Polystyrene

As lovers of a good glass of wine we gave ourselves the luxury to order wine from Spain. While some goods you order from nearby towns in the UK sometimes might take weeks to be delivered; the boxes with wine arrived within a week. Packaged in a very safe way, so there is no breakage, they used polystyrene in the shape of a crate for  safety. Well done!

Getting rid of garbage nowadays is a very serious matter: we sometimes have hours of discussion to come to an agreement about in which bin certain articles must be put, to do it in the right way. We try to do our share in recycling where we can, but the guidelines on the leaflet ot the garbage collecting company or the site of the council are not always very clear. To do the right thing I asked one of the garbage men how to do dispose of it in the proper way. I was a bit surprised, but NO it could not be recycled.

The next week I was fully prepared: I had put the polystyrene in plastic bin bags and put them together with the black bin that is destined for household waste. To make it easier I put the bags next to the bin. Because of a strong wind I had to replace them a few times, but I was pleased to do that for a good cause. I kept my eyes on the road: after the garbage collectors are gone, it's best to take the wheelie bins from the street as soon as possible to prevent the wind having little games with them.

When they came I was surprised to see one of the men fiddling with the bags instead of taking them along. I ran out of the house to see what was going on. I saw him placing red stickers on the bags. As a former citizen of the Netherlands I realised that this meant danger! Over there you first get yellow stickers and after that red stickers when you do something wrong. The first ones are a warning, the second ones mean that you are banished from the garbage collection society for some time.

I told the man I had asked his colleague what I should do to offer up my polystyrene and that I thought I was meant to do it in this way. He shook his head:
"No, the polystyrene should be in the bin." I started putting the bags in the bin.
The man shook his head again:"No you can't do that, the bags are stickered."
I pulled the stickers off the bags, which was not easy; he looked at me in amazement.
I put the now heavily damaged bags in the bin.

He thought a few seconds and took all of the bags including the polystyrene bags out of the bin and put everything under his arms. His mates didn't have the time to wait for his discussions with me, so they were already driving out of the street. My new friend ran after them with my bags under his arms. Two of the bags now were really ripped open and a bit of polystyrene was flying around in the street. He managed to catch it and ran out of the street, out of my sight.

My wife asked me what happened and I told her about my experience; she was not very positive about the system. I disagreed, told her I was glad I was in the UK. In the Netherlands the man would eventually have refused to take the bags along, he would have told me that even when the stickers were removed that still didn't take away the fact that they had been stickered and that the warning I had received was very valid. I reminded her of the neighbour in the Netherlands who had put food waste in biological dissolving bags. She had got a warning for putting her food waste in plastic bags. Even in appeal this stood.

Rules are rules!
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