For our Earth Day celebration, Supercross08 worked with Yo Ho Hostel to organize the best beach clean up that Varna, Bulgaria has ever seen! The just-hearted folks that run Yo Ho Hostel are constantly involving themselves in environmental projects! They even have plans to clean the beach again after the tourist season - no Earth Day necessary! Together, we set out to inspire people to take responsibility for their community!
We started off the day at 10 AM with about 25 people. Most of them came from the group of girls I wrote about in the previous posting. 25 isn't a lot. But as the day went on, we were joined by the Bulgarian Scouts, passers by, EVS (European Voluntary Services) and Peace Corps Volunteers, as well as other late risers! It was an extremely successful action! For nearly six hours we filled bag after bag after bag, until the beach was clean! Garbage bags were provided by a local trash company called Adian, and the Bulgarian Scouts brought along some gloves for people to use! The Bulgarian Scouts are like the Boy Scouts of America, but they include girls! Take note, BSA, tolerance, respect, and integration are fine values to instill upon youth in addition to tying knots!
We cleaned about a mile of coastline that hasn't yet been "purchased" by someone to open a club or a bar. Of course, the majority of the waste we collected was leftover from the nearby, already existing bars and clubs. For me, this is a sign of irresponsibility on the part of tourists, clients, bar/club owners, and particularly the local government for failing to enforce regulations.
The "undeveloped" beach (the part without bars or clubs) has a nice pedestrian walkway. Pedestrians, often unwillingly, share it with cars as it runs the length of the beach. It's located about 40 or 50 meters from the water - the only thing separating the two, is sand. While collecting pollution from near the walkway, I continued to encounter construction debris. This was because of two things: 1) the walkway is being widened and 2) new bars/clubs are being developed. I asked one of the guys from Yo Ho Hostel whether we should be cleaning up their garbage, as they were still about, or should we leave it for them to throw away when they finish. His response was, "It doesn't matter who you ask or whose responsibility it is, everyone will tell you that it's someone else's job to clean this." Later in the day, I roped myself into a conversation with Kiril Yordanov, the mayor of Varna who has to have all his decisions approved by the Bulgarian mafia, though rumor has it he's allowed to take potti breaks and order from a menu on his own accord. I asked him about this destructive phenomenon. He competently answered, "Responsibility? What's that?"It's a bit frustrating that most of the stuff we were finding came from existing, nearby establishments who are unwilling and uninterested in helping maintain the natural health of the environment. One would think that upon bestowing the perspective that it's more appealing for clientele to come to a nice place rather than one with litter all about, it would be enough to influence an owner to be responsible for the area around their establishment. Well, One is wrong! It's just a little glimpse at the bigger picture of how Bulgaria deals with environmental issues. It screams of careless, unsustainable practices as it yields a quick profit in the short term for a select few people who are "connected", and loads of problems for the rest of the community in the long term.
If I hadn't spent the day with optimistic, willing-to-help, responsible people, even I would lose hope for Bulgaria! Fortunately, these promising agents of change are the youth of this country. Meaning, they're tomorrow's leaders. And fine leaders they'll prove to be, too! They have the morale character that allows for the benefit of the many, and they have the aptitude needed to be able to influence others to do good! They are the solution to Bulgarias problems! Just so long as they stay out of Bulgarian politics!
As we spent the day saving the world, it was fun and entertaining to receive the reactions of people walking by. The looks on their faces ranged from 'What are you doing?' or 'Why bother?' to 'Gee wiz, you guys are great!' and 'Can I help?' It was the positive reactions that I found inspiring and hopeful. This community is well ready for positive change. They just lack adequate political leadership to guide them.At the end of the day, we celebrated with a concert! One of the owners of Yo Ho Hostel is the lead singer of a band called "Pizza" and they played a rockin' show that night! Ending a positive day with positive energy is my idea of success!
4 comments:
did the Kmet really say that? That seems pretty extreme, even for there. I miss you, A!
K!
Ha Ha! Koubi!!! C'mon! That was a reference to lyric from an MxPx song.
When facing entrenched corruption, there are usually only three real alternatives: (1) clean-up by an outside power (e.g. FBI busting Congressman for bribery); (2) clean-up by internal forces (e.g. reformers or organized resistance by those oppressed by corruption); or (3) clean-up by the market (making corruption unprofitable so the criminals move to different endeavours).
Of these, it seems like (1) is impossible when corruption is endemic at every national level, unless the international community comes in and forces change, which will probably be resisted for nationalist reasons and in any event will probably be superficial. The problem with (2) is that typically the type of support organization that would be effective to fight such entrenched and organized corruption is, itself, basically a form of government. The organizational channels have already thus been subverted. From what you've said, cultural expectations about government's role make (3) difficult as well -- Bulgarians expect the government to be large and intrusive.
Which of these, or which alternative methods, do you see as having the best chance of success? Personally, I favour method #3. To paraphrase Frederic Bastiat, when the government's function is confined only to protecting liberty, rather than controlling or distributing great wealth, there will be no great profit to lure corrupt individuals to try to control it.
Hoo-Whee! That's a doozy of a question!
Well sir, for the time being, I think that the only effective cleanups in this country are those such as our beach cleanup. I say this because it has a greater effect on the mentality of the participants and the observers than it could ever have on the beach and the environment. And in all reality, the change of mentality for Bulgarians is the only thing that will save them from this peril.
(1) A cleanup by outside power happened when communism fell. No positive result. (2) A cleanup by inside 'power' exists in the form of a television show that exposes corrupt officials. This is sort of a reality TV show that directly identifies who's involved and how. No result. There's no recourse because judges are paid off to acquit everything. (3) A marketing cleanup 'exists' in the form of a campaign to bring back the Bulgarians who have left the country in search of opportunity. They're promised incentives, which aren't met.
I wish one of these three things would be powerful enough to right what's wrong in this ailing nation. But even with all three things combined, Bulgarians are fighting a tough, tough uphill battle.
From some people I've spoken with, it seems that Bulgarians are waiting for something of a messiah to lead them from their woes. Unfortunate. And again we're back to "the buck not stopping."
In my opinion, the single greatest thing that could have the best chance of success is a change of mentality. But the methods for such an accomplishment, on the scale that's needed, are extremely complex. My hippie ideals tell me that grassroots efforts such as beach cleanups will act like an infection and spread throughout the country. But seeing a result from something like this will take years.
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