Don’t Trash My Kuwait
You know how ideas are . . . they some in flashes sometimes, and other times they trickle through a lot of material before appearing . . . you catch glimpses, and then one day the idea is complete.
Kuwaitis are proud people, and they love their country deeply.
That’s why I can’t understand how they can allow Kuwait to be so covered in trash and filth. I don’t understand why people just inches away from a trash can will toss a tissue on the ground. I don’t understand why there are plastic bags blowing around in the desert.
So here is a public service campaign idea. It puts Kuwaitis at the center. I would love to see a series of magazine ads, billboards, bus ads, etc. with real Kuwaitis who are making a difference, with the theme Don’t trash my Kuwait.
I know there is a new recycle group in Kuwait, who pick up recyclables – for free. I don’t know their name, but my heart was so happy when I heard about this group. Start with them, one photo, showing them holding things like plastic milk jugs and bags, newspapers, and give them a little free publicity, and get the campaign started. Their information is small print, big campaign slogan Don’t Trash My Kuwait.
Second photo, the volunteer group that goes underwater and rids the gulf of abandoned nets and trash, still in the water, holding the kinds of trash they collect, trying to rescue the Gulf: Don’t Trash My Kuwait.
Third photo, one of the volunteer beach clean-up groups with their bags and bags of litter: Don’t Trash My Kuwait.
Fourth photo – guy in traditional Kuwaiti dress with a falcon on his arm, trite, yes, but I still love it. I just don’t know how to tie it in to the campaign, LOL.
Fifth photo: 3baid, holding up handsfull of flyers, computer in the immediate background with PaperDump on the screen: Don’t Trash My Kuwait.
Don’t you just love it?
Your turn: additional photos/ groups / ideas for the Don’t Trash My Kuwait campaign.
Here’s how it started. At the top of an exit ramp the other day, we saw a man unbuckle his seatbelt, exit his car and place a bag in the trash receptacle. We clapped; he pumped his arms in the Rocky-esque victory signal. It was a glorious moment. I’d love to have more of them.
Yes, I’m an ex-pat, but I live here. Don’t Trash My Kuwait!
26 Comments »
Leave a reply to Patrick Semaan Cancel reply
Recent Comments
Catherine on Donna Leon Crossing Cultu… intlxpatr on Ignoring the Law thani on Ignoring the Law Anon. on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… Reeva Mills on Cahors to Bordeaux, Preparing… Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 
i would love to see that too … !!!
Absolutely agree, love the campaign idea!
How about bumper stickers??? We used to have “Don’t Mess With Texas” ones ….
Oh! Bumperstickers! I love it! But . . . aren’t bumper stickers illegal – or something? I thought we aren’t allowed to have things on our car that say things . . . ( ? ? ? )
Some Kuwaitis think by littering, they’re giving the cleaner’s a job to do. I’m not kidding.
I feel your pain.
It drives me mad & I always sound the horn or flash the car in front of me that litters (what really drives me mad is those who throw out lit cigarette buts while driving!!!)
During traffic stops, I always contemplate getting out of my car, picking up what was littered & handing it back to the offender ‘sir, u dropped this’ lool.
Better yet, i’ll keep a stache of small litter bags & hand them over to the offendErs to keep in their cars. I actually did that once a month or too back, but in a parking lot not a traffic stop (i worry the light will go green & i’d be offending the affic lool). It was at the coop parking where an arab expat was illegaly parked AND was throwing seed shells out the window. he must have been waiting there for a while because a huge pile accumulated near his car. which prompted me to empty the contents of a plastic bag I had in my car and hand it to him with a polite comment; he was taken a back embarrased, but managed to thank me lool.
3 A.M. – I’m glad you said you aren’t kidding, or I would have thought you were putting me on. . . . (speechless). . . (that doesn’t happen often . . .) @@
OH! NBQ! I have had the same fantasies, but I have never had the courage to actually DO it! I totally LOVE it! So kind, such a sweet way of making the point! And the last guy actually THANKED you, LLOOOLLLLL!
I have often heard the expression since coming to Kuwait, “The desert will take care of it.” May be true….but it may take it a 1000 years.
Ken – That’s just sad.
I keep a small bag in my car for all the gum wrappers and kleenex that I use.. which reminds me, Its almost full !!
🙂
I do the same thing, Mathai. I just hate seeing people throw things out of car windows. Like nbq, I think the WORST is still burning cigarettes. AArrgh!
Yeah that annoys the hell out of me but I think Kuwait is pretty clean despite that. Try walking along the street in Paris without stepping on some dog poop and you’ll know what I’m talking about 🙂
Oh! You are so right about Paris and the dog poop! You’d think they would take little designer plastic bags and scoop up the mess!
I just think it is disrespectful to the country, and to one another, to toss trash where others will have to pick it up, other than in a garbage/trash bin.
I also like the double entendre “trash”
I’m totally in love with this post, thoughts are racing and I feel energized with the flowing stream of them.
Sometimes I feel you are more Kuwaiti than most of us, that you even love this country beyond our perception and I’ll tell you this, the day you choose to go back home, and I shall speak for all of us, “we will be sad for your departure when someone like you isn’t here to post about Kuwait”.
You can’t imagine the magnitude of joy that your words caused as if it’s a happiness adrenaline injected in me, maybe it’s the anticipation of this upcoming particular national and liberation day, maybe because this is the first time since the invasion my mother decided it is time to stop grieving and celebrate it as she used to do in the eighties or maybe you words were so sincere, heartfelt and enthusiastic.
On a side note, this is related to your previous post “Words strung together in new ways”, I loved you slogan and the images you’ve mentioned, the funny thing is I tried to translate it to Arabic and it is neither applicable nor comprehensible!! We can say “Don’t trash OUR Kuwait” but we can’t say “Don’t trash MY Kuwait”. I loved the implication that Kuwait belongs to “US” and not to a single person “ME”, we are all accountable and responsible for the progress and welfare of Kuwait, it is the sum of all of us and not one or some of us.
I know it is totally impertinent but emotions have been rushing through me once I started reading this post, it’s your fault 🙂
One more thing, regarding incorporating the falcon guy in the campaign, how about him standing on a distance with his arm extended for his falcon to arrive with a litterer’s “ghetra” in the falcon’s claws, wild but I thought to give it a try 🙂
Enjoy your day.
toche,
loool.
better yet, the falcon can be equiped with tiny guided bombs that r dropped on the offender.
if u’re going the mild way, the bombs can carry trash bags instead of explosives.
i’m reminded of an old (80’s) tv awareness commercials where they show people littering & a song comes up saying: ‘no no no this is wrong. this our country doesn’t want’ ‘لألأ لأ هذا غلط هذا بلدنا ما تبيه’
lool.I also fantacize confronting litterers & singing this song to their face… i’ve been trying to get my kids to confront walk-by smokers who ruin our mall experience by their drive-by smooking. I tried to get my kids to tell them ‘no smoking while walking pleas’ lool. maybe i’ll teach them that old littering song; I can probably find it on youtube.
Maybe better to use good old religious sayings that pertain to cleanliness as well.
Touche´ – you just made my day. I love it that you can’t say MY Kuwait, but you can say OUR Kuwait. See! I just learned something, and a wonderful something it is.
I wish I could see your mother celebrate. My heart is full with your happiness. 🙂 Thank you for telling me.
God gave me this life; a life of a modern day nomad. He created me this way, and gave me the need to understand. You cannot imagine what a blessing this blog has been to me, and the kindness of the Kuwaitis – you know who you are – who have so graciously and with such kindness shared with me what being Kuwaiti means. You are the angels God sent to help me learn about Kuwait. 🙂
LOL at the litterer’s ghetra – sadly, it is more likely to be a plastic bag. 😦
nbq – LOL! Teach your children just to look at the smokers or litterers with those great big beautiful brown eyes and say “Mamnua, amu!” and shake their little fingers back and forth! See if you can find that song somewhere on U-Tube; I would love to hear it. Sounds like a GREAT campaign – start with the children; it worked in the USA against both smoking and littering.
Speaking of – it’s rant time. Why does Liberation Day bring out the worst in parents who have children hanging out their windows or even (gasp!) sitting on their laps in the front seat, or with their heads out the sunroof?? My friends, this is Kuwait. The roads are some of the most dangerous on earth. I know you love your children – when they are in the car, they need to be seated and BUCKLED IN! Yes, I am a spoil-sport. I don’t want your children to get hurt.
oh wow I can’t believe it… it took me a few minutes, but I actually found it on youtube.
It was apparently part of a ‘Clean Kuwait’ awareness campaign at the time. Here it is:
There are actually kids that wave their fingers “no no no” loool.
wow that brings back memories certainly… Hmmm… I wonder if this campaign ad actually worked its number on me as a kid and that’s why I get upset when people litter?
Who knows.
Wooo HOOOO, nbq! I’m working on posting it now; maybe in an hour (I’m slow) Thank God it has pictures; I could only really understand the La!La!La! and the Sah! Sah! Sah! LOL
I totally love it. The children are adorable, the ad is simple and effective and utterly charming.
Amen to that Intlxpatr!!!! I had an idea to start posting pictures of the filth around Kuwait to shame the powers that be into starting some kind of campaign…of course, I don’t have the right forum/readership, but maybe together we could get enough publicity to be heard/seen. What do you think?
Carly, I think the tipping point has been reached in Kuwait. There are so many smart, educated, thinking young Kuwaitis, and I think, I believe, they are going to make a big difference in Kuwait. I think big changes are coming, and I think they will start in small ways – people who don’t toss trash out the window, and who create campaigns to educate others – Kuwaitis telling Kuwaitis. I see it happening with more and more community awareness and community building.
How can we help? We set the example. We teach our children. We help them to understand that we are all connected, and we work for the common good. I think you are already on track with all that. 🙂 How about volunteering in your children’s school one morning a week? I think the campaign is going to be long, and slow, and more of a one-at-a-time kind of thing, but I think it will be successful.
hi how are you guys doing… i tried my best to create events for people to come and clean up the beaches
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=15903289228
but people in kuwait are not for volunteering purposes 155 people confirmed my event only 8 people actually showed up!
Hamad, God bless the work of your hands!
Go to the newspapers. Go to the American Women of Kuwait and speak to them, to the British Women’s Club, to the Phillipine clubs – they will help.
I love it that Kuwaitis are organizing, and taking on tasks that will make their country a better place in which to live. God bless your efforts mightily!
Unfortunately, we Kuwaitis are all for volunteering events, sadly if and only if such events are hyped enough and labeled as a must attend for social exposure and to be trendy. It’s too sad how we adopt values and ideas for the mere purpose of being socially prestigious.
Who knows, maybe someone will actually start a well planned campaign to hype those events all year long for few years till those values are instilled in people’s characters.
Touche, you and I know a secret. It starts with one person who believes in what he/she is doing. When you believe in what you are doing, and don’t care what others think, you create your own cool. Your commitment attracts others.
I’ve seen it for myself in Kuwait, women who are working with children born with disabilities, autism, orphans – because it needs doing. Look at Abaid, and his paper dump. I also thought, on my recent visit, that I was seeing less trash on the streets, but it could be my wishful thinking . . .