Wildfire smoke around Port Moody, BC, credit: CityNews

This fall is my last semester as an environmental student before I leave university and begin post-grad life. I imagined myself soaking up the fall colours on campus, sharing career plans with classmates and eating as many signature Renaissance Coffee muffins as I could get my hands on. This past week, I sat inside my bedroom battling headaches, tight sinuses and general climate anxiety under a yellow sky while I attempted to prepare for classes and stay engaged with my zoom lectures. The idyllic last fall I had imagined for myself has gone up in smoke along with the more than five million acres of land along the west coast.

The wildfires have forced me to reflect on why I chose environmental studies in the first place. My story starts in Kampala, Uganda in 2017 where I worked as an intern and experienced regularly unhealthy air quality for the first time in my life. The city is densely populated, many people use charcoal-burning cookstoves and residential trash is openly burned. From my balcony, I watched plumes of smoke rise from a burning garbage pile each Sunday and savoured my time outdoors before stinging eyes and off-putting smells forced me inside. That August, I flew home to one of the worst wildfire seasons my province has ever seen. I remember my flight descending and seeing nothing but a layer of impenetrable smoke. The aerial view of my city I always love to behold was nowhere to be seen. I felt reverse culture shock as we drove through seemingly abandoned streets with the city holed up in their homes. I had grown accustomed to bustling roads in Kampala with children, motorcycles and cows constantly rushing past. While Uganda had once seemed like another world, coming home felt like being dropped into a different planet that I had once visited in a dream. I was previously on the track to major in International Studies, but the summer had shifted my focus and I changed my program to a Bachelor of Environment.

Fast forward three years later and I am just two courses away from finishing that degree. But it wasn’t only the smoke that was making my head hurt. I am being forced to grapple with the reality of an ever uncertain future. For the past three years when someone asked me what I plan to do after I graduate I always responded by saying I’d love to travel more before getting serious about my career. Of course, this has been postponed until we are living in an AC (after-COVID) world. But, I’m not only thinking of my immediate future. I’m also realizing that the healthy and beautiful environment I grew up in may not be a reality for my generation, in our young adulthood and beyond. British Columbia is predicted to see larger and more frequent wildfires, hotter temperatures, increased drought and water shortages. It is a depressing realization that it is not only my fall plans that have been dashed but maybe my entire future as well.

As I write this, the smoke has cleared and blue skies are in sight once again. It is a lot easier to feel hope when the sun is shining. But, I know that I must stay hopeful even when it is not. No matter what is yet to come for my province and the world, I have already chosen my degree and my path, and I will walk it no matter dark, clear, or smokey skies ahead.

I Began the Last Semester of My Environment Degree Trapped Inside from Wildfire Smoke