The Great Scandinavian Garbage Gyre: Denmark has a littering problem.
You've all heard about the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre? You know, the massive flotilla of mostly plastic waste that has swirled into a Quebec-sized island of trash lurking just below the surface of the Pacific Ocean?
I found one here. It's called Copenhagen.
When I first saw the veritable heaps of garbage surrounding Sunday park goers having a little relax on the lawn of the King's Gardens, I thought... well that's a shame. Some garbage has blown out of a dumpster and those poor people have no where else to sit.
Not the case. Not the case by a long shot.
No where else have I seen people so perfectly oblivious to the fact that they are little better than swine wallowing in their own filth. It's like they don't even notice the ankle-deep trash and used-tampon smell of their public parks.
Hohoho! It's just another partially cloudy and barely warm day in good old Copenhagen, time for a trip to the store to get a flat of disgusting beer and to display ourselves in all our smarmy splendour out at the public park! Litter? What litter? You mean the world is not my personal garbage can? But whatever can you be talking about? Us Danes, we're so green and we all ride bikes everywhere! What's not to love?
Oh sure, they love the earth in theory. They love talking about how much they love the earth. But somehow they remain disturbingly ignorant of the widespread local blight that is their Sunday afternoon at the park.
Let's not even get started on public drunkenness and all the glory following that life choice. If you're brave enough to bike out on Sunday morning, you'll encounter puke splatters, broken bottles, mountains of cigarette butts outside of every pub, and if you're really feeling courageous, you can head over to Sankt Hans Torv where its likely a group of young aspiring alcoholics are still out there smashing bottles, peeing in the fountain, and breathing their rotten-jam cigarette breath all over the church square.
Seems a little sacrilegious, but in Denmark, it's all about FREEDOM. No other country knows what real freedom is. They're so free here, they can spend all night and day in a pool of their own vomit and no one will arrest them for public drunkenness! Hoo hah!
The first twitchings of this particular spleen vent started yesterday morning while biking to the start line of Jed's marathon. At first I thought there was some kind of riot in the streets because of all the trash, but nope, that's just collateral damage for Saturday night in dear old dannymark.
My twitchings started becoming pronounced around 8:57am when we noticed this fellow taking his morning piss in the 'CLEANEST HARBOUR ON EARTH--SO CLEAN THAT THERE IS AN OUTDOOR HARBOUR BATH LESS THAN 25 METERS AWAY!' We had previously observed a raging algae bloom near this harbour bath, and the probable cause was confirmed as we watched not one, not two, but dozens of dudes spouting proudly into the pristine Copenhagen Harbour in the span of 5 minutes.
Toilet with a view! BONUS
The twitching became full on convulsions when I went for a walk before dinner, entered the faelledparken, took one look, and turned back around.
I later decided to bring my camera to make this heinous habit public and shed some light on that ever so attractive 'the world is my personal trash bin' mentality we have going on here.
We are so clean in Denmark, biking everywhere! Remember the extra large bike tires so you can get through the 6-inch piles of trash everywhere!
Denmark--The country where there is enough garbage for everyone to enjoy.
Nothing out of the ordinary here, just taking a public pee and enjoying nature, surrounded by the wafting scent of half-masticated swine and regurgitated Carlsberg.
YAYDENMARK! Nothing more Danish the our beloved Dannebrog discarded with our afternoon waste. What littering problem?
HELP! I've fallen into my own pile of garbage and I can't get out!
The best part about Sunday Barbeques in the park is that YOU DON'T HAVE TO CLEAN UP AFTERWARDS!!! And open fires? Don't hesitate to burn your cut of swine right on the grass!
You see, this is not just an anomaly of nature. This is what the park looks like EVERY SINGLE TIME the Danes have more than 15 minutes of leisure time to spend. I ask you, how can you possibly NOT notice this problem?
As a closing remark, I leave you with this quote from another blog dealing with this problem:
“Littering is a MAJOR problem in Denmark, but most Danes do not believe it is. When people visit Denmark, they often remark how clean the streets are and how sparkling everything looks.
Well that may be the case, but it is only because there are hundeds of people hired to constantly clean up the streets. Danes do not think that throwing trash on the ground is wrong.
When a recent survery was done, people would remark: “If I throw trash on the ground, it will a person a job cleaning it up. I am helping someone keep a job!”