Rubbish

Pog Blog

Sir Frog is in the garden painting an African lily flower, and I am resting up on my favorite chaise in my greenhouse. I am snookered* from our recent journey to India. I am still a bit jet lagged, so if I nod off, I apologize. We went to Chidambaram, India for curried crickets. It’s a small temple town in the southern part of the country. What an extraordinary time we had there. When we arrived, the Festival of Lights happening. The streets were filled with the divine smell of sandalwood incense* and the sound of temple bells rang through out the city. After settling into the Lakshmi suites, we visited our friend Ganesh* at the Nataraja* temple. What a sweet lad he is. We sat together in the center courtyard of  Nataraja, and ate fresh prasad* consisting of sweet  coconut rice and curried mango. It was served to us on a   banana leaf. We sipped on fresh masala tea* and Ganesh told us stories about the yogi traditions, and the service he is blessed with doing around the temple.

 In town center, restaurants were over crowded. Due to the fact that we were in such an exotic place, we needed to stay very picky about where we ate. Although we happened upon a few nice clean restaurants and were advised to eat vegetarian. But since we are carnivores, we went to some smaller towns outside of the city to the local swamps to hunt for some bugs. There are species there that you cannot find anywhere else in the world.

Along with the  bugs and delectable bugs and beautiful plants, you would not believe what we saw! It was a complete shock to both of us!

 RUBBISH!*

Heaps of it! The amount of trash in the water and streets was heart breaking. It’s a shame these buggies don’t have a choice to mind their manners by picking up after themselves. I don’t mean to be rude at all. Its quite simple. There is no place for them to put their rubbish. There are no trash bins on the streets. I never once saw a trash truck disposing of the waste.  Instead it just sits in ginormous heaps creating an unsanitary environment for these lovely people.

When I come to think of why this is happening, I know that throughout history, the natives have always burned their trash. It was organic matter only, and it was safe to do so.  Now, in this modern world, they are faced with disposing of plastic. If they burn it, well you can only imagine how horrible it is for their air. This forces them to just leave it all over the streets.

So here is what needs to be done!

If I had 22 million dollars or so, I would build a privately owned sanitation plant to help the Indians dispose of their rubbish!  I did notice while driving through India, quite a lot of open space. The land is cheap down there and work is much needed. With a proper dump site installed, some trucks and some infrastructure, a private party could help set up a simple sanitation process by educating the people and giving them what they need for a cleaner way of living. The locals do not want to live in dirty streets, they just do not have a choice. It so odd to me, really. All they need is trashcans and trucks to pick up and dispose of the rubbish.  I just know how much they would appreciate that.  They are such happy folks always dressed in gowns of color. I did see one man collecting bottles out of the trash heaps to recycle and sell.  It is so lovely to see people caring about keeping their planet healthy, even in the depths of filth.

All people can benefit from a little clean up…no?

If someone gave you 22 million dollars to make the world a happier place, what would you do?