rubbish

I was walking down the street today, as I do a lot of days, when I suddenly noticed all the trash, rubbish and general filth covering the ground, like I do everyday. What provoked the sudden awareness was watching a young girl open a pack of sweets, stuff them in her mouth and then toss the wrapper aside.

See in Spain they have this problem. It's called littering if you haven't picked up on it yet. (Please notice the pun using 'picked up on') Supposedly there are fines, hefty jail sentences and occasionally hangings to be had for absently tossing aside your snickers wrapper. But these fines, sentencings and hangings don't happen. Like insurance claims don't happen.

Granted, one can argue that littering creates jobs. And that is true, especially here in Badajoz. Lots of jobs are created. People in green uniforms push carts with little dustpans hanging off the sides down my street every morning, picking up what had been dropped off the night before. And my street isn't even busy. The thing is, people buy things in stores. Then as they walk they unwrap them, take them out of the box, and happily leave the box and wrapping lying on the street, believing that they have just made some homeless person's day. It's just the mentality I suppose. One thinks that they would happily dump freeon and other chemicals that cause bird flu in the street because they know the green people will come the next morning to clean it all up.

That's all I have to say really. I just wanted to gripe.