Tribu "gangsters" against plastic!

Plastic bags are a curse. They consume fossil fuels, are wasteful and ruin our oceans. That said, opposing plastic bags is also usually a pet project of people who want to be (seen to be) green without having to challenge power structures or consumption patterns head on. They are the kind of things Gordon Brown worries about. It´s all the more remarkable, that plastic bags have just gained a forceful new enemy. The inner city Manila boys - who were still street "gangsters" when they produced the excellent movie Tribu - have just joined the battle against plastics. Or so I gather - as plastics is the only part of the lyrics that I "understand". Their tune protests plastic bags destroying the Pasig river - Manila´s main artery. - I have walked along the Pasig. I walked along a bit of the river that town planners had tried to spruce up. This had not really worked - for two reasons. One, people still needed the river embankment to camp out - to eek out a living. The idea of a "recreational strawling space" in the middle of Manila proved a bit fanciful - given economic realities. The other reason was, indeed, plastic bags. They were everywhere. They made even the newly designed riverbed look just dirty and cheap. So, have fun with this inner city boys attack on plastic bags. Much more real, then pious words from Gordon!