On my island, we have garbage police: community members who stand guard over the garbage heap to make sure everyone puts out their garbage properly. These normally laid-back people can get very testy when they are put in a position of such authority. They have a very high garbage IQ.

Garbage is serious business in Japan, and if you try to throw out something nonburnable on a designated burnable garbage day, for example, the garbage police will send you back home with the nonburnable item, even if it is a small tuna can that will have to wait another three weeks for recyclable garbage day. And when that day comes, the garbage police will again send you home with that same item if you haven't cleaned it out before throwing it onto the heap. On recyclable garbage day, when cans, bottles, newspapers and magazines are segregated according to race and religion, the garbage police are especially strict. Did you know there is a special pile for funeral "o-bentos"? Yes, those extra large black plastic lunch boxes given out at funerals are separated into their own pile, next to individual stacks of milk cartons, Styrofoam meat trays and plastic wrap.

On the island, we don't have garbage trucks. Instead, we have a garbage boat. And no, it doesn't sing Stevie Wonder songs like the garbage trucks do. Everyone must mobilize their own garbage to the port, usually by wheelbarrow, and pass the garbage police inspection. The garbage police gather at the port and, as a group, descend upon individuals as they wheel in their garbage. Although the garbage police appear to be merely helping you toss your garbage, they really are inspecting it in order to separate it into the proper pile.