Mt. Plastic

On the drive back into Delhi, Cryptic Moth spotted several large hills that, upon closer inspection, turned out to be landfills – dumps that largely consisted of plastic waste.



Thanks to Ashley, our kick-ass production coordinator, we would be one of the first film crews to actually climb these plastic mountains.



Parvinder works for Toxics Links (toxicslink.org), a local NGO committed to bringing awareness to everything from water quality to electronic waste.



Plastic is also on their radar and Parvinder agreed to show us recycling, India-style.



We chose a location on the backside of the landfill in order not to attract attention. We then hiked in a few hundred meters up the mountain where “ragpickers” as they are known actually live and work.



Different materials – like cloth, metal and plastic bags – are sorted by hand into large enough piles that are weighed and then sold as scrap for just a few rupees. The mixture of feces, rotting corpses, food waste and other garbage made our throats sting and eyes water.



We interviewed Parvinder amid the devastation. He spoke eloquently about how “ragpicking” is an illegal profession in India but the system relies on these families to deal with the ever-increasing throwaway packaging. And while recovering these materials is necessary, the toxic working conditions make sites like this a crime.



And we felt it.



After filming some walk-and-talk broll with Parvinder, Gad started to notice small pools of toxic sludge with hatching insects. It was time to move on.



We drove around to the entrance of the landfill. Tewari weaved the car through a train of garbage trucks to about half way up the mountain. It was as far as he – and most of the crew – would go. Ian spent 20 minutes filming alone on the topside and those details will be saved for the film. Suffice it to say, this was the most testing Cryptic Moth shoot to date. And we were shaken.



Parvinder still had another location for us – an area outside Delhi where computer equipment; monitors and circuit boards are salvaged – by hand – for various parts and metals. After only 5 minutes of shooting, the crowd that had gathered forced us back to the car.



On the way home, we stopped on the banks of the Yamuna river – a heavily-polluted waterway where children were collecting trash from a plastic raft and a woman washed her hair.



According to Parvinder, most Hindus believe that rivers will take the litter away to God but somehow don’t realize how much it is accumulating. Just as he was explaining that, a car on the overpass threw a plastic bag of trash from the bridge that let out a great SPLOOSH when it hit the water.



After another interview in the setting sun, Cryptic Moth dropped Parvinder at his office and planned to meet for dinner later in the week. We can’t thank him enough for giving us an inside look into Delhi’s plastic pollution. The city is lucky to have him.



After many showers, excellent food and a sound-sleep, Cryptic Moth had an appointment across town with Conserve – a small business that transform plastic bags into designer hand bags, shoes, jewelry and other accessories (conserveindia.org).



Anita and her husband founded the company a couple years ago and it has now grown to over 300 employees with buyers around the world.



Anita showed us where they make new designs, where they pack finished products and we interviewed her in the Conserve showroom.



But as Anita explained, she’s taking a lot of risks. Many of these people are illegally living on government land and performing an illegal act - once packaging hits the ground in India it becomes government property.



Anita took us back to the “slums” to show us her operation. Plastic bags are collected from all over Delhi. Some locations – like high-end hotels – become part of a daily routine for the collectors. Then the bags are washed, hung to dry and sorted according to colour.



This one location can process about 5,000 plastic bags a day.



The bags are then sent to be blended with other fabrics to make their basic material – one that is labor-intensive as well as proprietary…hence no photos.



Our hats come off for Anita, Conserve, and all those artists/business people out there who are making profit - and jobs - from waste.



Later that night, Gad and I experienced our first rickshaw ride to have dinner with Angad and Tara – friends of Ashley.



Word to the wise: if you’re ever down or had a rough day, a rickshaw ride through Delhi is the near-death, exhilarating ride for you. We highly recommend it.



The next day, we were again in he capable hands of Tewari, hauling-butt to Agra, home of the Taj Majal. The plan was to get some iconic images of India and we were told by reliable sources that we would see elephants, monkeys and snake charmers.



Well, we did see some monkeys…but the Taj did not let our cameras inside even though they did take our money. Lesson learned. We hiked around the backside of the Taj and managed to get some nice shots, as well as garbage lining the riverbank. We also got some far shots from the Red Fort.



Cryptic Moth then spent our last day in Delhi shooting various landmarks like Paharganj (the main Bazaar), the New Delhi train station, and the gates of India.



Quite a week…next we’re off to Bangalore to speak with more government officials on plastic bag bans and hopefully get a deeper look into e-waste recycling.



Out.

G+I