Japan's Garbage Sorting and Disposal 日本垃圾分类与处理
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When speaking of sorting rubbish, Japan takes it to a whole another level. Any person who go to Japan for the first time will be surprised by the systematic and precise separation and disposal of garbage in the Japanese recycling system.
说到垃圾分类，日本很重视而且设最严格垃圾分类的标准。第一次去日本的人都会被日本回收系统中对垃圾分类与精确的分离和处理感到惊讶。
If you move to Japan, the first thing you'll need to do is get your town's Gomi guide. Gomi ごみ (sometimes written ゴミ) is the Japanese word for garbage. For example, a guide for Niihama City is forty-two pages long. As the Tokyo International Communication Committee says in its garbage guide, "Trash-related issues could easily become a cause of trouble with your neighbors. To establish a comfortable life for both you and others in the community, it is important to follow local rules for trash collection."
如果你搬到了日本，第一个要做的事就是找城镇的垃圾处理指南。Gomi《ごみ》《有时写为ゴミ》是日语中使用的“垃圾”词。例如，一本关于新山市的垃圾处理指南长达四十二页。正如东京国际传播委员会（Tokyo International Communication Committee）在其《垃圾指南》（garbage guide）中所说，“垃圾相关的问题很容易让你和邻居产生矛盾。为了让你和社区里的其他人都过上舒适的生活，遵守当地的垃圾收集规则是很重要的。”
Each city, town, and district have a completely different system. Even Tokyo's twenty-three wards have different systems. So even if you've mastered one system, that doesn't help you all that much if you move somewhere else. For example, my town's garbage was sorted into burnable (red bags), non-burnable (blue bags), paper, plastic, PET bottles, cans, styrofoam, newspapers, cartons, unbroken glass, and batteries (white bags, with different collection days).
每个城市、城镇和地区都有完全不同的垃圾处理规定。比如说，东京的23个地区都有不同的垃圾处理规定。所以，即使你已经掌握了一个地方的规定，要是搬到其他地方，这对你没有太大的帮助。我所在的镇的垃圾分类被分为可燃（红色袋子）、不可燃（蓝色袋子）、纸张、塑料、PET瓶、罐头、泡沫塑料、报纸、纸箱、未破碎的玻璃和电池（白色袋子，垃圾收集日都是不同）。
That was a fairly relaxed system, comparatively. Some types were collected every week, every fortnight. Other types were collected anywhere from once a month to once a year (I kicked myself the year I missed the one day for battery collection). Oversized garbage was collected twice a year and you had to buy a special sticker to pay for disposal.
相对而言，这是一个相当宽松的制度。有些垃圾品类是每周或每两周收一次。其他品类有的每月收一次甚至还有的是每年收一次（我有一年错过了一年一次收电池垃圾，那意思是我还要再等一年）。超大垃圾一年收两次，你必须买一个特殊的贴纸来支付处理费。
You also have to buy specific garbage bags that are only usable in your town. You couldn't just put your burnable garbage in any red bag, it had to be a special, approved red bag. If you messed up, you risk having your rubbish returned to you with a sticker of shame, so that all your neighbors could see how you failed.
还必须购买特定的垃圾袋，这些垃圾袋只能在你的城市使用。你不能把你的可燃垃圾随便放在红色的袋子里，袋子必须是一个特别的而且经过批准的红色袋子才行。如果你搞错了，你的垃圾袋会被拒收并退回你的地址，垃圾袋上会贴一张耻辱的标签，这样你所有的邻居都能看到你这次的失败。
The town of Kakimatsu in Shikoku has 44 different garbage categories. A New York Times article detailed how the strict garbage sorting system affected residents, from a woman who was shamed for using a thin pen to write her identification number on her bag, to a non-compliant couple who were evicted from their apartment under pressure from a local garbage sorting enforcer.
四国的Kakimatsu镇有44种不同的垃圾分类。《纽约时报》的一篇文章详细描述了该镇严格的垃圾分类系统是如何影响到当地居民，从一位因用薄笔在包上写上身份证号码而被羞辱的女人到一对不合规的夫妇，他们在当地垃圾分类执法人员的压力下被赶出公寓。
This might be at the extreme end of the spectrum. Getting all of this done may be inconvenient, but it's certainly not impossible. For people living in small apartments it can be hard to find enough space to fit in all the rubbish bins they need to separate their trash, but it will be even more of an inconvenience if you don't bother to sort it out at all.
上述的两个例子只不过是极端的情况。完成所有这些可能不方便，但肯定不是不可能的。对于住在小公寓里的人来说，最苦难的是空间不够，因为需要很多垃圾箱以便分垃圾，但如果你根本不费心在自己家分类，那将更为不便。
Why Is Sorting So Strict? 为什么垃圾分类管的这么严格？
You might ask yourself why Japanese go to all this trouble just to treat trash, but there are some important reasons behind it. Japan has a set of specific challenges when it comes to dealing with its waste. The biggest of these is lack of land suitable for landfill. In the 1960s it became clear that, with its rising population, Japan would have to find a solution for its garbage or sink under the weight of its trash.
你可能会问自己为什么日本人费那么多劲处理垃圾，但其背后有一些相当重要的原因。日本在处理废物方面面临一系列具体挑战。其中最大的问题是缺乏适合填埋垃圾的土地。早在20世纪60年代，随着人口的增长，日本必须想出处理垃圾问题的办法，否则会在被垃圾堆沉没。
According to Waste Atlas, each person in Japan produces an average of 401.7kg of waste per year and as a whole, Japan generates more than 50,000,000 tons of municipal waste per year, ranking 8th in the world. There simply isn't enough space to bury it all. Japan had to find another solution.
根据《垃圾地图集》，日本人均每年产生垃圾为401.7公斤，总人口是每年产生城市垃圾5000万吨，世界排名第8位。这样根本就没有空间将其全部掩埋。日本必须找到另一个解决的办法。
Why Japan has so many Trash? 为什么日本人产生那么多垃圾？
Many products are sold with a lot of packaging. Shoppers are used to individually wrapped apples and pears. For example, after a French bread is purchased it is placed in three separate bags: one to keep it warm; another to separate it from other goods and a third to carry it home in. Japanese give a lot of gifts, which often come wrapped in layers and layers of fancy wrapping that ultimately have to be thrown away. Plastic bottles and throwaway wooden chopsticks are favored over recyclable alternatives. Japanese also like to have the latest thing and after they get tired of it they throw it and get an even newer model.
在日本很多产品都会用很多不同的包装。比如：他们买苹果和梨，都会分开苹果和梨的包装。还有，当他们买了一个法式面包，一般会放在三个不同的袋子里：一个用来保暖；另一个用来把它和其他商品分开，第三个用来打包。日本人送礼物也很频繁，通常都是层层包装，这些包装最后不得不扔掉。塑料瓶和一次性木筷比可回收的替代品更受欢迎。日本人也喜欢用最新的东西，当他们厌倦了它之后，他们会扔掉它，买一个刚新出来的东西。
This principle even applies to houses that are expected to only last for 33 years and be torn down and replaced with a new one. Japan relies so much on generating new products and carefully packing them to keep their economy going. The Japanese are also known for throwing out electronic items that still work and furniture that is still in good condition. A whole industry has grown up around claiming items that are regarded as valuable. Many of the items end up in foreign countries and many of the people who collect them are also foreigners. Old bicycles, refrigerators and washing machines often end up being shipped to North Korea.
这一原则甚至适用于那些预期只会持续33年的房子、33年后会被拆掉并建设新房子。日本在很大程度上依赖于生产新产品和精心包装，这样做是为了保持其经济发展。日本人也以扔掉没有坏的电子产品和处于良好状态的家具而闻名。有一些行业都是以收藏那些被认为有价值的物品被扔掉而发展起来的。大多数这样的物品最终都会运到国外去，很多收藏它们的人也是外国人。比如，旧自行车、冰箱和洗衣机经常会被运往朝鲜。
Where Does It All Go? 都会怎么处理？
After all that waste has been sorted and collected, where does is all go? You might think that you are sorting your waste so that it can be more easily recycled. This is a fairly common misconception and one that I shared when I first arrived in Japan. When it comes to its recycling rate, Japan lags behind other industrialized nations that also face problems with lack of space, e.g. the Netherlands and the UK. So, no, your rubbish is probably going to be burned.
在所有的垃圾都被分类收集之后，它们都会怎么处理呢？你可能会认为当你已经分类好你的垃圾，它就可以更方便地被回收。这是一个相当普遍的误解，也是我第一次到日本时所共有的误解。在回收率方面，日本落后于其他同样面临土地不足问题的工业化国家，如荷兰和英国。这意味着，你的垃圾最可能是会被烧了。
Recycling 回收
One success story can be found with PET bottles. PET stands for polyethylene terephthalate and these are used to make drink bottles you'll find in vending machines and convenience stores all over Japan. PET bottles can be dissolved and filtered at high temperatures, producing a pure resin that can be turned back into new PET bottles. This has reduced Japan's need for petroleum-derived resources for making PET bottles by 90%. PET bottles that do not undergo this filtration process can also be turned into other things.
一个最积极的例子是PET瓶。PET是聚对苯二甲酸乙二醇酯的缩写，用于制造饮料瓶，这些瓶子在日本各地的自动售货机和便利店到处都是。PET瓶可以在高温下溶解和过滤，生产出一种纯树脂，这个可以再做出新的PET瓶。这使得日本生产PET瓶所需的石油资源减少了90%。不经过这种过滤过程的PET瓶也可以做成其它物品。
Use Garbage to Make More Land!
用垃圾制造更多的土地！
Japan has one more solution for dealing with its trash. If there isn't enough land to bury the trash, why not just make more land with the trash? You might be familiar with land reclamation, Japan has also used this technology of filling in an area of water with heavy rock, cement, dirt, and garbage to make new land. The Chūbu Centrair International Airport near Nagoya and Kansai International Airport are both built on artificial islands. In Tokyo, where land prices are astronomical, 249 square kilometers (96 square miles) of land has been reclaimed in Tokyo Bay through land fill.
日本还有一个处理垃圾的办法。既然没有足够的土地来掩埋垃圾，为什么不用垃圾来造更多的土地呢？人们都可能对土地复垦很熟悉，日本也用这种技术用重石、水泥、泥土和垃圾填充一片水域来造出新的土地。名古屋附近的Chūbu Centrair国际机场和关西国际机场都建在人工岛上。在东京，地价是天文数字，但是其249平方公里的土地在东京湾都是填海造地的。
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