LA River Clean Up !!!!

Hello, I am Heran Zhan and have take English 101 class in this Spring Quarter with professor Hernandez. On the last Saturday 4/23, I attended this activity " A TOLERABLE PLANET "with my English 101 classmates. When I arrive at the destination , we found that there are a lot of volunteers to participate in this event. After entering the active area , the volunteers lined up in formation , we took the staff gave us ready gloves , garbage bags and T-shirts, we follow the direction of flow of people, we started to clean up the river.

In the process of cleaning up the river , we saw all kinds of waste, such as food packages transfer bags , discarded mobile phones, clothes , plastic boxes , trolleys , wood , etc., most of which is plastic garbage bag .Some garbage bags wrapped around the bush , it is difficult to directly get out . We have to walk in the dry river , at the foot of massive stones , but walking is not very convenient to be careful every step to go . When I was picking up trash in the dry river, I thinking why there has lots of trash and why there has no water in the L.A. River.Should we have a deep reflection about the environment? I think that we should take the initiative to protect the environment in which we live . If we do not litter items, do not pollute the environment, I believe that Los Angeles will look both better and cleaner than now，even the river will also have clean water.

When we returned , I saw on the ground there are a lot of other people picking up garbage containers in the garbage bag , I put my pick up garbage containers in garbage bag in there, we see them clean up garbage and I felt very satisfied and happy because we paid labor in exchange for a clean river. Although the weather is very hot, we sweat a lot when I clean up the river. But I think it is worth it, we do meaningful things for this city, for this river.

Actually，it is possible to participate in this event i feel very honored and very excited because this is the first I came to Los Angeles to participate in a volunteer activity. And the atmosphere of this event reminds me of the activities to participate in similar public activities in high school in China, and I feel so good that I can have a chance to be a volunteer in this activity.

If I can, I would like to call for more people to participate in environmental protection activities like this event that can let more people know the importance of environmental protection , protection of the environment allows us to live in a clean and no pollution place to grow , for our health , for our city, for our world.

Reviving The L.A. River

Hello, my name is Noel Soto and i am a student at CSULA taking English 101 with Ms. Hernandez. In this class the main topic is the environment and we discuss how we may preserve the environment and make this world look more green. On Saturday, April 23rd we had a service learning which was to clean the L.A. river along with FoLAR. Looking at the river of L.A. makes me think about the Lorax; we the people of L.A. took our river for granted and acted like it was an infinite water supply. Being apart of the service learning opened my eyes to just how dirty people can be. The river was far from looking like one, it kind of looked more like a desert. I was finding a range of items ranging from clothes to buried shopping carts to bicycle wheels. If we could get people to clean the way they did on Saturday every Saturday it would be our first big step into reviving the L.A. river. Cleaning up the river made me feel a sense of a bigger purpose and made me happy to see that there were still people who actually care about the environment because a lot of people just talk but never actually help in anyway. It's always nice to see people gather and do something nice for the environment.

FOLAR Clean Up

FOLAR


On April 30th, we cleaned up the LA River at Steelhead Park with the FOLAR (Friends of the LA River ) team. It was great to see all of my students there--and thankfully, Diana finally found us. The day was warm, but not oppressively hot, and at first I wasn't sure what to think. From where we were on the high, concrete verge, I couldn't even see the river, but people were heading down the steep slope with bags in hand. The FOLAR folks shared some information about the river, including its' length and that they hope to clean it up enough to bring the Steelhead trout back (hence the name of the park).
My students headed out and I waited for late arrivals, handing out plastic bags and wishing I could join in. Finally, I made it down. The river floor was soft sand and hard to walk on, but once I got down there I could see why we needed to clean it up: plastic, plastic everywhere, and none of it good for the river or the ocean the river eventually leads to. I thought about our unit on trash in the ocean and the Algalita talk we attended, and here was the evidence before my eyes: plastic bags, wrappers, bottlecaps, a dish drainer, all melded and welded into the plants growing in the river bottom. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen such a great advertisement for banning plastic bags; they were everywhere, and when I tried to pull them out they shredded. I quickly realized that we would not be able to clean the river, but I hoped it would at least be cleaner, that there would be less plastic for the birds and fish and turtles to mistake for food.
My students were great! Gavi found a bone and a dead lizard (which freaked everyone else out, I think), and Gabby was rolling down the highway with helpers. Markisse, Vanessa, and Esmeralda brought back a really gross couch cushion, and towards the end Gabby, Gavi, Nayeli, Veronica, and Diana brought back a shopping cart (one of four found that day!). Sitting in the shade by the water coolers, we talked about the experience. I was so happy that my students got to see a little bit of what we had been discussing in class, and I hoped that this event would help them realize that we can make a difference, by not throwing trash on the ground in the first place, and by cleaning up after people who do. The entire experience impressed me so much that I am writing an essay about it, and I want to extend my thanks to all of my students and to the wonderful people at FOLAR. In the end, as I headed out with my husband for some more cleaning, he told me "I think plastic might be human's worst invention", and looking at all the bags still stuck in the trees, all the bits we hadn't been able to clean, I had to agree. Still, it felt good to try to make the best of a bad situation.