My workspace is very close to where I live. And I walk past Thapathali Bridge every day. Always lost in thoughts trying to hold my breath in to avoid the foul smell. I come across different activities everyday! Some days it is children of the slums throwing the river water at each other, their parents chasing them, monkeys chasing people, and what not. My favorite past time is looking at the objects floating down in the river and thinking which ones might have come from my household apart from the poop and the ashes of dead people from Pashupati.
Like any other day, I had my earphones dug deep into my ears and I was listening to “If its love by Train” which is my current favorite. I saw a disturbing scene. Yes, I saw a person poop. How disgusting could that be? Worse, I try to divert my eyes and I spot another person peeing. Such a way to start my day! “Thankyou god!” I thought to myself!
What is wrong with our country? But again, as I was explaining the situation to my colleague at work, he told me when he was in India a few years back, people peeing wherever they wanted was a common sight. Is this happening because of illiteracy? But wait, don’t kids who are getting education in well known schools thrown sweet wrappers/ noodle packets out of the windows of their school busses?
The main problem for this is ignorance. We were never taught to do such things but we end up doing the wrong thing.
I am not calling myself an environmentalist because I too at times throw things openly. Not always but sometimes. My sister who got married some years back built a beautiful mansion in Sanepa. The beautiful house stinks like a toilet. Even they cant stay there anymore!
We should all get hand in hand with the environment conservation. That reminded me, if you are a How I met your mother fan, you will know how much Marshall wants to save the environment. In the latest episode form the 6th season, he even quits his well paid job as a banker to work for the environment as an intern. This is what he says that made a heavy impact on me! And, I googled it! :]
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (or as Marshall puts it, “Garbage Island”) is a swirling mess of bottles, bags, toys, packaging and plastic trash from all corners of the Earth forming an enormous plastic whirlpool in the North Pacific.“Discarded water bottles from Iowa, takeout containers from New York City, flip-flops from California and plastic debris from the world over make their way from land into storm drains, streams, rivers and other waterways.” The plastic is carried out to sea, where it gets trapped by a vortex of currents to form a giant, floating trash dump. Seabirds, turtles, and other marine mammals mistake the floating plastic for food and ingest it, filling their stomachs with bottle caps, cigarette butts and fishing lures instead of food, ultimately causing them to starve. Scientists estimate that around the world, up to one million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and sea turtles die each year from eating plastic.
This is just an example of the Pacific Ocean.
Similar things happen in Nepal.
No matter how much people try to create one day cleaning campaign in Bagmati, one day wont make a difference. You need time and effort for this. That doesn't mean you save today's work for tomorrow. Start today and let your children be healthy!
Take Initiative today.
No comments:
Post a Comment