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| Free Tee for every volunteer! |
I have been itching to hang out at the beach with my Capricorn friend for the past month and she made this suggestion instead to volunteer at the
Heal the Bay (HTB) event at Venice Beach. I have always wanted to do more volunteer work, but my motivation to pick up trash at an LA beach was lacking. For those of you who have never been to one of LA's beaches before just let me say in the nicest way possible that you never know what you're going to find and if your health insurance will cover what might get you sick when picking it up. Get it?
Ok, so I went any way and we were a little late due to traffic. I should have know better. LA has traffic 24hrs a day- even on Saturdays and even at the beach! It didn't matter though, because the trash wasn't going any where, really. So here's the drill. You check in at the main booth where you sign a waver form. Then you go to one of the HTB flags where you listen to a short orientation about what not to pick up and how great it is that you're helping out the environment. Lastly, you go back to the main booth to get a t-shirt, trash bag (1 per 3 people), 1 glove, and a check list to fill out about the kind of trash you picked up. They ran out of gloves by the time we got to that part, but my friend wasn't squeamish about using her bare hands so that was her job. I held the trash bag open for her and marked on the sheet what kind and how many pieces of trash she picked up.
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| Check-in booth cray busy! Nice! |
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| Orientation time! |
Now this is why I participate in specific volunteer events. I mean, I could go to the beach on my own time and pick up trash, but it's events like these where I can help collect data that will bring insight and one day change to help really heal our bays. This data helps researchers to focus on specific problems at a specific beach and that is what motivates me to volunteer. It's the scientist in me that comes out to help. So now you're probably wondering what was the most type of trash we picked up? Random bits of sharp plastic pieces (small ones), chunks of tar (that melted onto our shoes and hands!), and cigarette butts. Not a beach to lay out or run around bare footed. Oh one more thing! BYOTP...bring your own toilet paper! The homeless take it and tourists use it up quickly so to be on the safe side take a roll with you and be brave, because their restrooms are down right disgusting. Don't believe me? Ok, lets see your pictures because here are mine...enjoy!
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| They look and smell worse inside. |
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| No soap and all the dispensers are broken. |
