Second Day with Clean Himalaya

The previous day’s trips up and down to the workshop and the afternoon collecting rubbish in Laksman Jhula have taken their toll! Marc has huge and very unpleasant blisters on the soles of his feet! Nevertheless, we set off again for the workshop to see what Jitendra has planned for us next.

We are off on a morning collection run, this time with Chotalal and his Clean Himalaya bicycle and trailer. It is very hot, the sun burning in a bright, clear sky and it is only 9am!

If anything, Chotalal’s morning run is more strenuous than that of the previous afternoon, in the alleyways of Laksman Jhula. There is an equal amount of truly unpleasant waste to be collected, but in the full glare of the merciless sun.

We are flagging a bit behind Chotalal, who is cracking through his round at a fair pace. Being a one man team, he collects all the rubbish in one sack, carries is back to the bicycle trailer, where he does the sorting and separating into food and non-food waste. There is a terrible, smelly bucket slowly filling with the slops from households and hotels, as well as decently concealed sacks of other waste.

Some places have obviously diligently been collecting their rubbish, some have made a token attempt and a few places have nothing at all despite the fact they are paying for the collection to take place. Since many of the places today are private homes, quite a few holiday homes for tourists from other towns in India, a lot of time is spent hanging around outside, waiting for a small bag of paper to be finally handed out by the householder.

At one point, Chotalal parked his bike and headed up a steep slope away from the road, carrying a couple of sacks. We duly set off behind him, not realising what lay in store! Up, up, up… along a single track road without any shade, dodging the bikes and motorbikes that are freewheeling down the slope in the opposite direction. After what felt like about a day of trudging along, we turn left, follow a small stony track for about 30 yards and stop, red-faced and out of breath, outside a private home. We are immediately confronted by a snarling, barking dog, doing its best to squeeze through the gates to get at us. At this point, the householder puts her head out of the window and calls out the Hindi equivalent of ‘no rubbish today!’.

Shattered, we turn down the hill. Some of the other houses do have some rubbish to collect, but the effort of getting to that top house for nothing has had a deep effect!

Marc’s injured feet are too painful… he is hobbling badly. He heads for the relative peace of Red Chili internet café and I trudge on behind Chotalal followed by curious looks and clouds of flies.

In the afternoon, there is a change from the regular rubbish collections. It is time to get out and about on ‘Public Service’ which is basically picking up recyclable waste from a public area. In the full heat of the day, we are going to clear up a stretch of nearby dirt pavement – Aswani on the left hand side of the road, Surinder on the right.

As the afternoon wears on, the sacks get fuller. As well at picking up litter lying loose on the floor, both men are clearing the rubbish that is choking the foul and stinking gutters at the side of the road. Pavement or gutter, they are having to dodge in and out of the heaving throng of people, vehicles and animals to be able to do their job.
It takes about 2 ½ hours to finish this stretch of road. The sacks are sealed to await pickup by the Clean Himalaya truck and we start of the walk back to the workshop. You only have to go a couple of steps before you realize what a soul-destroying, not to mention back-breaking, task this could be. There is already a fresh showering of sweet and ice cream papers, banana skins and plastic bottles beginning to show on the floor not 5 minutes after we have finished this afternoon’s labours. Tomorrow’s work is already waiting for us!

As we get near to the workshop, Aswani and Surinder stop to point out the ravines that are used for the usual method of waste disposal. From the top to the bottom, which is by the edge of the Ganges, there is a solid covering of multi-coloured rubbish. It would take an army of Aswani and Surinders to clean this lot up, and then it would be back again the next day…… We stand at the top staring into the garbage abyss, shaking our heads, stunned at the task in front of Clean Himalaya.

It does not matter how many people there are to make rubbish collections, however useful they are in getting out there and raising awareness of the pollution issue. If there is not any kind of change in the attitude of the people so wantonly undertaking such destruction, no amount of ‘Public Service’ work is going to help.