I recently moved to a new apartment which is located near my school. As it took more than an hour to commute to school from my previous house, taking less than twenty minutes to go to school is one of the biggest benefits that I have gained from moving my house. Moreover, my new apartment is located far from the chaotic downtown, which makes it less distracting and even peaceful to focus on my studies. Under clean and quiet environment, I began adapting to a new life in a new environment and I was pretty much satisfied with my new apartment.

However, my satisfaction did not last long. One day, as I was studying quitely in my room, I could hear people screaming and starting off a chant. There were a bunch of people staging a protest but I did not care much about the noise, expecting that it would calm down soon. A little later, the loud noise from the protest quietened but few days later, even louder noise began to distract me and loud angry voices of people could be clearly heard even from ten stories above. When I went down to see what was going on, I was surprised by the fact that it was actually the residents who were shouting out loud in their own housing complex. The next thing that I did was immediately contacting the guard's office to find out why the residents were putting up a noisy protest in their own area. They explained that residents were angry by the fact that a new landfill would be constructed in front of our apartment. They were recruiting people to join the protest so that the construction of waste disposal site would be stopped immediately. After I grasped what happened, an inconvenient thought could not escape my mind. It was ironical that residents were making noise in their own area but more importantly, they were against the construction of landfill, when they are actually the ones producing uncontrollable amount of trash every single day.

We humans, cannot survive without consuming foods and spending daily necessities. It is natural that certain amount of waste is produced as a result of our consumption and spending. However, after rapid developments in almost every industry took place, the advanced technology enabled mass production, leading to excessive and unnecessary consumption. Eventually, humans are the prime suspect of the current state of global warming, as well as abnormal climate changes that have threatened our lives. If we are the ones responsible for what we have done to the environment, it is our fair duty to contribute in solving environmental problems. At least, we should not be the ones who value their convenience more than settling environmental issues. However, some residents in my apartment seemed to neglect the fact that we would reap what we sow. It might be inconvenient or even repulsive to have smelly district near our house. Most of us, would hope that it be built elsewhere, so that we would not have to smell stinging smell of trash everytime we go out.

No one is forcing us to become environmentalists who would dedicate anything to save our environment. But it is our sincere duty that we take responsibility to do what we can do to help our environment. If there has to be a landfill to manage the wastes, let it be where it is meant to be. As humans who have damaged our earth for decades, we do not possess any right to refrain from saving the environment. Let's get things done, before it gets bigger.