Trash. Garbage. Refuse.
The refrain is not new. I have written on garbage before: talkin' trash in February of 2008.
My tirade was about trash in the park where Jiggs and I took our evening walk in Salem. That post engendered quite a few comments.
Well, it is time for a reprise in my new home: Melaque.
During the month I have been here, I have been amazed at the amount of trash that accumulates on the street and on the beach in front of the house. Bottles. Wrappers. Plastic bags. Things that I cannot begin to identify. Not to mention, the odd shoe or pair of underpants.
I realize the Melaque area is a tourist town. And tourists have a way of treating the places they visit in the same manner the Romans treated the Sabine women. Drunks urinating on the stoops of New Orleans mansions comes to mind.
What strikes me as odd, though, is that the village has set up numerous garbage cans to help alleviate the trashing of neighborhoods -- to little avail. The mess pictured above is mere steps from a receptacle.
As I wrote over a year ago, I have a choice. I can either keep griping or I can do something. My solution in Salem was to take an extra garbage bag with me on my dog walks. If I found trash, I would pick it up.
So, I started the same technique here while Jiggs was still able to cruise the neighborhood. I saw Mexicans (locals and tourists) shaking their heads at me. Not because I was picking up garbage -- but because I was picking up after Jiggs. That seemed to be a unanimous source of joking.
At a minimum I pick up along the beach fence line and in front of the house each day. When I get back to my regular morning and evening walks, I will pick up as much as I can.
Will it make a difference? Probably, not.
But, at least I will be doing something other than complaining about the trash -- until the next post.
The refrain is not new. I have written on garbage before: talkin' trash in February of 2008.
My tirade was about trash in the park where Jiggs and I took our evening walk in Salem. That post engendered quite a few comments.
Well, it is time for a reprise in my new home: Melaque.
During the month I have been here, I have been amazed at the amount of trash that accumulates on the street and on the beach in front of the house. Bottles. Wrappers. Plastic bags. Things that I cannot begin to identify. Not to mention, the odd shoe or pair of underpants.
I realize the Melaque area is a tourist town. And tourists have a way of treating the places they visit in the same manner the Romans treated the Sabine women. Drunks urinating on the stoops of New Orleans mansions comes to mind.
What strikes me as odd, though, is that the village has set up numerous garbage cans to help alleviate the trashing of neighborhoods -- to little avail. The mess pictured above is mere steps from a receptacle.
As I wrote over a year ago, I have a choice. I can either keep griping or I can do something. My solution in Salem was to take an extra garbage bag with me on my dog walks. If I found trash, I would pick it up.
So, I started the same technique here while Jiggs was still able to cruise the neighborhood. I saw Mexicans (locals and tourists) shaking their heads at me. Not because I was picking up garbage -- but because I was picking up after Jiggs. That seemed to be a unanimous source of joking.
At a minimum I pick up along the beach fence line and in front of the house each day. When I get back to my regular morning and evening walks, I will pick up as much as I can.
Will it make a difference? Probably, not.
But, at least I will be doing something other than complaining about the trash -- until the next post.
