, changing slightly each day, random mutations and us choosing to write in different formats and ways is shaping the future of writing: from the quills and bottles of lead ink, to the modern keyboard, we have chosen to be selective about the way we write, often choosing to type rather than write on paper, but why? Why change an age old technique of letting ink flow onto a page, for an electrically modified typewriter?  The simple answer is convenience. Why smudge your letters and try hard to make your text neat when an algorithm can fix your problems? And now in this age of perpetual lockdown and online school and work, we have resorted to technology to share ideas and communicate with each other. Even I am contributing to this, typing this out instead of writing it.  Writing and typing seem like the same thing: words come onto something, but there is something more that sets them apart: creativity! When you are typing, you have to focus on a plethora of things, such as if there are typos coming, if you have pressed the spacebar or whether or not you save the file. Even though there are flaws in conventional writing, it is far more reliable.  But there is one major flaw that typing can solve: paper. 3.5 billion to 7 billion trees are cut down per year. This is a lot of trees and many of them are used to make paper: for every ton of paper, there are 24 fully grown trees used. That might not seem like a lot, but 199 tons of paper is made each day. That's nearly 5000 trees for the global market of paper.  There are ups and downs to both writing and typing, and methods like recycling are brilliant to use. So, whichever way you write, be creative and (most importantly) have fun!

As we all know, the planet as we know it is changing; climate change is engulfing the world, and us humans are the root cause. We are chopping down the natural habitat of a plethora of astonishing and winsome creatures just so we can have a few more acres of land for new homes, factories and hospitals, which will inevitably create more air pollution, and without trees it will simply build up in our atmosphere, slowly suffocating all creatures, all plants, all life on planet earth. Our home will turn nothing different to Mars or Venus: just a rocky ball orbiting the sun. Scientists used to believe that life on Earth will end thousands of years later, if not more: but in the last decade, things have changed dramatically.  We are now losing more and more species to climate change everyday, some looking and doing legends for the planet, such as keeping poisonous mosquitoes at bay, but now? Now life as we know it will perish into a cripple. How can we change? Media: social media, political media, print media or broadcast media: they all spread messages, but the amount of articles or posts based on climate change has lowered since 2009. It isn't like the situation is getting any better, if anything it's getting significantly worse, so why is the media choosing to ignore such a pressing issue? Is the government trying to ignore it, no. Everyone is simply scared of it, terrified of the single reason the natural balance has been tipped in such a way that will be irreversible after a short while. Governments are still worried and will continue acting on it, but will not publicise it, as the people will be petrified if they keep talking about or will truly understand the pressing issue that it truly is.  Our planet is a wonderful place, with gorgeous and spectacular animals, some of which are dying and what will happen next is the question on everybody’s lips. In reality, we cannot be sure. In the past few months, things got much better: there were no flights to pollute the lower atmosphere and no cars to pollute the ground, the situation got better. But as people got out of their bubble, the pollution became at large again. So who knows, we might be able to win the battle against climate change after all!