Love the Farm, Leave no Trace.

[FunkyDenz]

I am in no way being condescending when I say this, but excellent. This is what life is all about... and I certainly have learned to be more aware over the years. I see you went to tribal Gathering in 97. I was there too and it was fecking ace! However, I don't think I was quite so gung ho about litter dropping then and I too like to think that I've learned something over the years... one of the lessons, being more respectful of the people and environment around me.

[benisright]

A lot of this thread is extremely lame, patronising and the like. There are seriously more important things to worry about than how people around you are messy.

[BonnetBird]

We always clean up our campsite, bin the rubbish, put it by the bins etc.

However - I get equally upset about the state of the main area, the food stalls, the bins around the stages etc. - this year the rubbish was flowing over and around the bins and was an absolute mess.

I appreciate there cannot be someone on hand to empty the bins every 5 minutes, but with the bins in that state, people around think 'well why should I bother, there's nowhere to put the rubbish anyway'.

Perhaps it's been like this before but I only really noticed this year.

[londonlady]

All the rubbish makes me sad. There were only two of us, myself and my partner (we got there later and our friends were camped elsewhere) so we cleaned up our own campsite - then as we were leaving late, we cleared a circle around us as well. We were in no hurry to leave, so I think we managed to do a fairly decent clear of a roughly 5-10m circle. Most of that was rubbish picking, though some of it was selflessly rescuing a six-man tent in near-immaculate condition along with some camping stools, a brand new cool bag and a couple of bananas. We decided against picking up the five or six pop-up tents practically within arms reach and the two gazebos, couldn't be bothered to carry them.

But really, it's not hard to just pick up your damn rubbish!

On the other hand (as it's always tempting to post on these threads being whiter than white) I did also wee behind a tree on the Saturday night. Beer, what beer?

[Ponyegg]

For our group this year was better than last year which was much better then the previous year when we left tents and (rightly) felt guilty.

We do our best, take our own recycling bags down, have a designated camp cleaner, ensure there are bags tied to each tent for your own rubbish etc. During the festival we try to make sure our camp area is always clean when the last person shuts their tent. I even take around my own ashtray now.

What would be handy is if the bins themselves were cleaned more regularly. it's difficult to take the No Trace message seriously when the bins seem to never get emptied eg; the ones by the Pyramid stage were utterly overflowing at 6pm on the Wednesday night, doesn't bode well for the rest of the week.

2010 I intend to leave no trace apart from the light-green patch where the tent's been.

[Derby_Dave]

A lot of this thread is extremely lame, patronising and the like. There are seriously more important things to worry about than how people around you are messy.

[rischbrit]

The festival is your 'home' for 5 days.... would you do the same at home? Drink a tin and leave it on the lounge floor? Or perhaps you do.... bring on Kim and Aggie!

Edited October 20, 2009 by rischbrit

[cejx]

A lot of this thread is extremely lame, patronising and the like. There are seriously more important things to worry about than how people around you are messy.

Edited October 20, 2009 by cejx

[FunkyDenz]

To further that point, the less money Eavis spends on litter pickers, the more money which can be given to Oxfam and Greenpeace, the greater the benefit to the global Environment and those who are suffering the worst of climate change.

[4AssedMonkey]

To further that point, the less money Eavis spends on litter pickers, the more money which can be given to Oxfam and Greenpeace, the greater the benefit to the global Environment and those who are suffering the worst of climate change.

[LondonTom]

A fantastically relevant point. People's laziness directly costing the charities, so why do it? You wouldn't mug a collector would you. Or would you?

[1waveydavey]

I'd like to add my wifes name to the list of people who will never to go to the festival again as a direct result of the litter and disrespect for the site shown by far too many people.

I understand her point 100%, she is staggered that what we want to believe is a gathering of good and decent like minded people can be so crass. If we are the good, what on earth does that leave behind as the bad?

I still go, I can't bear the thought of not going, I do all I can to leave no trace and pick up other rubbish around me as well but it feels like pi55ing in the wind at times.

I'm hoping this doesnt fall on deaf ears, but maybe we can get a groundswell of support for this amongst the many good folk on here and pro actively do something positive about this?

[FunkyDenz]

KYJenni (a regular poster) felt similarly about the festival after this year, and has set up her own company Respect Your Festival (http://www.######/), with one of the aims being to encourage people to clean up after themselves, not just at Glastonbury but at a range of UK Festivals.

She is being pro-active, and I am sure plenty of others will similarly be pro-active.

Edited October 20, 2009 by FunkyDenz

[cejx]

KYJenni (a regular poster) felt similarly about the festival after this year, and has set up her own company Respect Your Festival, with one of the aims being to encourage people to clean up after themselves, not just at Glastonbury but at a range of UK Festivals.

She is being pro-active, and I am sure plenty of others will similarly be pro-active.

[FunkyDenz]

Someone appears to have blocked the link. It is ######, google it if necessary.

EDIT:- IS BLOCKING A LINK TO SOMEONE'S WEBSITE FAIR OR APPROPRIATE?

It is: Respect your festival (dot) com (all one word)

Edited October 20, 2009 by FunkyDenz

[BlackHole2006]

Someone appears to have blocked the link. It is ######, google it if necessary.

EDIT:- IS BLOCKING A LINK TO SOMEONE'S WEBSITE FAIR OR APPROPRIATE?

It is: Respect your festival (dot) com (all one word)

[cejx]

her site is OK. Different to Efest, so not sure why its blocked!

[BuriedBones]

Agree entirely with the people taking too much stuff with them. That is so true, then being faced with a potentially long-ish walk to the car park with all their stuff, they start to think better of it and jetison anything they think they can do without.

The group I was with started the big tidy at about 6am on the Monday. Once we had completely cleared our area, we started on areas that had been vacated around us...amazingly folk were still dumping stuff around us as we cleared up. No shame.

Amongst the perfectly good stuff left behind in one fairly limited area included

6 tents - all in great shape

4 sleeping bags

6 or more sleeping mats

2 flasks

3 full (still sealed) wine boxes

gas stove

loads of boots

magazines, glasto programmes, books

[cejx]

I don't think Neil likes that website very much for some reason.

[FunkyDenz]

He has, which isn't fair to Jenni. She's not a rival, what she is doing is very different from eFestivals, but Neil's being (in my opinion) an idiot.

[cejx]

He has, which isn't fair to Jenni. She's not a rival, what she is doing is very different from eFestivals, but Neil's being (in my opinion) an idiot.

[young561952]

These people are pigs. I am always disgusted by the mess some leave behind. It's not difficult to set up your rubbish bags when you get there - put everything in as you along and then tie and leave it neatly for the rubbish crew.

Makes you wonder what their homes are like - candidates for Kim and Aggie?!!!!

Edited October 22, 2009 by young561952

[5co77ie]

I totally agree, a shame as I think the two could complement one another.

[rabid]

I think it was the fact she was using this forum to recruit people

[abu hamster]

Dear KYJENNI

My heart bleeds for you that you feel the need to start up a site based around loving the idea of a small clean festival utopia and imposing it on the bigger festivals. Reading is and always has been shi* and thus will never improve even with your special brand of pixie dust. Glasto has 175,000ish guests each year! You can't expect them all to clear up its never gonna happen in todays materialistic society as much as we all want them to!

However back in the real world you do find pricks and some do go to festivals. There is no way of sorting this without lots of rules that take away from the overal feeling of freeness that we all love and enjoy.

One persons crusade to clean up festivals or just a way of blagging tickets to get into festivals and give them a good writeup??????

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Sorry if I am barking up the wrong tree

Edited October 22, 2009 by abu hamster