I remember the first time I saw the words ‘recycling’ and “landfill’ on some bins out in the neighbourhood. Somehow - the word ‘LANDFILL’ did something to my psyche and I had a pang of guilt putting the rubbish in it. Having that conscious reminder that it was going to be buried underneath the skin of our beautiful earth had an impact.
Things started to change at the Bindigenous (Bennett) house. We got chooks and a compost bin. I tried to avoid waste altogether (which is much harder than it sounds). We clean our soft plastic and put it in the soft plastic recycle bin at our local Coles. Woolies have them too.
I saw that the rubbish going into our bins greatly reduced. We could easily go months without putting our bins out.
So, I decided to paint my bins.
1 - it’s much nicer to look at than the ugly things we usually try to hide.
2 - it’s celebrating my culture. It’s worth celebrating.
3 - it’s another conscious or unconscious reminder that what I’m about to put in it. Could it have been avoided altogether?
My vision is for everyone to share my feelings about bins. That they don’t have to be used all that much. They can be beautiful and sit in our yards and brighten up the place 