XS Project - smell the recycling!

This month, our Indonesian Heritage Society group (alternative to another one of a gajillion coffee mornings, with focus on learning about Indonesia) visited the XS Project.  The goal of this organization is to improve the lives of the kids of the trash pickers, and to provide them with scholarships so that they can go to school and pursue a different vocation.  In the meantime, they collect trash that is otherwise not recycled and make some pretty cool stuff out of it.  For more information and catalogs, see http://www.xstransformed.org/.  Let me know if you want me to send you any of their prodcuts.. I'm happy to!

We toured the small facility and talked with the people who run the organization.  The XS project has been around for about 10 years, and they are very realistic about what they can accomplish.  Even with all of the challenges they face (seriously labor intensive process, small facility, relatively high cost of their products as compared to the cheap Chinese stuff all over the markets, stigma among Indonesians about reusing their trash), they still manage to grow their business and export their products to Australia and the US.  They are also very much aware of the trash problem in Jakarta.  It's a big problem, and while there is an industry of pickers and recyclers, it is informal and controlled by a mafia of sorts.  See http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/27/indonesia-waste-tip-scavengers for more on the city of people that live on and off of the dump.

At the moment, XS Projects uses plastic soap and detergent containers (different from the ones in the US, they are soft plastic pouches), old billboards (vinyl, the big ones.. I think she said 8 by 12 meters), and the fabric from car seats.  There is a lot of washing that goes on, and lots and lots of checking and sorting.  And drying in the sun to eliminate smell--which is not entirely effective as my office just adopted one of their small containers and there is a fantastic floral smell that has taken over the room.  And then they create.  They have one guy who does the designs and a number of guys who sew.  They do bags and bins and wallets and luggage tags and laptop cases and soft coolers and pencil cases and grocery bags and golf bags (possible Uncle Bill Christmas gift idea).  They are super creative!

Below: This one wasn't for sale.. it was rather a statement about the amount of medication that people take, as it's made out of pill casings. I found it a bit.. ew.  We agreed that we wouldn't likely see it on Lady Gaga anytime soon.