Folar Cleanup

Going into the FOLAR cleanup, my expectations were completely different from what it was actually like. Through our various pre-cleanup discussions and my knowledge from having done a couple of beach cleanups before, I was expecting the stereotypical vibe. However, it was much different than one might believe. Rather than the river being an actual river, there was hardly any water. There was, however, a ton of sand and rocks that made navigating through the area extemely difficult. But the biggest shock to me was that rather than there being lots of trash along the river ready to be picked up, you could barely see any trash at a glance because it was all buried and hidden. I honestly found this to be a bit discouraging, and it was difficult for me to collect a lot of trash simce a lot of it required lots of strength to pull it out of the ground, which I do not have. Nevertheless, the trash I was capable of collecting also shocked me; I was expecting the commonly known soda cans and chip bags, but instead I came across things like electronic accessories, computer parts, and lot and lots of clothes. The overall atmosphere was pleasing, and there was a lot more people and groups than I expected. I genuinely enjoyed the feeling of contributing to the community's cleanliness with others from the community, and I hope to participate again next year.