No plastic bags? Oh please!
What about eggs and
household cleaning products in plastic containers; mineral water in plastic
bottles; and fruits, vegetables, fish and meat products in plastic bags?
I took my kids to a
restaurant for lunch last Sunday. We enjoyed a wonderful array of dishes –
crispy roasted chicken, Hainanese chicken rice and asam pedas fish. Since we
could not finish our food, I requested the waiter to tapau it for us and he
gladly obliged.
As we walked towards
the cashier, the waiter handed us a plastic bag with the plastic food container
of our leftovers. I thanked him and got ready to make my payment. At this
point, the cashier informed me that she would be adding 20 sen to my bill for
the plastic bag. I was confused for a moment wondering which day of the week it
was.
“Today is Sunday,
right? I didn’t know Sunday was a no plastic bag day in KL,” I said.
“We don’t encourage
plastic bags here. Every plastic bag for any day of the week would cost you 20
sen,” the cashier explained.
I quickly removed the
container from the plastic bag and handed it back to her.
“I won’t be needing
the plastic bag then,” I said.
As she nodded and
proceeded to process our payment, I asked why the restaurant was using plastic
containers for takeaways if they did not support the use of plastic. She did
not bother to answer my question.
This is my beef with
the “No Plastic Bag” campaign. The usage of plastic bags is often equated with
the destruction of the environment – it piles up in landfills, blocks drainage
systems, causes floods, contaminates the oceans, kills marine life. But how
about other plastic products we use so freely every single day?
Just the other day I
ate at a fast food restaurant and was shocked at how many plastic materials I
had used in my half hour there. Plastic spoon and plastic cup for my Sundae,
plastic cover for my porridge, plastic straw for my drink and mini plastic
saucers for the various condiments my meal came with.
How much good are the
recyclable bags we now use when shopping for groceries when we purchase eggs in
plastic containers; mineral water in plastic bottles; beauty, hygiene and
cleaning products packaged in huge plastic containers; and let us not forget
the fruits, vegetables, fish and meat products we place in plastic bags.
The truth is, almost
everything we purchase comes packaged in plastic. So why do we single out the
use of plastic bags as the main culprit causing destruction to the environment?
Aren’t these “evil”
plastic bags one of the most reused items in our households? I don’t know about
you, but I use them for almost everything – for packing food items in the
fridge, organising things in drawers, for storing dirty laundry when
travelling, packing trash and even as shoe bags. As one of the most reused
items in our households, should we not be celebrating the use of plastic bags
instead of condemning it?
Perhaps those who
decide to ban the usage of plastic bags should get themselves a weighing scale
to determine the weight of one plastic bag and figure out how many plastic bags
are needed to cause a significant impact on the environment.
If you ask me, the
weight of all those plastic bags used over one whole year is not even
comparable to the weight of all those products packaged in plastic we put into
our shopping trolleys at the supermarket.
The authorities should stop all this CRAP about the usage of plastic bags. All hyped-up for nothing. If it so damaging then all plastic materials might as well be abolished! There are solutions - use of paper bags and a NEW invention -
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