Aoife Blog #7

After tracking my moves for 48 hours and reflecting on the amount of waste I felt horrible. I didn't do much in the days I tracked but still realized after and even while I was recording my moves how much I waste. It was hard to write down detail by detail what I threw out on a daily base. It's frustrating to see how much waste one person can produce even on minimal days. I usually eat out and during school I walk around the corner and buy something from Starbucks or Dishes just by getting lunch you produce a lot of waste. Dishes especially gave huge plastic bags for the small container I had and napkins and a wrapped plastic fork and knife. I felt like it was a lot of waste for the small amount of food I had and saw how they do the same packaging for all customers and there are so many. After I ordered I took the food on my way to my next class, ate quickly and tossed out the unused knife bag etc. Dishes should use recycled or degradable packaging and should have a station by the door where they can grab what they need so there much less waste. And for the times I have eaten in store there should be a recycling trash option. I also realized I order more than I eat. I went to Starbucks and ate with my friends a few times and didn't touch most of what I ordered. The Starbucks bread I took a bite and tried to save it for later (knowing I was tracking myself) but never ate it. I realized I should order smaller portions or only when I'm very hungry and know I will eat everything I order. It's foolish waste! I opened some packages and made sure to recycle all the packaging. There was so much access and unnecessary plastic and cardboard!

If I wasted so much in my simple life in 48 hours I can't imagine the abundance of waste stores produce. It's really a scary and angry thought. When stores bring in new merchandise the amount of waste in the packaging seems just ridiculous. Dishes and Starbucks were just two restaurants where I took food To go but imagine the amounts of restaurants and customers in the city that need their food on the go and how much waste there is in the packaging. I really didn't touch half of the utensils they gave me. After my 48 hours I realize every day without noticing every person wastes SO much. Some more than others and obviously but even it's not obvious we're still wasting too much. I feel if humans waste so much plastic and paper there is an abundance of material already made and ready to be reused. There really shouldn't be a demand for new paper and mostly plastic. There should be a lot more products made out of recycled materials. Things we use and pass by daily that is made from plastic should really be recycled. There's more than enough to reuse. So there can be use for these materials and a huge reduce in waste. Schools and buildings and stores should all make a larger push for recycling cans. Displayed everywhere so it's in everyone's face and makes it that much harder to not ignore the change to reuse. This brings me back to idea I had about new innovations in fashion and furniture with 3D printing but to integrate recycled plastics only and I believe in this more now and believe it's really the only way to produce anything plastic is with recycled materials.

By Aoife Guiteras