Waste Disposal

Yes, that's right, waste disposal in Changwon, South Korea, is complicated enough to merit a blog post. I'm told that the process for waste disposal is different depending on the building you live in so this post is how waste is collected in my building which is several different ways.

- First, there is a bin for used clothes, blankets...
- Second, there is a bin for organic waste (compost),
- Third, there is a bin for used light bulbs,
- Fourth, there is a container for used liquid waste (oil, bacon fat I guess),
- Fifth, there is a pile for used large items like ironing boards, baskets, buckets...
- Sixth, on Friday nights every building in our subdivision piles their cardboard along the side of our building (we are closest to the main road) and it's collected Saturday afternoon.
- Seventh, on Saturday I found large canvas bags filled with glass bottles however I don't know how to get those bags yet. (added Feb 4th - On Friday nights/ Saturday morning there are 6-7 canvas bags for various recycling options in front of a neighboring building and the security guard monitors the area to ensure proper disposal. They open and clean milk cartons, they save every piece of plastic wrapper and they separate glass bottles from liquor glass bottles. We just started piling everything in one big bag that we will bring to separate everything on Fridays.)
- Eight, I have only guessed that plastic containers are placed in a separate bag and disposed in the large trash cans. I'm probably wrong on this. (see above)

Ninth, regular trash deserves it's own paragraph. First you must purchase blue waste disposal bags as shown to the left with my 9 1/2 slipper next to it for scale. These blue waste disposal bags can be found at most convenience type stores and grocery stores and cost 480 KRW which is about $0.48 cnd each. Why you ask? I heard someone using the term "paying the garbage men". So, you fill your little blue bag up and place it in the large waste containers when you are finished. This kind of makes sense, if you can't recycle it, you pay for it.

Most of all this is placed in a specific location around your building and is unique to each building. Our spot is in the far corner of our parking lot (top right of the parking lot picture in the "Apartment building" post) and I think the garbage men come by daily to pick everything up as I hear them just about every day.

And that's waste disposal in South Korea. I might learn that I'm doing something wrong at a later date and will change this post to reflect my new findings.