One thing that amazes me here in Africa is that very little gets wasted. That is a great thing because waste is one thing that nearly makes me insane in the US. We can hardly stand to know how much grocery stores and restaurants throw away, as we watch people go hungry here in the village. So that is one blessing here in Guinea. I rarely throw food away. Even when I cook chickens, people want the broth and bones to use for their rice and sauce. Of course, it took me a little while to feel comfortable offering that to people – but they love it and the broth contains great nutrients for their kids.
But even beyond food, many things we would dispose of in the US gets passed right out my back door. Almost everything gets snatched up. Cardboard boxes – you bet. Batteries that you think are too dead to use – I have many takers. My national friends tell me that they don’t consider a battery dead until “water” is leaking out. 2 -3 inch pieces of glass that we cut to make the windows fit – they are destined to be glass for picture frames. Tin cans – play things and “cooking pots” for little kids. Glass jars – women love them to put oil and salt in. Plastic jugs become new water bottles. Old bike tires – the tube can be cut into strips for tying things and the outside becomes a “car” for a little boy to roll down a path. Old clothes – hand them out. Someone will use them. Big plastic bags become rain slickers for kids or mattress protectors from bed wetters. Fuzzy toilet lid cover – voila – a new hat. The village doctor loves the kid’s old school papers to wrap medicine in. And when you buy bread o the street, it comes wrapped in torn pieces of cement bags.
OF course, there is a limit. Old, used medical gloves become a new balloon. I really try to stop that but the kids break the locks on the trash pits and dig them out to play with them. The concept of germs is just not happening. Even old pregnancy tests become play things – I am sure it puzzles them why the white woman gets really FUSSY when she sees those in their hands and takes away their newly acquired toys!
I am sure we are a mystery to the villagers – giving away perfectly good tins and jars and batteries. But in the end, everyone is happy and we have no landfills here. It is recycling at this best!
But even beyond food, many things we would dispose of in the US gets passed right out my back door. Almost everything gets snatched up. Cardboard boxes – you bet. Batteries that you think are too dead to use – I have many takers. My national friends tell me that they don’t consider a battery dead until “water” is leaking out. 2 -3 inch pieces of glass that we cut to make the windows fit – they are destined to be glass for picture frames. Tin cans – play things and “cooking pots” for little kids. Glass jars – women love them to put oil and salt in. Plastic jugs become new water bottles. Old bike tires – the tube can be cut into strips for tying things and the outside becomes a “car” for a little boy to roll down a path. Old clothes – hand them out. Someone will use them. Big plastic bags become rain slickers for kids or mattress protectors from bed wetters. Fuzzy toilet lid cover – voila – a new hat. The village doctor loves the kid’s old school papers to wrap medicine in. And when you buy bread o the street, it comes wrapped in torn pieces of cement bags.
OF course, there is a limit. Old, used medical gloves become a new balloon. I really try to stop that but the kids break the locks on the trash pits and dig them out to play with them. The concept of germs is just not happening. Even old pregnancy tests become play things – I am sure it puzzles them why the white woman gets really FUSSY when she sees those in their hands and takes away their newly acquired toys!
I am sure we are a mystery to the villagers – giving away perfectly good tins and jars and batteries. But in the end, everyone is happy and we have no landfills here. It is recycling at this best!
Hey Dawn- it's interesting to read this. When I was in China, we always felt comfortable throwing any-and-everything away, because we knew most of it got sorted through and "gleaned" by the local people. Of course, it made us more careful about what we did with certain LOVELY gifts...people were even known to take their trash bags on the bus to some other trash drop-off area, so no one ever found something they shouldn't in the garbage. :)
ReplyDeleteA thought on the contaminated glove balloons. If you started cutting them into small pieces before throwing them away, do you think it's solve the problem? Or just cause hard feelings? Just an idea.
Thanks for your work there.
My two favorite from Sierra Leone are the lady who was wearing shower curtain rings for earrings (big ones, mind you!) and the time a teenage schoolboy was walking around our village with a tampon applicator in his nose. (My dad discreetly explained to him what it was and it suddenly disappeared.) :-)
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