Climate Change: 6 facts about Greta Thunberg, the 16-year old environmental activist

Greta Thunberg, a staunch climate change activist, spoke at UN Climate Action Summit, as she has before, spoken at multiple platforms advocating an action to prevent climate change.

Here are a few facts you did not know about her:

· Greta is not a fan of social niceties; she does not encourage or indulge in them. Her first vocal action protesting the government’s inaction was outside the Swedish parliament building, in Stockholm, handing out flyers that read “I am doing this because you adults are shitting on my future.”

· The sixteen-year-old climate activist from Sweden doesn’t fly—the emissions from aviation are too high—so she’d spent two weeks sailing across the Atlantic in a racing boat. When she reached New York Harbor, she told Trevor Noah, on “The Daily Show,” the first thing she noticed was “Suddenly, it smells.”

· Greta’s mother, Malena Ernman, was 8 when the first global meet on climate change was held in 1979. Malena wrote a book about her family, which in English translates to Scenes From the Heart, talking about family, the environment and how climate change affects family.

· Her mother is an internationally acclaimed opera singer, and an environmentalist too. Malena gave up her international career, because it involved a lot of travel and she, like Greta gave up flying because of the humungous carbon footprint.

· Baeta Thunberg, Greta’s sister, has her social media feed dominated by her evident love for singing, taking after their mother, presumably.

· Greta Thunberg does not believe in hope. When asked if she is a pessimist or an optimist, she shrugged and said she was a realist. Greta Thunberg has put it best. “As for hope, that is something you need to deserve—that you have actually done something.”

· Thunberg’s actions have made hundreds of thousands of young people around the globe to stage school strikes for climate action. Ahead of the strike called for the eve of the climate summit, the New York City school system said it would excuse students who skipped classes; Thunberg was set to speak to the strikers in Foley Square.