World Cleanup Day

Wednesday, 23 September 2020

Last Sunday, we held our very first cleanup event in conjunction with World Cleanup Day.

What’s World Cleanup Day you ask? Well, the idea began in the small northern European country of Estonia in 2008. 50,000 people united to clean up the entire country in just five hours, and on that day, a global bottom-up civic movement was born. It spread like wildfire around the globe and captured the imaginations of people worldwide. 11 years later, this simple idea has grown into a global movement with millions of volunteers and partners worldwide coming together to rid our planet of trash, cleaning up litter and mismanaged waste from our beaches, rivers, forests, and streets.

Why do it? Because anyone can pick up trash. It’s as simple as that. And isn’t it always the smallest actions that lead to the biggest impact? Schools, corporations, government officials; the old, the young, the rich, the poor, the able and less able – everyone and anyone can contribute. Because it’s on us to make our planet a better place. So that’s exactly what we did.

We picked. We sorted. We audited. And here’s what went down:

Armed with our gloves and trash bags, a group of 24 of us made it our mission that morning to clean up the surrounding streets of Titiwangsa Park, located in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. As we made our way around the park, it became evident that the most concerning waste item was none other than cigarette butts—we couldn't even walk 5 steps without spotting one on the ground. 

Auditing the trash we collected was just as important as the act of picking up the trash itself, which is why we used an app called Clean Swell to audit the trash we picked up. We also separated recyclables from general waste, which we collected in semi-transparent bags vs generic black bags.

After a fun and sweaty 2 hours of walking and bending and squatting and picking, we added up the numbers and boy, were they shocking. Drum roll please...

A huge thank you to all our amazing volunteers who showed up and sacrificed a few hours of extra shut-eye on a weekend to help make our streets and our city a cleaner place.

Missed out on last week's cleanup? Join us this weekend at our beach cleanup in partnership with Orale.
Details below: