SINGAPORE: I didn’t think much of the Bloobox at first, when the National Environment Agency (NEA) expanded the collection of free home recycling boxes for Singapore households nationwide in March.
For one, I am against recycling as a first choice. It should be the last resort – to recover materials after we keep our possessions in use for as long as possible and repurpose them for a second life if need be.
Even for those who strive to reduce and reuse first, there will be items that become obsolete, irreparable or are intended to be recycled.
A Bloobox just didn’t seem necessary for someone like me who has been sorting and cleaning recyclables from my rubbish for some time now. My family has our own system set up at home, which simply involves a couple of cardboard boxes along my living room wall.
DO I NEED A BLOOBOX TO TELL ME TO RECYCLE?
But when I passed by a vending machine in Our Tampines Hub during my monthly Repair Kopitiam event last month, I decided to collect one anyway. Surely, I thought, an initiative to make it easier or clearer for everyone to recycle right should be worth a try.
So I set it down beside my regular cartons and after some use, observed a few things.
The Bloobox is washable, reusable and definitely appears sturdier than my carton boxes, which occasionally need replacing when they get dirty, broken or just dented out of shape after repeated usage.