the sanitation officers

Twice a day, five days a week, the familiar dinging of Beethoven’s Fur Elise drifts through the sliding doors of our apartment. Neighbours rush outside bearing their official, powder-blue, Taipei-City garbage bags, filled with the day’s trash. In hordes they hustle down the streets to meet the long foray of rubbish trucks. In our apartment we tend not to ‘hustle’; mostly because we never quite adjusted to the system, and usually let our rubbish live with us until it becomes unbearable. Eventually (and it is always a spectacle), we load ourselves up with our copious, oversized bags, baskets of beer cans, and kilos upon kilos of frozen food scraps. Like donkeys we herd down the three flights of stairs, out into the street, and around the corner. From time to time our incompetence has sparked the empathy of our neighbours, who kindly offer to lighten our load.

Personally, I am not afraid of the trash, but of THE SANITATION OFFICERS, who not only drive, but guard the rubbish trucks. These watchdogs are the main reason I evade this nightly event, which for some locals is the social high point of their day. The Sanitation Officers have taught me: the official garbage bags are not just official, but mandatory; waste must be separated into general trash, paper, bottles, food scraps, and unidentifiable things; not every day is bottle recycling day; I choose the wrong truck because I am an illiterate; and some trash I will have to take back to my apartment. Without their help I have learnt just how long maggots take to breed in the tropics. Sanitation Officers are licensed to fine any offenders who don’t separate their trash properly, and in my opinion, the stench from the trucks makes them testy. As a foreigner, I am considered an ignoramus, so they tend to just yell at me, and angrily gesture that I: STEP-AWAY-FROM-THE-TRUCK! I am then grudgingly allowed return to my apartment with bits of my trash.

On a good night, the kindly junk collectors are passing by - they are the toothless, cart-pullers hidden under rice hats that like trash. They at least, are ever willing to lighten my load of styrofoam, cardboard, and plastic bottles!


.cardboard collector (photo: nicole simes)