Volunteering for Clean Up UAE Campaign 2009

Amruta Khemkalyani
Thousands of UAE nationals and expats from all background and cultures gathered for Clean Up UAE event on Saturday morning. The campaign was held in all 7 emirates at around 70 sites. Everybody was wearing Clean Up UAE logo T-shirt and cap. we gathered near the clean-up site. After a worm welcome by scouts and guides we started with our work in groups. All necessary gears like hand gloves and garbage bag was provided. The site selection was good for the campaign as there was lot of garbage in the sand :). Specially glass, bottle caps, teens, plastic was included in garbage. the slight drizzle also took part in the campaign to clean up UAE!
For an NGO it is really hard to provide gears, food and drinks to thousands of participants and mainly to get such no. of volunteers to take part in clean up campaign. But EEG organised and managed it well.

On my part I worked hard and collected about 4kg of garbage containing glass, metal and plastic all non-decomposable waste. I personally felt if some instructions about classification of waste and which is important to collect to clean the site was necessary. Because some people were not clearing glass but wooden sticks which should be vice-versa. Also the garbage bags given to each one of us was plastic bag, instead better if it would have been paper bag!
But at the end of day everybody present there came with good intention of cleaning up and the campaign was real success. I am happy I was part of this campaign!
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