Plastic, Environment and My Grandfather

My Grandfather is one of the most meticulous and responsible persons I have had in my life. He was alive only until I was 6 years old, but he has had a great influence on my growing mind. He passed away in 1989. I am still amazed at how patiently and meticulously he does things to perfection. One of the awe-inspiring tasks that he did was his weekly visits to the market to do groceries.

We lived in Bangalore at that time. Every sunday my grandfather grabbed 3 cloth bags and waited for 311C bus to take him to Shivaji nagar. He would go only to that market as it always had the freshest of vegetables. While buying the vegetables, he would buy them in a specific order. Vegetables like onions, potatoes, beetroot, cabbage which were hard and wouldnt be crushed always went to the bottom of the bag and vegetables like tomatos, spinach, green chillies, coriander etc took the top area of the cloth bag. It was simple common sense and I am glad that I carry it with me to this day.

Anyways the main reason for the blogpost is to focus on my grandpa's CLOTH BAGS. Grandpa always used the cloth bags as he was of the opinion that nothing must go wasted(The cloth bags were made by my grandma with our old clothes) and somehow never took a liking to the plastic bags. Strong sturdy plastic took over the cloth bags after grandpa passed away. And I also started to observe the amount of plastic bags of various shapes and sizes take over not just in our home but in almost all homes. Today here I am in the USA buying groceries every week and I carry my own bags to do my groceries and I get discount for not using plastic bags. 20 years after my Grandpa's death, the world that was enjoying the conforts of the sturdy plastic bag has realized its harm and is trying to revert back.

I am a proud granddaughter of my very meticulous grandpa who loves to carry her own grocery bags everyweek to get her groceries. Sometimes I even tell the person loading groceries, which vegetable goes to the bottom and which ones are at the top.

THANK YOU GRANDPA FOR INSTILLING THE VALUE OF BEING RESPONSIBLE TOWARDS NATURE. YOU HAVE BEEN IN MY LIFE FOR JUST 5 1/2 YEARS, BUT YOU HAVE TAUGHT ME VERY VALUABLE THINGS. I HOPE I MAKE YOU PROUD.