While I spent the last week doing the work necessary to be able to put my lessons together I found myself spending a lot of time going over the ideas I started developing a few weeks ago in regards to the problem of pollution in and around Wenzhou.
Last Sunday I bought a couple large bags from one of the shops in the University Town business center and on Wednesday I biked and hiked up one of the trails behind Chashan Town looking for garbage to collect. I continued my ascent until I reached a village where the neighborhood dogs got a little territorial and didn't let me pass through (haven't had any trouble with dogs in China before, not sure what went wrong).
In any case I started picking up garbage in plain view of several of the locals as they did some of their work and I continued to work my way back down the trail. I ended up with enough refuse to half fill one of the garbage cans (~100 liter) near my apartment; hardly a dent in the grand scheme of things, but people watched me work, and hopefully that at least will tell people that there's a problem.
Then today I had another hike with the Crazy English Club. This time we went by a new route and continued hiking (ascending and descending) for almost three hours (not counting breaks). I brought both bags and on the way back we loaded them both.
I live for this stuff.
Defacto Club Leader - Wang Liao Xin
Susan (newcomer)
(right) Xiao Ming - the younger brother I never asked for but like regardless.
Jia Jing (in her Earth-goddess pose)
(The fruits of our labor)
I felt sorry for making the casual weekend excursion with friends into an activity approaching extremist environmentalism, but most everyone seemed proud for having done it, and some of the students say they hope to learn from my example. And we passed several people on our way out, so we didn't do this unnoticed.
Now we just need to get other people to do their part...
