Volunteering at Glastonbury’s Recycling Centre
Being uninitiated in the whole Glastonbury experience I was understandably apprehensive about leaving my comfortable London flat and travelling to what promised to be a mud bath populated by crazy and occasionally naked hippy-types. Arriving on the Thursday the site seemed intimidatingly sprawling but the people none the less very friendly and welcoming and I quickly managed to procure myself a map which boosted my confidence no end. There was grass on the ground, which was firm under foot, and I was beginning to think it had been unnecessary to lug my wellies all that way on the tube, the train and subsequently the bus. I was soon to be proved very wrong.
Our first meeting saw us being issued with comfortingly sturdy gloves in preparation for the mounds of refuse which we’d be rooting through over the coming days. After the usual safety information and a brief run-down of how the recycling system worked we were dismissed and spent a pleasantly dry evening roaming round the festival site quaffing cider.
The first shift, kicking off at 7am, was a gentle introduction to the recycling centre. Rubbish came sporadically and there was plenty of time to get to know the lovely people who I was working with. Although the area was unsurprisingly quite dirty, there was still no sign of the famous Glastonbury Mud (capital letter essential) and the going was tiring but not exhausting.
By that afternoon, free to enjoy the many delights of the many stages, tents and ‘quirky’ passersby, mud was copiously evident. Squelching down walkways unrecognisable from the previous day, I’m still convinced that the oddly appealing liquid had been pumped in overnight.As the weekend progressed and the mud made it very clear that it was here to stay, so the work that we were undertaking got wetter and dirtier. Sacks of recycling became back-breakingly heavy as they were laden with mud-smothered plastic and aluminium. It was here that I was thankful to be working with such an incredible group of people. Spirits which fell so hard with the arrival of yet another load of the filthiest rubbish imaginable were equally buoyed by the camaraderie felt in the group when music was provided by a volunteering bag-piper and people began banging on bottles and bins in at least a semblance of rhythm (it’s the taking part that counts).
Emerging at the end of the four days after a total of twenty-four hours hard and dirty work, I had a definite feeling of satisfaction - I’d completed my small part in the Herculean task that we’d been charged with and I’d had an amazing time in the process. Neither would have been possible without the support of all the fantastic people around me. It’s good to know that the work we did raised money that will make such a difference in people’s lives. I’m sure that had the people on the tube known this as I made my way home they would have been much more understanding about the reek of damp mud and rubbish…
Graham Lyons
6th August 2007