Coming Clean

I have never been accused of being a tree-hugging environmentalist. But even I have noticed that Hong Kong does not seem to have jumped on the recycling bandwagon. I have yet to see anything resembling a recycling bin around town, nor have I seen any ads in print or on t.v. promoting recycling.

As an ambivalent recycler, I’m not casting aspersions. Hong Kong has a lot on its plate. A comprehensive, city-wide recycling initiative simply hasn’t risen to the top of the priority list. Yet. I'm sure its coming.

But what you do see around town and on t.v. are ads encouraging everyone to Clean Up Hong Kong. Almost every time I’ve turned on the t.v., I’ve seen the same commercial featuring a crew of well-scrubbed, good looking young people pushing brooms in sync with a drum-heavy pop tune. Think Westside Story, but with mops instead of switchblades.

It’s a good start. Now if only we had a place to put all those plastic bottles and aluminum cans.

Maybe I –forsooth- will have to start a recycling club at my school.

Rachel Carson would look down from the Great Rain Forest in the sky and smile at the irony of having a guy who doesn’t believe in global warming in charge of the school’s recycling club.

But stranger things have happened.

-Jack