Cleaning up after Chinese lantern craze

Mar 22 2011 Perthshire Advertiser Tuesday

DEAR Editor, – The “Chinese lantern” – pictured – trend to lighten up milestones now means litter louts have taken an upmarket Oriental feel in our country. It has become a craze to release these lanterns at the drop of a ceremonial hat, yet do the people launching these burning beacons into the night sky give a thought as to what happens to them when they have burnt out?

While they look spectacular when lighting up the night sky they are an appalling slight on our countryside when they have come to earth.

Several of these lanterns have been released in the Glenfarg and Kinross area on, and since, New Year and the countryside and gardens of Kinross-shire are now littered with the wire skeletons and burnt out papery canvas remnants of this craze.

A new take on “not in my backyard”, those releasing the lanterns enjoy the spectacle as they glide into the sky – blowing away to litter someone else’s backyard!

The lanterns land indiscriminately in trees, fields of livestock, the loch, gardens and the countryside we all claim to be proud of.

Do they even think beyond the moment of release or is it just another sad reflection of a society that doesn’t think beyond the here and now and the litter we create?

Just don’t get me started on the lazy wasteful “convenience” of bottled water and paper plates!

It is a sad fact that the litter lout stereotype has been smashed. It is not some yob discarding a crisp packet or fast food wrapper. They are members of our community who feel they are sky-high above looking after it.

Mrs M Muir,

Lathro,

Kinross.