Gold is not gold when it litters, didn’t someone say that once? Coming from a rich coutry where bottles equals money and all waste is sorted, I am finding it really hard to come to terms with the enormous waste problem found in poor Gambia. To me, it’s like all the resources are left unused and destroyed, and people come to me asking for money. I find it mindboggling how they don’t look after what they already have, and look to others to provide new stuff. They are never going to get past poverty this way. This has to change, but how?

I think it has to start in early age, and it has to be fun. What I see, is a population of people who until very recently lived off what the land could provide. What comes from nature, goes back to nature, and all waste is eaten by animals and insects and devoured by the sea. It was nature. These days everything, like, even water, comes in plastic containers. Nobody questions it, and nobody reflects on the fact that this isn’t nature, and doesn’t belong there. I asked a group of young teacher how they liked the beach. “It’s nice,” they replied. Lucky for you, I said, but noone from Europe would come to this beach and actually enjoy it. Where I come from, this would be in the news. The teachers looked at me with bewilderment. Really? They hadn’t noticed. A country that relies so heavily on tourism have no clue how to make the tourists want to stay. So really, they need to change their mindset. They need to learn to see. They have all they need and more, but fail to see it, because they are looking to a different continent, a different way of life, a different economy. They need to see what they already have, floating around under their bottoms or feet or wherever. And to see it, they might well look to other coutries. How do they make use of their existing leftovers? It is highly fashionable all over the place where wealth has left us drowning in too-good-to-goes.

Creativity. It has been with us since the beginning of time. I see it everywhere. Especially in the Gambia! But too many give up and say they aren’t creative. I want to show them that they are. Starting with the kids, we’ll see what they can make of what they already have.

This project covers the following topics:

• Art and creativity
• Environment awareness (don’t litter!)
• Sustainability (make it last)
• Resource awareness (You have much more resourses than you think)
• Collaboration and independent work
• Progress and patience
• Planning and measuring, if required
• Concentration and flow
• Personality mirror: Are you patient or quick, detail oriented or efficient, – how do you learn or work best?

I want the kids to think twice before they throw things on the ground. I want them to see the potential gold in what loses it’s old value. I want them to want to sort their gLitter in selfmade containers saying bottle tops, paper and fabric. I want them to imagine what can be done with it, and then actually create. I want them to beg to go beach cleaning, and call it a treasure hunt. I want them to tell their teachers and parents and siblings to collect and take care of all these great resourses, and who knows? Some day some of them will be able to make a living out of this. Waste has come to stay, it seems, and if there is a great problem somewhere, there is most probably more than one solution, also called business idea.

How could this possibly fail?

Link to project (password protected)

gLitter Kuruba