educational

Posted by Ryan (Buenos Aires, Argentina) on 11 May 2007 in People & Portraits.

One thing I've enjoyed about having family down here is that they have to listen to me talk about things I've learned about this country, good or bad. It also makes me happy to think that they've learned something that they may not have known before. Case in point, the cartoneros.

These people are the city's recycling program. They come in from the suburbs as the day winds down to collect bottles, can, paper, and cardboard out of the trash and pack them all together to be picked up and recycled. A person might earn 300 pesos (about 100USD) a month doing this. As you can imagine, they generally live on the edge of poverty and are generally looked down by those with more money.

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