Keeping Paradise Clean

The Issue: Efforts by people with a sense of community to keep the island clean for both visitors and residents alike.

Our View: All must partake in this venture in that after all it’s our island and we must all keep it clean and beautiful.

The DEQ Clean-Up Brigade is scheduled to pick-up trash sometime this month. In the past, students and others in the community have voluntarily walked the road sides and park areas picking trash to ensure that we maintain the pristine environment of paradise.

The volunteers’ efforts isn’t included in their wish list of “Things To Do”, but came from a heartfelt commitment and sense of community to practice what we preach about keeping our environment clean. After all, a clean environment lends to the natural beauty of an island in the tropics blessed with the sun, sand, and surf; the dream of many who live in cold countries nearby.

Its beauty is our very wealth that we often take for granted. Yes, we’ve taken it for granted until we travel to big metropolitan countries and inhale filthy air from dawn to dusk. Imagine other cities nearby where the ocean fronting the shore is so polluted as to make swimming prohibited. What a waste of a natural resource, right? It happens and we’re not sure that this is what we envision of the waters in the lagoon facing the Philippine Seas.

An island and its natural pristine environment must be kept tidy at all times. It’s the very aspect of what we have that has lured so many visitors to paradise since the beginning of tourism to these isles nearly 40 years ago. It is so beautiful and colorful as to make taking photos in black and white a strange experience. And we need not come to actually losing it all before we begin anew to clean it up once more for our children.

The coconut trees that were planted more than 30 years ago have slowly died of age, including our famous flame trees along beach road. Need we leave this responsibility to government once again? How about taking a proactive role as a community by replanting these trees in appropriate places so that our children can enjoy them too in the future?

We salute DEQ, students, business establishments and others who have voluntarily picked trash to keep our island tidy. Like safety and peace in our villages, keeping the island clean is everybody’s responsibility. Shall we begin by cleaning around our house and neighborhoods? Si Yuus Maase` yan ghilisow!