Was interrupted after 15 minutes or so by the old guy who lives nearby. He was out walking (or maybe he saw me passing by his house and into the woods and decided to come and have a chat) and stopped by to give me some compliments on how nice the land was becoming, and also to let me know the path was now much nicer with the gravel which I made the city people come and pour.
We kept chatting about all kind of things and then saw Mr. K come in with his mini truck and the weekly dose of garbage to be burned.
Oh great I thought. Now I have to give up and go home. He gave us a quick hello and went back to unload his truck.
I continued chatting with the old guy a bit more, he was pretty sympathetic. We talked about how he played golf when he was younger (my age), how I was same age as his young kid, how he had a bad knee and had to have it replaced with a metallic one, how the new corona virus was killing off people, how sad it is that young people are not into planting things anymore and how the government was taking their motivation by enforcing a lot of hurdles and regulations, how I should not give up on this piece of land, and how he had no idea who Mr. K was although he had seen him around a few times. Then he went over to Mr. K to ask him who he was.
I took the opportunity to dig a little more while they were chatting, before the fire would start.
Then suddenly I found a piece of bamboo which had been buried for a while and which ants had turned into their nest. When I pick it up and opened it, it was absolutely exploding with ants. I found it extremely funny, so I went over to the old guys and showed it to them, with a smile. Mr. K said right away "want me to burn it?". No, thanks I said and took it and threw it back in my plot, and continued with my digging. He really likes burning things.. hmm
After a few minutes the old guy came back to me and said bye, of course not without chatting 10 more minutes. By the time he was gone, the fire of Mr. K had just started and I was hoping that it contained only wood for once.
 |
| Lets see... what else can I put in there? |
However, before leaving I called him over and asked him what he was burning. He said house garbage. I asked if it also had plastic and rubber in it (as if the smell was not enough to answer that)
He said yes and asked if I had any complain.
I explained to him that the fire is not hot enough to burn the plastic and stuff and that all the toxic stuff goes up in the air with that black smoke, which is very dangerous to inhale. I also explained for him that I, being a human, inhaled extra amount of air and deeper than usual when doing body work such as digging. I told him that burning wood is fine as it is still less toxic and hopefully burns more complete with the low temperature fire, but that he must please stop burning plastic, rubber and other garbage when I was nearby working my plot, because it affects my health.
I told him that I am going home now, so he can take his chance and burn all he wants, and that I will come back and work tomorrow instead. But from now on, no more plastic burning in my presence. Also I made sure to mention that it was illegal, although I had no intention to report or complain him if he just kept it away from me.
He either understood or got worried about having to pay fine. Anyway he apologized a lot and said he understands and that he will stop burning non-wood when I was there. Then he continued to apologized like 10 more times and bow, and then 20 more times when he caught up with me again just after I left the plot and was about to ride my bike. I told him that apology is not needed, just do that stuff when I am not there, and also be careful cause the neighbors might just report him instead of complaining directly to him. He got the point.
See you tomorrow, he said finally. That is the day he will be back not burning stuff but cutting weeds.
No comments:
Post a Comment