I have nothing bad to say about the traditional lei or even about the lame 20th century bastardizing of that tradition as a way to promote tourism. I just think that there is absolutely no reason for the existence of plastic leis. The traditional materials used to make leis are renewable, biodegradable and abundant.
I work at home. I had already been working at home for a couple of years before I started trying to seriously reduce my plastic consumption. I had forgotten all about office parties until last night when we were invited to a party at the school where our kids are learning French.
If I was writing a details oriented blog like FakePlasticFish, I would have compiled a list of the plastic items that I personally used at the party. I chose instead to push aside my principles and try to enjoy myself. After a good night’s sleep, I have a few things to say about plastic and parties.
If your office has semi-regular gatherings, then reusable plates, glasses and cutlery might save money in the long run. For purposes of comparison, I took a look at Walmart (shudder). Ten reusable (still plastic) plates cost about seven dollars while twenty-five disposable plates cost about six bucks. Once the reusable plates have been washed twice, you start saving money. If you are trying hard to impress somebody, consider renting dinnerware. I saw a price of sixty cents per piece on the first site that I checked.
My other suggestion is to forgo those noisemakers that you blow on. Nobody is likely to miss them.
I was really happy to see a special report on the Chicago Tribune website detailing Trine Tsouderos’ efforts to live without plastic. The timing couldn’t be more perfect. People are looking around for something to resolve as New Years Day approaches.
On closer inspection, it seems that her experiment is not as inspirational as I had hoped it would be. I still loved reading it, and the minutia of her failure effectively highlights how ridiculously ubiquitous plastic has become. Sorry I can’t help but use really big words when I think a real journalist might read my blog 
Recognize these?
If you received new clothing for Christmas, you probably had to snip/chew your way through a few of these. Many used clothing stores don’t use them. New clothing stores buy Tagger Tail Fasteners in packs of 5000 for about ten bucks. A piece of string could conceivably serve the same purpose, but tagger guns with plastic fasteners reduce labor. My mom used to buy me plaid shirts wrapped in plastic at Woolworths. My kids prefer to buy their own clothes and buy used more often than new.
I am not convinced that buying used clothing is the best choice with regard to the environment and social justice. The global clothing industry is a very complicated monster with a lot of sad stories. Buying durable clothing and caring for it well seems like the best way to go. Increasing the demand for organic, fair trade and/or sweatshop free clothing can only help matters.
One my favorite things about reading blogs is that they are a window on the world. That being said, I have occasionally ended up at one of two ends of a particular brand of frustration. I try to blog about practical solutions to the problem of plastic, but sometimes these solutions can be difficult or impossible for people living outside of my local region to implement (in my case that’s about 100% of my readers). The situation also happens the other way around.
If you have arrived here looking for practical ways to reduce your consumption of plastic, I welcome you wholeheartedly and I promise that you will find lots of useful information. I can’t tell you where to pick up some cardboard packaged razor blades or bulk tea.
When I find the right widget, I plan to embed a little map displaying plastic-free blogs. Until then I can quickly link to blogs that would qualify as local for several million people:
Many of the best solutions for the planet are local solutions.
I have had this glass bottle of shaving cream for a few months now and I can say without a doubt that it is adequate for its intended purpose. I can’t say the same for the brush that I bought at the same time. The synthetic bristles had been poorly glued to the handle and it fell apart after only a few uses (can you say Made in China?). I am keeping my eye out for a better one, but I have discovered that the shaving cream can be applied and lathered with just my fingers.
I am not reducing my plastic consumption very much with this purchase. Conventional shaving cream cans usually have a plastic cover and nozzle. The best reason to choose products in glass jars is that these containers are very reusable. There may come a time when we have too many glass jars in our house, but it still a long way off. Besides using them for storing homemade condiments, we also them for spices, sugar and tea.
I have been living in furnished apartments and houses for several years. This means that I have often been using the plastic things that my landlord chose to supply. My most recent move was to what must be the least furnished of the four different places in question. Rather than a plastic garbage can, I found that there was no garbage can. Rather than a plastic dish drainer I found that there was no dish drainer.
The garbage can required quick thinking. A moving box had to fill in for the first evening. The next day, I found a store that sells used metal containers. I bought the perfect sized metal canister for the equivalent of about two bucks. I made a handle on the top using a wine cork and a screw.
The dish drainer hasn’t presented itself yet. Stainless steel drainers are available, but they are expensive and the ones that I have seen in the shops are Chinese and not that sturdy looking. We have been resorting to using a towel on top of the drain board. It works, but it precludes leaving the dishes to air dry. I am thinking about building a simple version of the IKEA drainer pictured here…
I was just on a short vacation to the Sahara Desert. The plastic litter that I encountered there did not come as a surprise. I didn’t take any pictures of garbage. I don’t take very many pictures when I travel because overuse of the camera tends to filter the experience. I actually only took about twenty photos, just enough to document things for the children. The kids enjoyed our overnight trek enormously.
Water bottles were the most common litter hands down.
When I started searching for information about pollution and litter in the Sahara the first thing that I found had nothing to do with the Sahara. A blogger who is on the crew of an oceanic research vessel compared the idea of cleaning up the North Pacific Gyre to sifting the Sahara.
The second item that caught my attention was written by someone who was crossing a scary war torn section of the vast desert. She mentioned litter, but it was the least of her worries. Land mines present a more immediate danger than a few bajillion discarded water bottles.
We did not cross any borders on our trip, but we were in a border region. There were long stretches of road that were lined with makeshift gas stations. Libyan petroleum sells for a fraction of what Tunisians pay within their country.
These gas stands were typically nothing more than a hut made out of pallets and sheet metal with stacks of plastic containers piled up in front. Here is a photo taken by the people who write Yacht Strummer…
This business model uses a lot of plastic, but I am also concerned about the soil contamination from spilled gasoline.
I spent a few minutes thinking about how I could give someone a present that would be appreciated AND would potentially result in the recipient using less plastic. Cloth bags are a bit boring and obvious, but they could be thrown in with more thoughtful gifts. The strategy that I am proposing is to find non-plastic items that have that ‘last one you will ever own’ kinda thing going on.
I am not overly active as a handyman and I have lost count of how many cheap plastic utility knives I have had in the past. A high quality knife has more than just durability going for it. Carefully engineered and well balanced tools are safer to use. I am pretty sure that most of the engineering that goes into plastic utility knives involves minimizing production costs. I am sure there are also people on your list who think that quality tools are beautiful. Giving such a person an instructional book about making toys or garden furniture out of wood could conceivably result in fewer plastic toys and plastic patio tables finding their way into the ecosystem.
If you have a loved one who uses the kitchen to express themselves, you can use the same basic idea for a gift for them. Find something that is of high quality that replaces disposable (or remarkably less durable) items that as often as not contain a lot of plastic.
I think the best gifts for music and/or movie enthusiasts are available as legal online downloads. Online media uses infinitely less plastic than cds and dvds and your gift could save young people from a life of piracy (yeah, right).
Plastics have recently replaced natural rubber for many of the uses that it had been put to since Europeans first got interested in the stuff back in the 1700’s. 42% of the rubber that is produced worldwide is natural, the rest is synthesized from petroleum. Of that 42%, a small fraction is Fair Trade certified rubber. This stuff is made into sporting goods and condoms and marketed to obsessively ethical consumers. I think it would be pretty cool if a significant portion of the plastics that are being produced and consumed could be replaced with biodegradable, responsibly produced rubber. I do not know how possible this is. I would rather have a rubber raincoat than a plastic one. Everyone who reads Mother Jones knows that I don’t use condoms, but if I did I might consider using Fair Trade Condoms. As an interesting side note, the guy who brought rubber back from the New World to Portugal and showed it off got charged with witchcraft.
