What if...

… a waste management system is implemented as such that, the more waste we dispose of, the more ‘service fees’ we have to bear? This is a bit far from how we currently manage domestic waste. If I’m not mistaken, some people (especially those in taman perumahan or managed residences like apartments, but also those who engage garbagae disposal company individually) do pay a certain amount of rubbish collection fees, which depends on the frequency of collection rather than the amount. Some other people go and throw their own rubbish at the nearest local garbage bin (which will then be cleared by the local authority) or at other places, including to bury or burn the rubbish themselves. The fee imposed don’t have to be big. It could be 5 sen per kilo for example. But it’s probably enough to incentify people to reduce domestic waste. Afterall, there is real and tangible cost to managing waste and currently it's probably borne by the government via the local municipal. Still, this is still hypothetical of course. As I mentioned earlier, our system (and moreso our mindset) is still far from there.

Now why would I think of something as random as waste management?

Hmm…

OK, now I remember. It must be the movie “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” I watched last night. I hope what follows is not a spoiler to those who haven’t watched the movie yet (and this is supposed to serve as a warning), but in the movie, there’s excess amount of food because a food-making machine had caused all sorts of food to fall from the sky. These obscene amount of wasted food were piled behind a dam, and the pile got bigger, until one day the dam gave way. And that is not the most disastrous consequence of having the food-making machine, by the way, but this is not a review of the movie I’m afraid.

See, it’s not random afterall.