Zhong
Congrong, a successful businessman from Chongqing, China, has become known as
the “the millionaire trash collector,” for his longtime habit of scouring the
streets of his city armed with a trash-picking claw and picking up any
garbage he finds.
The
52-year-old entrepreneur began cleaning up the streets of Chingqing three years
ago, after a family trip to southern China’s Hainan province, for the Chinese
New Year. There, he met a retired university professor who had reportedly
been picking up trash from one of the local beaches every day, for the
last four years. He was so impressed with the woman’s dedication and commitment
to trash collecting that he decided to replicate her daily habit in his home
city, as soon as he got back from his vacation.
Interestingly,
in the beginning, Congrong’s trash collecting habit attracted a lot of negative
attention both from locals and the media. People just couldn’t understand why a
millionaire who owns real estate, car dealerships and several material
processing factories would stoop to picking up trash by hand. They though it
was nothing more than a stunt to attract attention, but Zhong didn’t let the
negativity distract him.
Even
his family was confused by Zhong’s behavior, at first. His wife and children
were embarrassed by the negative media coverage of his “eccentric habit” and
refused to be seen with him in public. But as time went by, people’s attitude
changed. They noticed their neighborhood getting cleaner thanks to Zhong’s
efforts and started praising and supporting him. His wife is now an
anti-littering campaigner herself, and scolds everyone she sees throwing trash
on the street.
“Whether
we throw away or pick up trash is unrelated to our academic degree, cultural
background, age, or socio-economic status, Zhong Congrong told Sixth Tone in
December 2017.
The
millionaire trash collector has been doing his best to inspire others as well.
He wears an attention-grabbing orange t-shirt featuring anti-littering slogans
whenever he goes on his garbage hunting missions, and fines all of his workers
10 yuan if they litter at the workplace. However, he is fully aware that
broader measures are needed for a true change.
“China
needs stricter regulations to deter would-be litterers,” Zhong said. “Relying
on self-discipline won’t be enough. Chinese people are afraid of ‘losing face.’
They care less about how much they’re fined and more about the shame that comes
with it.”
Zhong
Congrong may be just one man, but his genuine dedication to solving his city’s
trash problem has inspired millions in China.
Believe
it or nor, Zhong isn’t the world’s only millionaire garbage man. back in 2014,
we wrote about “The Boss of Cleaning“, a Korean-born businessman living in
Bahrain, who had been manually picking up trash every day for 11 years.
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