Pollution

I just spent a great weekend in Ain Draham, where I got fresh air in my lungs, and escaped the excessive smoking habits of my fellow Tunisians... This particular small town (village?) in the north of the country is really green, mountainous (so I got to do some hiking/trekking), and overall soothing.

Now, trust me when I say that I am not always complaining or whinning... Really, it is not in my nature, but again, please view my questions or venting as a way of understanding my surroundings... A way to comprehend what is going on, because that is my nature. I need to understand why people do the things they do.

So, to get back to the subject. During the hike, while enjoying the beautiful cork oak trees, I start seeing empty beer cans... So just for "fun" and to see the extent of this disaster, we start counting the cans while climbing. Within the short span of 30 minutes, we hit 50 cans, and honestly I just had to stop because it was depressing me... Understand that this area, in the north of Africa gets snow, is very green, and very unique in its landscape (you will see the pictures I took very soon)... Nothing that the average european/american can understand (they always thing of tunisia a sandy landscape, not a mountainous green one). In my eyes, we have something precious and beautiful that we need to take care of, to preserve and to be proud of.

How do some show this pride? By filling the freakin forest with cans of beer, sardines, yogurt, and harissa. WTF? Why can't you f*cking drunken bastard collect your trash after you leave? Why must you litter the place? Why can't the municipality do something about this?

This is a problem on 2 levels: i) the stupid selfish third-worldish mentality and ii) the quasi non-involvement of the municipality... Now, the mentality, god knows when or if it will change to understand the consequences of its actions on mother nature... The municipality on the other hand, I WILL do something about. So I took pictures of all the littered dirty places, will write to the newspaper, the guy in charge of the city, the mo'tamdya, the gouvernorat, and the ministry of environment.

Perhaps it will be a waste of time, a small insignificant thing to whoemenver, but frnakly, I will feel better, because at least I did something, I did not just take the fatalistic attitude of "it's a shame, but what can you do?".... There is always something you can do, and if after the first try nothing happens, I will keep on writing, and harassing, until my voice is heard...

So there.