Upcycling: Re-imagining Our Waste: Blog

Conserve India is an industrious upcycling business formerly based in Delhi, but now located in Bahadurgarh, Haryana, India. The Upcycling Portal posted an article about their work that you can read here. The organization also worked to try to upcycle waste from the 2010 Commonwealth Games which you can read more about here.

A few months ago I received this notice from Conserve about "Waste to Wealth" tours that the company was going to be hosting in and around Delhi. Here is what the notice says:

"A learning journey for the eco-minded tourist, the Waste to Wealth tour brings you through the process of how discarded plastic bags can be converted into high quality fashion products in a way that benefits both the environment and slum dwellers. Also experience firsthand the problems the ragpicking community face through a visit to a local slum."

Here are the highlights:

• SHOPPING! The tour package also includes a voucher for the Conserve Store, so make full use of it by purchasing the same fashion products strutting the runways in Europe!
  
• PLASTIC SORTING ACTIVITY Learn how to sort plastic the way ragpickers do - through bollywood stars! Try your hand at sorting the various plastics that go into creating high fashion bags sold all over Europe.
  
• VISIT TO LOCAL SLUM Gain and understanding of how local slum dwellers live - observe the ragpicking business that provides sustenance and watch how the women prepare rotis the traditional way for their families.

As someone who has hosted learning journeys before and has been faced with the many dilemmas that these kinds of experiences seem to unearth I have to say that this flyer deeply disturbed me. Though I recognize the importance of the innovative work that Conserve is doing I have long been challenged by the way that they continue to be deeply entrenched in the capitalist model and mode of operating. There are some aspects of their business that I deeply respect, like the fact that they are not importing higher quality garbage from other places for their bags. But I struggle with the glorification of the European fashionista dominion and their insistence on exportation.

Now the Waste to Wealth Tour may be taking things a step too far for my comfort level. I suppose what is most disturbing is that the first thing that the flyer highlights is SHOPPING! YAY! just what the world needs ... more consumption. Don't people realize that SHOPPING is what has gotten us into this waste mess in the first place. I'm all for making our own things from garbage and even selling (on a reasonable scale) upcycled products ... but if this is an educational experience intended to enlighten folks to the realities of slum life I can't imagine why you would want to make shopping one of the highlights. Any one else find this ironic?

Then there is the ever present moral dilemma of hosting this type of “reality tour” that takes (presumably privileged) tourists into slums, shantytowns and favelas around the world. I feel that it is important that people have a first hand experience of true poverty. It has changed my worldview for sure, but I guess without some space for deeper analysis about WHY people end up in this state of poverty it seems not only ineffective but actually offensive. There is something particularly difficult for me in the language of the flyer about “observing” or “watching the women prepare rotis” – as if these people were zoo animals or something. Not appropriate in my book!

Then of course there is the ever-present question of including “hands-on” activities in these kinds of tours. At Berkana we have had lots of conversations about the importance of including experiential activities in our learning gatherings or journeys. The issue that we continually bump up against is that most often the work that can be done in an hour or two by participants on a journey or tour is actually not useful for the project or local work. So, who does this experiential activity actually serve in the long run? I have my doubts about it serving either participants or local people.

Finally, after my visit to the dump two weeks ago I am thinking more about people who actually live from the garbage and how we could actually start to revalue and understand what it means to live this life. I think that to some degree Conserve India does do this. It is offering a more lucrative end to the process of sifting through garbage, which is a form of validating the work. But how can we take this even further? How can we really appreciate and see this profession as truly meaningful and noble? I am feeling more and more called to be in these questions with this particular segment of society.

This week I visited the dump. For all of my big talk about how much I love garbage and have a passion for trash, I am ashamed to say that I haven't been to a landfill since I was a kid. I had the opportunity to visit the municipal basurero of Oaxaca, located beside Colonia Renacimiento (the neighborhood of rebirth), because of my friends Jose Carlos and Aurelia. They started an organization called SiKanda (Solidaridad Internacional Kanda) that works with some of the folks that live in Renacimiento, the pepenadores. These are the hearty souls that sort through the thousands of kilos of trash that arrive at the dump every day and separate out materials that can be sold and recycled (or upcycled, I suppose).

I had been wanting to visit the basurero in Oaxaca for about a year and a half and to meet some of the pepenadores that I had heard so much about. I was very excited. But as we came around the corner and I saw that giant monstrous mountain of refuse I have to admit I felt a little overwhelmed. Like woah! Here it is, Aerin, right in your face. Poptab purses and magazine bowls are nice, but this is the real deal-i-o! Not a statistic, not a number on a page but a mountain of trash that I have been contributing to for the past two and a half years. WOAH! 

We visited the dump to do some work on a project building "eco-casas" for some of the pepenador families that live in a hodge podge collection of structures (mostly made out of sheet metal and concrete) right across from the massive pile. The houses that SiKanda and others are building are cool because they are made of trash. The structure is all new materials (wooden framing, Styrofoam-type roofing, prefab windows, etc) but the walls are made with tetrapak. Tetrapak is that aluminum lined cardboard that a lot liquids here in Mexico are sold in, most commonly, milk. So we were stapling opened, cleaned milk boxes to make the walls and then filling them with plastic bottles to give them a bit more strength. A couple of builders then wrap the whole house up with chicken wire, slap a couple coats of cement on it, paint it and voila! instant eco-house. 

Anyway, I have lots of reflections on that whole project ... but that's not what is most alive in me after my dump visit. What I am most interested in as a result of this experience is learning about people around the world that live and, at least to some degree, see that trash is their medium. It's what they work in. The idea that people can have pride in this work, is something that has just recently become clear to me (from a clip of a film called "Garbage Dreams" about trash pickers in Cairo). So these are people I'd like to talk with more. To get to know and to understand. Because I know that if I say that trash is my passion, I need to be ready and willing to deal with it in this, its rawest and most ominous form - en masse. 

I have to say that I was still intimidated by it all - the smells, the filth, the living conditions, and just the overwhelm of STUFF everywhere, stuff salvaged from the massive, buzzard magnet of a pile. But somehow these people have learned to navigate it, live from it and I am sure that it may be an interesting life, a totally distinct way of being and seeing things. Some of these families have been pepenedores for generations now. This is their trade. My question is what do we, the society at large, have to learn from this way of walking through the world? I believe that these kinds of people exist around the globe. I want to know them more.

The other thing I found so amazing is just the way that in their world the line between what is trash and what is not is utterly not present. The distinction seems almost impossible to know because garbage, of every type, is literally infused into everything around you - mixed into the dirt below your feet, filling the enormous plastic bags that line the little space around each family's home, it is EVERYWHERE! - gates made of the wire frame of a box spring. So that blurring of the line between what is garbage and what is not is also of utmost interest to me.

I had one final observation. Most of the houses I saw and visited seemed to me a series of chaotic piles of refuse. In some cases, trash was separated according to it's type. In others I saw no apparent system. And in the one house I actually entered this chaos continued. Valuable metal pieces or other things that might fetch a higher price on the market were stored inside. But the level of disorder remained the same.

But there was one house, a neat little place with flowers growing toward the back, in which everything was organized so well. The patio was open, even the remnants of grass seemed green to me, the enormous bags of recyclables stacked neatly against the fence. I looked at that and I thought: what are the conditions that instigated this one family to live in this way, while the rest seem to live in what appears to me to be a total mess! What does it take? How did it happen? Who are those people?

I know that my affiliation for the organized house is just related to my own anal retentiveness ... but putting aside all judgment ... I am just so curious about how one house out of hundreds ended up like this one. What makes the difference?

What else might I learn on my next visit to Colonia Renacimiento? I know for sure I'll be back out there to see what I can find out about rebirth in this incredibly intense environment.

Photos courtesy of SiKanda. See the full gallery of photos on the portal here.

I was not expecting the invitation that arrived in Berkana’s inbox late last year to give an upcycling workshop for 100 of Redken UK’s top clients. I still haven’t any idea how the company learned about our work to re-imagine trash but the practice fit well with the theme of their 2011 annual conference: Inspiring the Future. At first, I wasn’t sure about working with Redken, given that it is a big corporation that their profit generating activities do not likely include dumpster diving.

One of the key principles that we have been using within the Upcycling Initiative is to start with the waste we generate ourselves. So it was a little frustrating when our contacts at Redken UK explained that it would be impossible for conference participants or organizers to source waste for the workshop (given that they were flying from England). In the end we came up with a great solution upon considering the types of waste generated in this industry. Magazines are something found in nearly all salons and they are also a versatile and beautiful material to upcycle. Though we recognized the challenge of bring waste materials in bulk, we realized that if each participant brought one or two magazines that they were ready to get rid of we would end up 100 – 200 magazines.

The workshop in January was a personal challenge because magazines are not a medium I had worked with in the past. I had to learn two entirely new techniques in a few short months. The workshop included three projects – paper jewellery, baskets and bowls. The group of participants was divided into 15 teams of five, and there were five teams working on each of the three projects. The workshop was intended as a group-building session and to encourage collaboration between participants who did not formerly know one another. This made the experience fun for me since teambuilding dynamics are something that I enjoy hosting. I was available to offer tips and advice to participants during the hands-on portion of the workshop, but essentially I laid out a few guidelines and left the stylists up to their own devices to create something together. The “rules” included things like: work must be done collectively, a concrete product must be produced and there was a time limit of one hour. I also pointed out that teams had a limited set of tools to work with and I encouraged groups to make decisions about how they wanted to divide the labor and make the best use of materials before beginning.

I was pleasantly surprised when the majority of the people a) chose to participate in the workshop on the sunny rooftop of the hotel and b) were truly engaged in their teams and committed to creating things together from waste. Participants made necklaces and earrings adorned with the flowers from the tables, a beautiful bowl to hold a wine bottle, many baskets and bowls, and even an upcycled brassiere. At the end we took a few moments to reflect on the experience. Though it was a challenge to gather the energy on the rooftop, a few commented on the experience of working in teams, the importance of clear instructions. My impression was that the participants in the conference really enjoyed the experience, were happy to be let loose from the dungeon-like conference room, and that many genuinely worked together as a team. What impacted me the most, as it often does regardless of the audience, is the infinite creativity of human beings. Even in non-ideal circumstances, in which we fear that people may be more reserved or concerned about what others will think, our creative nature finds it’s way out.

There is another significant story related to the Redken work in San Diego that was as important, if not more, than the workshop itself. As I mentioned, I was somewhat concerned about the sourcing of magazines locally. Though we requested that the conference organizers communicate to the participants about bringing along a magazine or two, I knew there was little chance that we would have enough this way. About a week before leaving for California I did some research to find out if there was anything like the Re-Store in Berkeley (a place that collects and sorts waste of all kinds and sells it to artists, teachers and others). Though I didn’t find anything quite like that I came upon a woman by the name of Erin Pennell who owns a business called the Rare H.A.R.E. Studio. She does arts and crafts workshops with kids using trash. I wrote to Erin to find out if she knew where I might be able to track down a few hundred old magazines. Within the hour she had written back wanting to know more about the workshop, me, upcycling and the upcycling portal.

Erin said that she could likely track down the magazines, but that she would like to be able to participate in the workshop in return. Though it didn’t seem like that great of a deal at the time, I told her that it was kind of a “closed” event and so participating wasn’t really likely, but that she was welcome to come and help me out. I went to pick up the magazines and see the Rare H.A.R.E. and we had a great long discussion about the studio, her thoughts on upcycling property rights and patents and her dreams for the future. It was such a rich and great conversation and connection. I was reminded of the importance of finding strength and solidarity by meeting other practitioners and hearing their stories. Erin also basically saved my butt with the Redken folks. Because of a last minute change in the scheduling, we weren’t able to set up the space beforehand. During my brief presentation Erin and the hotel staff managed to get all of the magazines and materials out on the tables and ready for the participants. This was just another reminder of the principle: we have what we need. I never imagined that sending off one random e-mail inquiry would lead to the formation of a key relationship for the success of the event. But I am truly grateful to Erin for stepping up, supporting me in a somewhat unfamiliar and intimidating environment. I hope that we will stay in touch and that someday I might repay the favor.

Although this experience may not have had a lasting impact on the lives of 90 hairstylists from the U.K. and perhaps they did not start suddenly upcycling their rubbish, the experience was a successful one. It helped build my confidence and deepen my belief that human beings are creative and truly want to figure out a better way of living on this planet.

See more photos from the workshop in this gallery.

Español abajo . . .

As our little group of upcycling practitioners was just finishing our first big event together here in Oaxaca, we received the news about the Pepenafest, a 10-day long festival in Mexico's Distrito Federal focused entirely on the creative reuse of waste. In July we made a decision to participate in this huge event in Mexico City by hosting a booth and some workshops in the practices of upcycling in which we have some experience.

The idea behind this event was really exciting for me because although I had seen quite a bit of upcycling in fairs about “appropriate technology” or “sustainability” or “autonomous living¨ I had never been to, participated in, nor had I even heard of such a big event that lasted 10 entire days and ENTIRELY focused on working with waste as a resource.

It was a little difficult to find the common ground amongst those participating jointly in our small group which we called ¡Basura! ¡No más Basura! Probably because we are such a diverse group (you can read about the different participants in the other blogs in this section) and because we were not involved in a common project in the place that we lived, it was hard to figure out what was at the center of our group, our shared purpose or intention. In the end, I feel like we really went together more as a collection of individuals, each with our own expectations and ideas about what the Pepena would be mean to us. And in the end, I think that all of us had very distinct experiences based on our previous expectations.

The best part of our week in Mexico City for me was meeting other people for whom upcycling is their passion in life and who are working to make the practice more visible. I was particularly excited by the connection that we made with a group of young people using a community center-like space (the faro) that has existed for many years as their upcycling workshop. It really made me realize what a big advantage a physical space might be in this work and has inspired me to bring this virtual space down to earth (literally).

Omar, one of the guys from Recicl@rte giving a workshop on making wallets from tetrapack.

The other great part was just expanding my horizons about what's possible with new types of waste materials and this was an expectation that I really had for the Pepenafest. The slideshow I made highlights some of these great ideas, like the flower pots made from discarded tires and some of the tetrapack art. I was also excited to see some demonstrations of things I have thought of but haven't seen or tried out yet, like these curtains with plastic bottle caps:

I felt that the hands-on workshops were pretty basic, I didn't see any on practices that I had't heard of or seen before. But then again, a really big challenge for me during the fair was not being able to really fully participate in the event because we were kind of chained to the booth most of the time. If I had to do it over again, I might actually have just gone as a full participant for the 10 days.

There are two things that I would have done differently in terms of the organization of the Pepenafest. The first one is that I really would have tried to keep the focus on the creative use of waste, and not include the “Expo Alterna” which was more like a “natural/organic” marketplace. I felt that this diluted the experience for me. Perhaps it was bothersome because of my own biases about the “green” or “organic” movement; I have the real sensation that living an environmentally conscious life has become a fad or trend for many people in the West and so while we are still producing tons and tons of waste every year, now we feel good about ourselves for buying “green” products. For many of these producers, it is not about changing the way that people consume, this is simply another marketing tactic.

The other observation that I think all of us in the ¡Basura! ¡No Más Basura! group made was that there were several organizational challenges with the event and a lack of clarity about logistics and the people responsible for different areas. It seemed like they just tried to do too much. The festival was perhaps a little too long, there were many, many different locations involved and the printed information did not provide any details about what was happening at these different sites.

I was particularly disappointed that I did not have the opportunity to talk about the Upcycling Portal at the event as I believed I would. For me, this was one of the main reasons that I wanted to attend. In the end I do not think that I was able to share about, nor ask for input from practitioners about this virtual environment. I hope that I can find another setting to do this presentation, as I feel that it could be very useful on many fronts: for local practitioners and communities of practitioners, for the improvement of this virtual site and as an opportunity to re-articulate our purpose and vision in this field of practice.

______________________________

Reflexiones sobre el Pepenafest 2010.

Mientras nuestro pequeño grupo de sobrecicladores estaba terminando nuestro primer evento juntos aquí en la ciudad de Oaxaca, recibimos la noticia sobre el Pepenafest, un festival de 10 días en el D.F. enfocado completamente en el re-uso creativo de desechos. En julio tomamos la decisión de participar en este gran evento en la Ciudad de México y armar un puesto para vender nuestros productos y dar unos talleres en las practicas de sobreciclaje en las que tenemos algo de experiencia.

La idea tras este evento me emocionó porque aunque había visto la práctica de sobreciclaje en ferias de la “tecnología apropiada” o la “sustentablilidad” o “una vida autónoma” nunca había asistido, ni oído hablar de un encuentro así que durara 10 días completos y fuera enfocado totalmente en la idea de trabajar con los desechos como un recurso.

Fue un poco difícil encontrar la sincronía entre las personas que formaron nuestro grupo: ¡Basura! ¡No más Basura! tal vez porque somos un equipo tan diverso (se puede leer sobre los participantes en otros blogs dentro de esta sección del sitio) y porque no estamos involucrados en un proyecto compartido donde vivimos. Fue un reto identificar lo que hay al centro de nuestro grupo, nuestro propósito o la intención compartida. Al final siento que fuimos juntos más como una colección de individuos, en lugar de como un equipo unificado; cada uno con sus propias expectativas e ideas sobre lo que el Pepena nos significaría. Creo que todos tuvimos experiencias distintas como resultado de nuestras expectativas previas.

Para mi la mejor parte de nuestra semana en México fue conocer a otras personas para quienes el sobreciclaje es una pasión en sus vidas y están trabjando para hacer la práctica más visible. Estaba particularmente emocionada por una conexión que hicimos con un grupo de jóvenes que están usando el espacio de un centro comunitario (el FARO) como su taller de sobreciclaje. A través de ellos me dí cuenta de la gran ventaja que sería tener un espacio físico y me inspiró para tratar de aterrizar más este espacio virtual (literalmente).

Omar, uno de los chavos de Recicl@rte dando un taller sobre carteras hechas de tetrapack.

La otra parte buenísima fue solamente expandir mis horizontes sobre lo que es posible con nuevos tipos de desechos y esto fue una expectativa que tenia para el Pepenafest. La colección de fotos que armé subraya unas de estas ideas: como las macetas hechas de llantas desechadas y el arte de tetrapack. Estuve emocionada también al ver unas demostraciones de cosas en que hemos pensado antes pero nunca he probado, como las cortinas de tapas de botellas:

Pensé que los talleres prácticos eran básicos, no vi ni uno sobre prácticas que no conocía antes. Pero, por el otro lado, un gran reto para mi durante el evento fue que no tuvimos tiempo de participar plenamente en la feria porque estuvimos atorados en el puesto la mayor parte del tiempo. Si pudiera hacerlo otra vez, quizá iría como participante para los 10 días.

Hay dos cosas que hubiera hecho diferente en términos de la organización del Pepenafest. La primera es que intentaría mantener el enfoque en el uso creativo de la basura, y no incluiría la “Expo Alterna” que fue más como un mercado orgánico o “natural”. Sentí que esto diluyo mi experiencia. Puede ser que me molestó por mis propios prejuicios sobre el movimiento “verde” u “orgánico”. Tengo la idea que lo “ambiental” ha convertido en moda efímera para mucha gente moderna, entonces mientras todavía producimos toneladas y toneladas de basura al año nos sentimos buenos y conscientes por comprar más productos “verdes”. Para muchos de estos productores, la idea no es cambiar como consumimos, es simplemente otra táctica para vender más.

La otra observación que todos nosotros en el grupo de ¡Basura! ¡No Más Basura! hicimos es que había muchos retos de organización en el evento y una falta de claridad sobre la logística y los responsables para las distintas áreas. Parece que trataron de hacer demasiado. El festival fue un poco largo y había muchas, muchas sedes diferentes y la información impresa no proporcionó los detalles necesarios sobre lo que estaba pasando en los diferentes lugares.

Estuve particularmente decepcionada de que no tuve la oportunidad para hablar de este sitio web (el Portal de Sobreciclaje) durante el evento como pensaba. Para mi, esto fue una de las razones principales por las que quise asistir. Al final, pienso que no podía compartir sobre el espacio, ni pedir sugerencias de otros practicantes sobre este ambiente virtual. Espero encontrar otro lugar para hacer la presentación, para practicantes locales y comunidades de practicantes, para mejorar este sitio virtual y también como una oportunidad para re-articular nuestro propósito y visión en este campo de práctica.

Aquí salen las respuestas del colectivo Las Hijas de la Luna en preparación para el Pepenafest:

¿Por qué decidiste participar como grupo (basuranomásbasura) en el Pepenafest en la Cd. de México?

Es importante para nosotr@s como cooperativa poder participar de manera colectiva con otr@s compañer@s que trabajen sobre el consumo que nos genera basuras...

¿Cómo crees que nuestra participación en el Pepenafest puede ayudarnos a crecer como movimeinto del uso creativo de los desechos en Oaxaca?

Es importante para nosotros compartir tecnicas, que se puede reproducir con cualquier tipo de material, es decir la idea de crear un movimiento para el uso creativo de los desechos, tiene que ver con la oportunidad de trabajar con los materiales que tengamos y nuestras ideas y ya... no crearnos dependencia a algun material... por ejemplo....

¿Por qué decidiste participar como grupo (basuranomásbasura) en el Pepenafest en la Cd. de México?

Porque el reciclado es parte importante en mi producción escultórica y artística en general y Pepenafest es un evento que promueve el uso y re-uso consciente de la basura para muy diversos fines.

¿Cómo crees que nuestra participación en el Pepenafest puede ayudarnos a crecer como movimeinto del uso creativo de los desechos en Oaxaca?

Creo que Oaxaca y la Cd. de Oaxaca son referencia artística para todo México. Nuestra participación ayudará a que el público sepa lo que estamos haciendo aquí con nuestras propias propuestas y nuestra labor como grupo.