THROWING one’s garbage just about anywhere, is one national headache that’s a click short of being classified as an inborn trait.
I’m beginning to suspect this sense of entitlement just about sums up our thug life as a people. It revolves around the tenet that just about anyone can do it, especially if no one is watching.
Affliction or not, what makes this mindset worse than it is, is the accompanying denial clause that one is free of it.
Now that may be a tough pill to swallow but in the literal sense, solely for animals, it could be lethal, too. Try telling that to marine or forest creatures after they have choked on your plastic refuse.
I’ve watched many documentary films online of well-documented cleanup drives in some of our waters and even till now, the results on some are really amazing, with touching sights to behold. For one, the commitment by both the communities and the volunteers makes one gasp that it’s possible after all.
What becomes secondary is the natural query, who made the call to clean the surroundings, the beaches, our waterways and the mountain trails?
That ceases to be important, especially when the amount of trash hauled after each dive or trail operation, makes one realize the magnitude at how, without our knowing it, we continuously poison the very spaces that house and feed us.
One can only imagine how long we have been killing the ocean and, in turn, poisoning the very source of food that feeds our families.
For perspective alone, try wrapping around your head the idea of three thousand sacks of garbage taken from one beach alone.
The spirited disposition of volunteers captured in these many documentaries, reminds me of the energy of children during Easter Sunday egg hunts. Look how many eggs I’ve found? The same spirit could also be seen among the volunteers, look how many kilos we’ve recovered!
One downside though, it’s the rainy season again and there’s flooding in many parts of the city. While many insist that the reason is our poor drainage systems that could barely accommodate the volume of water in its pipes, what’s revealed by this is the sad fact that garbage is still the cause of flooding in our streets.
Apparently, there was one photo taken by a newsman showing city workers opening a manhole along a major street. It revealed a clogged opening filled with used plastic and empty bottles of mineral water.
A neighbor tells me, we’re fortunate the floodwaters couldn’t reach us because of our elevation. Yet not far from my mind was what befell us many months back.
Our drainage canal had been clogged because of trash and tree parts. That’s flooding in a way. The news of community spirit and joint efforts may be one thing after all.
The reality beneath the surface, under the city’s drainage is another. We are still the same underneath.
