Learning how to live an eco-friendly lifestyle isn't hard and can be fun
Visitors line up at the Sustainable Community Market held in Lujiazui subdistrict on Saturday.
The Sustainable Community Market rolled into its fourth and last stop on Saturday, taking its message of how to live in harmony with the environment to the Lujiazui Subdistrict under the iconic Oriental Pearl TV Tower.
The fairs, held every weekend for a month, were part of Shanghai Daily’s 20th-anniversary celebrations, themed “20 Years On: Responsibility and Innovation.” Saturday’s event was co-sponsored by the Lujiazui Subdistrict.
“As one of the landmarks of Shanghai, with a renowned international community, Lujiazui is striving to make the environment better,” said Zhang Lei, deputy director of the subdistrict. “This is the first time for Lujiazui to hold such a gathering to promote a sustainable lifestyle.”
The series of weekend market events were held previously in the Xuhui, Jing’an and Songjiang districts, with more than 10,000 people attending the fairs over the four weekends.
Companies and organizations from both at home and abroad set up booths at the fair to conduct community education with a variety of games.
A boy throws a bottle into a bin as part of the game carried out at the Sustainable Community Market on Saturday at Lujiazui Subdistrict.
Every person — mostly children with parents — participating the fair received a booklet to paste stamps collected after finishing games or quizzes at the various booths. With enough stamps, participants could win prizes.
The 3M Co, a US-based multinational operating in fields such as worker safety, healthcare and consumer goods, played a short video at the fair, showing how five plastic bottles can be made into a 3M Thinsulate coat if recycled in the right way.
Honeywell, an American conglomerate company involved in commercial and consumer products, engineering services and aerospace systems, displayed its new air-refreshing technology to the fair, explaining the chemistry behind it to children with games.
“Methanol and other hazardous gases often harm people without being noticed in our daily lives,” said Yang Chiyan from Honeywell. “We want to help children understand how to protect themselves and their families.”
Unlike the previous three fairs where most of the visitors were local residents, the Lujiazui event drew a good number of tourists.
A girl who identified herself only as Yuting from Anhui Province, said she was particularly interested in the garbage-sorting game at one of the booths.
She was referring to a version of Monopoly, where each square in the game held some kind of trash to be sorted. By sorting it correctly, a player got another roll of the dice.
“I learned a lot about garbage sorting,” said Yuting. “Dad told me one day we will have to do the same back in our hometown, so it’s good to know ahead of time how to do it.”
A boy roles the dice while playing the garbage-sorting version of Monopoly at the Sustainable Community Market held in Lujiazui Subdistrict on Saturday.
Chen Yijia, a retired teacher who has been living in Lujiazui for decades, came to the fair with her granddaughter. She said children seem quite enthusiastic about the city’s garbage-sorting campaign.
“My little girl is teaching me lessons now,” said Chen. “The fair is a great opportunity to showcase to the whole country the achievements Shanghai has made in the rubbish-sorting and recycling campaign.”
