WHAT DO ECOBRICKS AND LEGO SETS HAVE IN COMMON?

Acknowledgement to plasticgeneration.com

   THEY BOTH BUILD HOUSES!

       I am protesting about living in year 2020. I have stayed home so much, I am sprouting roots. Ahh, a selfish me ruminating and hyperventilating about nothing. Yeah, everyone stayed home too and just got on with life, so I shouldn't be chanting and ranting like a sour lemon. 

         So besides training Thory not to mark his territory all over the house, qigong practices and online meetings, I have been getting on with an unusual project - filling 1.5 litre plastic bottles with plastic to make ECOBRICKS.        

  This is a project with LIONS Club Petaling Jaya Metro, a part of LIONS CLUBS INTERNATIONAL GLOBAL CAUSE ON ENVIRONMENT.  Ecobricks are recycled building blocks from waste that would have otherwise polluted the Earth. Plastics generally biodegrade slowly, sitting around looking dirty. 

        Recycling plastics into “bottle bricks” as building materials? Hmm, I must have fallen behind the times as these "friendly" bricks have already been used in houses, wells and even furniture in Philippines and Indonesia. HOW INGENIOUS! So I have been busy collecting my plastic wastes     instead of adding them to polluting Earth.

   A quick wash of the ones from food packages,     drying 'em with my washing 

          and stuffing them tightly into plastic bottles. I push them in tightly with chopsticks. I am still stuffing this bottle after 4 days. I have learnt that plastics can really be compressed!

 

HOORAY, I just started my second ecobrick. 

These packets will all be stuffed into the bottle by next week when the contents are emptied.

Two bottles of mine almost up to weight.

Another three ecobricks from Lion Shirley Koh.

It’s not just squeezing and stuffing, the process follows weight requirements too. 

  Firstly, I am shocked how much of my food is wrapped in plastic – 

all frozen stuff, choc bars, bread. Secondly, I thought I could fill a bottle really quick but it is amazing how much plastic I need to reach the 500 g requirement. So I am still stuffing and pushing daily. My end result – many stuffed ecobricks instead of stuffed turkeys before Christmas!

My little contribution is NOT going to make or shake the world. 

But I'll be happy if my plastic bricks form a corner stone in someone's house.    

 

     Acknowledgement to Mystartr: Crowdfunding in Malaysia for this picture.