Life in Dresden

Monday, May 19, 2014

Looks can be deceiving

I usually don't buy cereals, I don't have the habit of having them for breakfast. So when I buy any, it's to eat as a snack. My all time favorites are those chocolate balls (many brands make them) and the champion of all times, Froot Loops

And then one of these days I felt like eating cereals (obviously at the moment I saw the boxes at the grocery store) and I was really happy to see the Froot Loops box just like the one in Brazil. I bought it.

When I decided to eat it, the weirdness started when I opened the package. I was greeted by these rings:

They are much bigger than (our) normal and there ar eno pink ones (how come?!). And, unfortunately, it also tastes different. It tastes like nothing, like some flavorless generic cereal with almost no sugar.

Needless to say, I think it'll be a while before I buy them again.

Thursday, May 15, 2014

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

What to do with garbage in Dresden, Part 2

On my previous post, I talked about the kinds of garbage the city hall picks up at your house. Today, I'm going to talk about all the other kinds, the ones you need to take somewhere.

It's not very common to see glass bottles going to waste!

Here you pay a deposit (pfand) every time you buy bottled beverages. Water, soda, wine, beer, juice, etc, you pay around 25 cents for each of them. Later, you take the bottles back to the grocery store and put them in a machine that identifies them and sums up what you're getting back. When you're done feeding the bottles into the machine you press a button and receive a small note with the amount. After you're done shopping, you give this note to the cashier and the amount is discounted from your purchase.

And that's why it's so unusual to see bottles in the trash: you're throwing money away.

Big trash cans for paper and glass.

Usually, the glasses you recycle are jars of jam, baby food jars, and others like these. The glasses are separated per color and go into these big cans you find all over Dresden. On the first picture you see the smaller ones and on this picture above, the big ones (they're about my height!).

In this picture there's also a paper trash can. Here, you discard big paper boxes, for instance. Anything that won't easily fit in the regular blue cans in front of your house.

I have also seen these big cans for clothes and textiles. From what I understood, these are for the pieces that are still in decent state and could be used by someone else. I could be wrong, I didn't pay too much attention because I haven't needed to use them.

As for batteries, you need to take them to places like the grocery stores. I have a glass jar in which I store them and always forget to take them with me.

Trash can in Hüblerplatz.

Trash can in Waldpark.

On residential street there are no trash cans every X meters like we had in Florianópolis. At the parks, close to the benches, there are always trash cans.

Some people, unfortunately, have the bad habit of not picking up after their dogs. I was really surprised with that, I would never have guessed. In the beginning, I thought it was because of this lack of trash cans, but now I'm not so sure. What I do is carry the bag with me until I get to a park (there are many here!) or to a building with trash cans close to the street and an open gate. I just toss it in the black bin.

I think I talked about every kind of trash. If you remember something else I haven't mentioned, let me know and I'll try to find out where it goes.

To read the first part, click here.