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My drinking challenge during ZeroPlasticWeek

The first couple of days of Zero Plastic Week went well – but I was unprepared for a quick day trip to London. Lots of drinks available in glass and cartons, but water was hard to come by without plastic. Fortunately, the place where I bought water as part of my on-the-go lunch had a recycling station for plastic bottles.

plasticweekLeaving London via Gatwick Airport without plastic was a bigger challenge, with the security guard demanding I put my lipstick in a plastic bag. I have now given that plastic baggie a permanent place in my bag, in case I run into more “lipstick police” at airports.

The plastic water bottle that I bought with dinner was more challenging to dispose of, as I could not find a recycling station on the way to the gate (even though I remember seeing them there before). So instead, I took it home to be reused. This morning, I discovered I could not reuse it, as I could not open the sports-cap without wrecking the bottle itself. So much for my plan to reuse it. Good thing that my city has a system for plastic recycling…..

Next trip, I will have to bring a refillable bag for my water and just use tap water. bottelicious-vapur-waterfles-paars5Perhaps that needs to live in my bag permanently with the plastic baggie for lipstick and other “liquids”. This trip has made me realize how easy it is to let unneccessary plastic get into my life – almost in an auto-pilot way.

Tomorrow I’m onto my biggest – foreseen – challenge this week, buying a week’s load of groceries without plastic – while not needing extra hours (and potentially fuel) to visit lots of small specialty stores.

Written by: Marjolein Baghuis (@mbaghuis)

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