Two more to add to our cache.

I had about 1.5 hours to wait for these puppies to be activated and during that time I witnessed rampant consumerism as only Japan can illustrate. I saw literally hundreds of new mobile phones fly off the shelves to eager new owners and I contrasted this with today’s other task which was the donation of the last of my parent’s household items to charity. (As a result of the fine upbringing provided by my darling parents, I cannot bear to throw things away that can be recycled or reused - not easy to do in Japan as most people just dump their unwanted items. Charities are hard to find.)

So today I have been reflecting on what our society has become… consume then discard, consume then discard. It has disturbed me somewhat hence this protracted post.

As a child I had very little and was taught to treasure and maintain my few worldly possessions. These days I find I get a rush from spending money and adding more and more to my mainly useless possessions. I have an unhealthy addiction to shoes, skin care products, kitchen items and hardware. Freud eat your heart out. I loathe wasting time chosing from the myriad of items in stores but I adore opening my wallet. Go figure…

But what happens to the items that are worn out or unwanted? Or what happens to the items on the shelves that are unsold? For example I saw racks and racks of mobile phone accessories for handsets currently on the market but next year these will have been discontinued and replaced by newer, faster, better models. What happens to the now obsolete (mainly plastic or epoxy) accessories? Can these be melted down and used again or simply discarded into land-fill to make new islands in Tokyo Bay or sinking runways in Kansai?

I realise that I am part of the problem but I am not sure there is a solution.
〓Tracey〓

p.s. Apologies for the poorly constructed post as it will pale in comparison to the pithy and erudite posts from Dr Dave. Now… Back to regular programming.