By: Pratama Aditya Haryanto & Natalia Trita Agnika

Car Free Day (CFD) is an activity that is now commonly practiced in several areas, especially on the protocol roads of big cities. One of the areas that also conducts CFD is Bekasi, which takes place in the Summarecon Bekasi area. However, for some international students, CFD activities open their insights that these activities can be a means to spread messages of concern for the environment, such as what took place last Saturday (22/01).

Since 06.00 WIB, the WWF-Indonesia Panda Mobile team together with AIESEC President University had gathered at GOR Bekasi to participate in CFD activities and carry out the mission to convey messages of environmental awareness to the public encountered in CFD activities. The AIESEC exchange program students were divided into three groups.

Each group delivered information about the environment and animals to the public they met in the CFD area. To make the message easier to convey, they used drawing media that had previously been made by students at the schools they visited. Due to the language barrier, the foreign students were assisted by volunteers Panda Mobile from President University and volunteers Panda Mobile WWF-Indonesia as translators.

The AIESEC President University students were very enthusiastic in the activity. It was the first time for them to participate in Car Free Day in Indonesia. Thomas, one of the students from Belgium stated that he was very surprised by the density of CFD activities at Summarecon Bekasi. "I was very surprised by the number of people who came to this place. It's like being on vacation but without a vehicle. The people here are also very friendly and seem happy to listen to us delivering this environmental awareness campaign."

The people in the CFD area were also enthusiastic. They were happy to be invited to take pictures together, and the photos were uploaded to social media with the hashtag #gogreen #AIESECPRESIDENTUNIV. This was one of the ways they campaigned for environmental awareness. In addition to taking pictures and telling stories about the environment, the exchange program students also distributed pins made from safety pins and plastic bottle caps. The pins depicted the earth and the various negative impacts it experiences, such as pollution.

After all teams had successfully campaigned for environmental awareness to 20 people per group, they returned to the main meeting point in front of GOR Bekasi to discuss the activities they had carried out while taking a short break. After resting, the AIESEC members stole the attention of the surrounding community by doing the AIESEC Roll Dance activity. All participants did the AIESEC roll dance while inviting the community to do the same movement. A cheerful and warm atmosphere closed the series of Panda Mobile and AIESEC activities at CFD Bekasi.