So, this post is way overdue. Four weeks to be exactly. As you may have noticed I took a little break from writing articles. By the end of August I got stuck in one of my AD(h)D spirals, which caught me completely by surprise because I hadn’t had one for several years while I was healing myself from all other health issues that had been going on. Luckily, I’m a tiny bit older and wiser now, so I knew how to deal with it: I cut everything unnecessary out of my schedule. I spent the month of September mostly offline, I didn’t write anything – except for the notes I scribble down to clear my head – and did not post anything on Instagram. I enjoyed that period very much and needed some time to readjust to my less frazzled head. But here I am again.
Over the past months not much has been added to the list of adjustments we made on our minimal waste journey. To get right to the point: we replaced our broken plastic containers with glass ones, we replaced our worn out plastic dishwashing brushes with wooden ones, and we replaced our trash cans. We used to have a 30 liter bin for plastic and a 20 liter bin for other trash which lasted us for several weeks upto a month, but over the hot summer months we would find maggots in them only a couple of days after we replaced the bin liner. Not nice at all. So we got ourselves some new ones and now we have two tiny 6 liter bins that get us through the week.
We also found out that it’s not that difficult to stick to our minimal waste goals on vacation. It saves a lot of waste when you sit down for your coffee or food and it makes it even more enjoyable. It gives a perfect opportunity to observe the world around you, which is the main reason for me to travel to another country. If I didn’t feel like seeing something new, there would be no point in traveling at all. I might as well stay in my own city. On the campsite I found it a bit more difficult. Even though we brought a cooler with us, it’s not like you can keep things for more than a couple of days. But that forced us to get more creative. So some days I would eat leftover dinner for breakfast, or we would eat yogurt and bread for dinner because it was about to expire. The coffee and tea part we got completely down, though. Matthijs has a percolator and I brought my loose leaf tea and reusable tea filter, so no waste except for the ground coffee and tea leaves.
That’s it for this three month update. If you’re curious why we started this journey, click here. Or like to learn more about what we did in the first six months, click here and here. And as always: if you have any suggestions, please leave them in the comments. I’d love to hear from you.
