Trash truck tie-up

If you remember from one of my previous posts, 'Trash Etiquette', the simple act of taking out the trash is really not too simple in Cesis. Yesterday was another example of that humorous difficulty.

About 4:55 we (all the people with trash) start gathering at our spot on the corner. You have to get in line early or you will have to stand and smell the trash truck as everybody else pitches their garbage in before you. So, we're all waiting for the truck and we can see him down the hill a little ways ... but he's kind of halfway turning across the street and isn't moving. We keep looking and finally somebody says that they think the truck has been in a wreck. We keep peering down the street and sure enough, that's what has happened.

Now, this is an busy street but it's just big enough for 2-lanes. Traffic is beginning to pile up because he has both lanes blocked. We're just standing and looking until one elderly lady says something (I don't know the language but I picked up the nuance!) and everybody grabs their trash and starts walking down the hill. So what do I do? I grab my trash and I follow along ... there we go like a bunch ants, marching single file down the sidewalk with loads of trash. I'm fifty-two and I am the youngest person there by about 20 years.

By the time we get to the crashed trash truck site, traffic is tied completely up. Latvian drivers are very impatient and they evidently dislike the trash trucks anyway. Drivers are jumping the curb, going up on the grass, honking...making new roads. There we are, the ant line, throwing our trash in the back of the truck while complete chaos is going around us. The trash truck driver is on his cell phone, yelling at his boss or somebody. A bunch of kids that had been on a field trip to the castle are now coming over to see what the mess is about and they are all in the way. In the midst of all that, people are coming from all of the other trash stops up ahead on the route and throwing their garbage in. I couldn't do anything but just find a safe spot to stand and laugh. It was one of those times I truly wished I had my camera.

I can't wait until Monday .... it's trash day again!