Went to Odaiba (お台場) for a park clean-up activity organized by a friend's company. Pretty cool, not just because I got to do something for the environment, but also because I got to ride the Yurikamome (ゆりかもめ) subway line for the first time. It's an above-ground subway that circles a large portion of Tokyo Bay, providing riders with very good waterfront views.
We went to the designated park in the morning, got equipped (long cafeteria tongs, gloves and trashbags--divided into burnable (燃える), non-burnable (燃えない) and recyclable (資源) garbage of course, and split up into teams. Each team combed a section of the park for an hour, fighting mosquitoes and picking up anything that looked out of place. The people in my team were a mix of Americans, Japanese and Chinese and had all spent time in the US, so we had a pretty fun time chatting while we worked. Not really back-breaking work, 'cos it was only for a hour+.
Conclusion: 90% of burnable trash consisted of cigarette butts *surprise*surprise*. The rest: cans, plastic forks, chopsticks. Didn't find any used condoms though, fortunately. I remember a similar event in Pittsburgh in which a lot of interesting items were found in the parks. The most interesting item found during this event was a baseball bat. However there wasn't much trash to begin with. Nevertheless if there are more public trashcans in general, maybe there will be less litter. Anyway I heard that many trashcans were removed from Tokyo streets after the sarin gas attacks a few years ago.
Official report: click here
The company was good, lunch was provided, got a free tee-shirt and I got to contribute a little something to society; What more can one ask for on a lazy Saturday morning?
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