Petitions.

Our IMPACT kids are working on a new project.  Lupeni has big problems with garbage -- there's a lot of litter, and the dumpsters around town where people from the blocks bring their household trash are almost always overflowing (partially due to dogs jumping into them and rummaging around in search of food).  There are still a few places in town where people just throw trash over the edge of a precipice (out of sight, out of mind, I guess), leaving enormous, slowly sagging heaps below.

The kids in our club want to bring recycling facilities into Lupeni.  Some of the other towns in the Jiu Valley have them, and there's a sorting plant only about 20 km away.  They have learned about recycling at school and think it's appalling that we don't have a way to do it here.  (Well, that's not totally true -- there are a few people who make their living picking bottles and jars out of the dumpsters and then carrying them on rickety carts to the sorting plant.  But it's certainly not a very thorough or efficient system, and a lot gets lost.)

So before Christmas, a few of the members went and talked to the mayor's office about it.  There they sat, three shy teenage girls, nervously twisting their hair around their fingers, while the vice-mayor, secretary, and environmental officer smiled kindly at them from across the huge conference table.  In that meeting we found out that the city was already trying to bring recycling services into Lupeni, but the process of finding a company who would provide it at a good price was taking a long time.  In the meantime, they pointed out, our club could do a lot to promote the idea of recycling, since simply providing a bunch of colorful containers is pointless if no one uses them.

Our kids jumped at the idea, and after we returned from Christmas break, we began planning.  They're hoping to do some promotional short videos, fun stuff like "the superheroes of recycling," to raise awareness.  They're hoping to design some posters to show people how easy it is to collect waste separately.  They're hoping to design flyers showing the benefits of recycling for the natural environment.  They're hoping to follow people around town to catch them littering and then talk about it.  (We'll see how that one goes.)  And in the meantime, they're doing petitions.

Most of the kids in our IMPACT club have a really deep-seated distrust of the local government, which I find fascinating -- it seems like an advanced level of cynicism for a bunch of 13- and 14-year-olds.  But they don't really trust that the city hall is going to keep their promise, or do it quickly, and so they are collecting signatures from Lupeni residents who also believe in the importance of providing separate collection facilities alongside normal trash pickup.  They want to bring these to the mayor's office as an extra dose of accountability and encouragement to bring the recycling infrastructure into our town.

On Thursday, the kids had a day off from school, so 10 of them came piling into the NHF office.  They had designed a really simple petition, so we printed out a bunch of copies, gave them official-looking folders to carry them in, made sure everyone had a pen, and divided into teams.  Then we traipsed outside and divided up stairwells (after I gave them a stern talking-to about respect, safety, and common-sense when going door-to-door).  I watched as the kids nervously entered the dark stairwells of the apartment building, folders clutched nervously in hand, their earlier bravado fading at the prospect of actually talking to real adults.  I waited behind the block in the cold, watching for them to come down.

The first group reappeared only about 3 minutes later.  They said they'd only talked to one older gentleman, who said the rest of the apartments were empty that time of day because everyone was at work.  They were a little disappointed, but jubilantly opened their folder to show me his signature adorning the top of the first page.  "Let's do another one!" they cried, and rushed off into another stairwell.

The next group had better luck, and almost everyone they talked to was willing to sign the petition.  "We figured out that we have to introduce ourselves a certain way so that they don't think we're selling something," the kids said, nodding at each other, proud of their discovery.  And they too rushed off to test their theory in another stairwell.

The third group took forever, and came back jubilant.  "We filled a whole page!" they cried.  After high fives all around, they explained that one of the women was on the phone to her sister, who was currently away in Italy, and her sister was so excited to hear about the petition that she asked to have the kids sign her up even from far away.  (We had to talk about the importance of everyone signing for themselves after that... but it was still fun to see the enthusiasm.)

And on it went.  Eventually I returned to the office, as the kids eagerly went through neighborhood blocks, calling me occasionally to report their progress.  In just two and a half hours, they collected more than 250 signatures, which they jubilantly reported on Facebook.  The next morning they were back again, ready to go out another time.

It's been so fun to watch the kids blossom in this project.  They aren't little anymore; they're mostly in 8th and 9th grade, so they don't need (or want) me and Jack to come with them all the time.  But they still need someone to run back to, triumphantly waving their folder in the air.  Giving them freedom to go alone, to go unscripted, to do as much or as little as they want, has been really exciting to watch -- because they're doing it, and doing it well.  It's a glimpse of their potential.  And there is so much potential in these kids.