日本語↓Today was a very unexpected Green Bird! Over the last week or so, a number of people just seemed to find the Green Bird Page, and the event numbers grew beyond my expectation! We also had around 10 people register outside of Facebook, including some people who showed up on the day without registering. At first it was a bit chaotic, but in the end we got going and our multicultural team of volunteers started their cleaning in Hyde Park. It's a place that often looks a lot cleaner than it is (as we discovered), and as usual the volunteers focused on both rubbish big and small to send a message to the city's residents about their responsibility when it comes to waste disposal. Our youngest participant was 4 years old, and he worked very hard on picking up as many small pieces of rubbish as possible, such as those pesky soy sauce containers (the fish shaped ones and their red lids are a particular issue in terms of microplastics - kind of ironic how many 'fish' parts are ending up in Sydney Harbour). In the end, we didn't have time to walk around Circular Quay to collect items, but we continued to collect all the way up until the Quay, with one bag overflowing and spilling due to being too full - that just goes to show how dedicated our members are. Today we had volunteers from Australia, Japan, Korea, Brazil, Vietnam and possibly other places that I didn't know about. If we continue to have turn outs like this, we will need to order more tools! Look out for next month's clean up. I'm planning to return again to the beach or a suburban area such as Chatswood.
今日は色々な意味で想像を超えたグリーンバードでした！まず、登録者が活動日の数日前からいきなり増え続けて、道具が足りないことが分かったのでボランティアがチームを組んで二人でお掃除するようにすすめました。当日キャンセルとまた当日登録せずに来た方もいたから、最初はバタバタしていて、グループの出発が遅かったのですが、道具をボランティアに配ったりいっぱいになったゴミ袋を捨てたりしてくれた常連のボランティアさん達にいつも感謝しています！結局は年齢も国籍も多様性に富むグループでした！60代のお母様たちから4歳の男の子まで参加してくれた中、オーストラリアと日本はもちろん、韓国、ベトナム、ブラジル、そして他の国籍を持った方もいたと思います。ハイドパークを中心に活動がはじめ、予想以上にゴミが植物の下に眠ったりしていましたね。皆様が頑張って掃除してくれたおかげでその事実が明らかになり、こんな観光地でも市がちゃんと清掃に取り組んでいないことにがっかりしました。最近プラゴミによるシドニー湾の公害について記事を読んだし、どんなに小さい欠片でもプラゴミを拾う大切さを再度確認できました。環境のためにわざわざ週末にボランティアをしに来てくれた皆様、本当にありがとうございます！私たちを見た人たちはきっと少しでもゴミ問題について考えさせられたと思います。また来月の活動を楽しみにしております!
