The future is in wheelie good hands

Luke Nordestgaard is a two-year-old spreading the word about responsible waste management.

Luke’s Mum Emily can't say for certain where Luke's fascination and passion for bins came from. “Since he was able to crawl and walk, he showed interest in our shiny silver kitchen bin, but he also seemed to recognise early on that bins come in many different shapes, sizes and colours,” Emily says. “He would get very excited to point them all out! We walked him around in his pram a lot on a trip to Sydney when he was 20 months old, and noticed he would point and exclaim, ‘Wawa!’ (his made-up word for bin) whenever he saw a bin, often before we had seen them.”

Family, friends and his childcare have supported his interest. He picks up rubbish at the playground (and sometimes his friends even join in!), and his childcare made a special book with photos of bins from around the world. He has various rubbish bin and rubbish truck related toys, he loves helping his Grandpa take out the bins. His 2nd birthday party had a bin theme, where people could dress in the colours of their local council bins. His Nana even made a green bin birthday cake and sewed a rubbish truck picture on his favourite jumper.

Luke knows what goes in each of the bins at home and really enjoys taking out the rubbish, including to the ‘squishy plastic bin’ at the shops. He even loves saying hello and goodbye to bins, and telling us which bins need to go on the road for collection each week!

Asked to name what goes in each colour bin Luke says: Yellow – cardboard rolls and paper. Green – food scraps and leaves. Red – rubbish and nappies.

It’s great to see someone so young continuing the great work of residents in the City of Burnside!