Garbage Collection And Itinerant Vendors

Here folks place their garbage each evening, except Sunday, in bags on a nearby corner and it is picked up by fellows plying the streets in a partially covered truck. One of the collection crew proceeds the truck jogging tough the streets ringing a cow bell to announce the approach of the collection crew. Crew members appear to take turns at the jogging and ringing duty.

As I was leaving Merida, as a aside, the city was beginning to enforce the separation of refuse into “organico” and “inorganico” bags which were picked up on different days of the week from the sidewalk in from of one’s home.

Similarly, both here and in Merida, itinerant vendors have various methods of announcing their approach. The LPG gas delivery fellows, for example, ply the streets in their trucks loudly playing music while the fellow in the back of the truck issues a ringing sound by banging one of the many gas tanks in the back of the truck. Other vendors utilize other means of announcing their approach, some simply hollering the name of their product.

In Merida the knife sharpeners announced their presence with pan flutes which they moved from side to side while blowing into them. The soil delivery fellows ply the in their horse drawn wagons loudly hollering “tierra, tierra.”