Sir Arturo Mercieca, Sir Luigi Camilleri, Nathalie Poutiatin Tabone, Ġuże Ellul Mercer, Manwel Dimech, St John the Baptist, St Hyacinth, St James, St Joseph, St Dominic, St Trophomous, Frères, Rudolph, Falzon, Helen, Gafar, Church, Depiro, Norfolk, Old College…I reckon there are approximately 130 streets in Sliema, but to list them all would eat up my word count. So I’ll stick with these for the moment. And let’s add Sur Fons, Karmelitani and Telgħet San Ġiljan, all three in St Julian’s, for good measure.

You may be wondering what they all have in common apart from being close to home – my home that is – and therefore on my radar and dog-walking circuit. But really I’m here to tell you what they don’t have in common. And that’s bins: dust bins, litter bins, waste bins or receptacles  – call them what you like.

The subject may not be arresting or even remotely important when you’re sitting at home reading the paper and not in urgent need of one. But when you’re law-abidingly holding on to dog poop that you’re trying to get rid of, the situation does get somewhat desperate. And when you consider the length of some of these interconnected streets, it really does start to feel Kafkaesque.

Yes, Manoel Dimech Street stretches from the Sliema Ferries all the way up to the police station and down to Balluta, cutting through Rudolph Street, which itself runs from Savoy down to Dingli Street, while Old College Street begins in Tower Road and finishes up in Mrabat. Yada, yada yada.

Or Nada, Nada, Nada?

I’ve always been acutely aware of Malta’s litter problem, particularly in the Sliema and St Julian’s area. But only recently have I discovered its drastic dearth of dustbins. Perhaps that’s because I was once able to think ‘outside the bin’ and dispose of my sweet wrappers in a pocket or handbag. But when you’re holding on to excrement, basic hygiene stops you from doing that.

And there are other impediments. For one thing, it is physically impossible to hold on to a boisterous dog and that boisterous dog’s business without sending one or the other (or yourself) flying.  My dog, you see, is rather large. And that means that I need all hands on deck.

Speaking of hands, in the last 15 months I think I have held on to dog poo longer than I have ever held hands with one of my own kind. That’s no exaggeration.

How can Rudolph, Manwel Dimech and Old College streets not have a single bin between them? It defies logical explanation

I have no idea how it works – whether there’s a dustbin protocol or whether regulations even exist. But I did discover a 1974 legal notice entitled ‘Use of Standard Dustbin Order’. That legal notice is my own age exactly, and by the look of them, so are some of the bins; and when bins need binning, it may also be time to give those legal notices and regulations a makeover too.

I can well imagine the complications that might arise when installing bins – narrowing the already narrow pavement, obstructing pedestrians, annoying the neighbours. There’s also mindless vandalism (more in the news these days). But there are ways of working around these things, especially when you are dealing with the wider and longer streets.

So how can Rudolph, Manwel Dimech and Old College Street not have a single bin between them? It defies logical explanation. High Street doesn’t appear to have a bin either, but at least there are bins on the corners of St Vincent and Amery Streets – so there’s some relief there. Mrabat, it is true, has one semi-serious bin, but its other two – small cylindrical bucket bins (yes bins come in all shapes and sizes) – need canning, though granted they’re better than nothing. The two ‘buckets’ in Isouard Street and Blanche Street (presumably there to service the government school) are too few and too far between.

A walk however on the bright side will take you to Margaret Mortimer Garden (the Sliema Swings) where suddenly you’ll be tripping over the blessed things. Twelve of them in fact – more bins than benches – some even seemingly inches apart. And then there are 25 more (and counting) in Independence Gardens, not forgetting all the bins that line the promenade on Tower Road.

It’s not that I begrudge them. It’s just that there doesn’t seem to be any sort of rhyme or reason, any notion of town planning. When it comes to bins, you’re either totally without or completely over-laden. Gives new meaning to the words ‘bin laden’ doesn’t it?

Blame my obsession with bins for that appalling pun. Talking about them may seem morbid and sordid, but that’s only because I’m so exercised – and dumbfounded – by the situation. Which brings me to enforcement and the letter (litter) of the law. I am all for enforcement and for slapping people with fines and penalties because I believe firmly that these are the only ways people will sit up and listen. But you can’t have five-star laws and swanky new fines when your neighbourhood is fast becoming a slum and when the community is not given the tools to work with.

I dare say 90 per cent (perhaps more) of the roads in Sliema and St Julian’s are ‘bin unfriendly’. And I’ll bet that is par for the course in most towns and villages.

Of course, there is never a justification for littering, just as there’s no practical or economic sense in employing a whole division of merciless Stasi litter police. Somehow fines have got to be the last resort, and somehow you’ve got to encourage/coerce people instead to do the right thing.

We need to get serious about serious bins (and take emptying them just as seriously too!).

michelaspiteri@gmail.com

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