A World Event Now!
Written by SurfWriter Girls Sunny Magdaug and Patti Kishel
Volunteers around the world turned out
for this year's International Coastal Cleanup Day, September 15th. What
started out in California in 1985 as a day to clean the coast has not only
spread inland, but to other states and more than 100 countries with 6 million
people participating.
With environmental groups, including
the Ocean Conservancy, Surfrider Foundation, Oceana, Heal the Bay, and Orange
County Coastkeeper, leading the charge, volunteers turned out to pick up trash
and educate their local communities about the need to protect our oceans and
beaches.
In Huntington Beach, CA (Surf City
USA) Surfrider Foundation members were up early setting up booths and
getting ready to turn the beach into a pristine blanket of sand.
No easy task, this involved
collecting everything from cigarette butts, plastic bags and straws to bottle
caps, cup lids, food wrappers, and an array of other trash items.
SoCal artist Katie Peck, a graduate
of Orange County's Chapman University, knows firsthand all the flotsam and
jetsam that ends up on the beach.
For the past two Coastal Cleanup
Days she has turned beach trash into art, creating a Wave in 2017 that was made
out of assorted plastics.
And a Seagull in 2018 made from
1,500 cigarette butts. Both artworks were showcased in Huntington Beach to
build public awareness of the pollution problem that plagues the world's
beaches.
Meanwhile, as the sun moved from
time zone to time zone, volunteers in the UK, France, Germany, Bulgaria,
Croatia, Italy, Cyprus and Montenegro collected trash. And Africa, Australia, Vietnam
and the Philippines, too.
Even volunteers from Carnival Cruise Line were on board.
Record numbers of volunteers turned
out in Great Britain cleaning over 300 locations from North of Scotland to the
Channel Islands. In France over 1.2 tons of plastic trash were collected.
The beach gives so much to us - soft
sands, balmy days, perfect waves. Like the tree in Shel Silverstein's
children's book, The Giving Tree, it would give us everything, until
nothing was left.
But, on one day in September,
surfers and non-surfers alike had another thought in mind –
to give back to
the beach!
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Sunny Magdaug and Patti Kishel hold the
exclusive rights to this copyrighted material. Publications wishing to reprint
it may contact them at surfwriter.girls@gmail.com Individuals and non-profit
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