Plastic cleanup marathon in the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan
Michael Kors, Rotarian and PDG in the Netherlands has done a cleanup while running the Ultra-X in Jordan. Five marathons in five days, in the Wadi Rum desert in 40°C heat.
After the Nijmegen 4 Days Marches, the largest walking event in the world, 4 days 50 km per day, he was curious how he would fare in a multi-day marathon. The most well-known is the Marathon Des Sables; he opted for its equivalent: the Ultra-X in Jordan.
Michael’s story
Over the course of these days, a new challenge arose. I quickly noticed that there’s quite a lot of litter in the desert. From PET bottles to clothing, and even entire car wrecks! As clean as the desert seems at first glance, it’s just as polluted when you zoom in. It’s very sad when you think about it.
As a Dutch Rotarian, you quickly connect this to our fantastic global project END PLASTIC SOUP. That’s how I came up with the idea to search for this litter every day and collect it.
Every seven kilometers, there was a rest stop where we filled our water bottles and a medic assessed whether it was safe to continue. There was also a garbage bin for our own waste. The organization was very concerned about the environment and emphasized to us every day not to leave anything behind in the desert. So they were even more appreciative when I arrived at each rest stop with a shopping bag full of trash. And that others were inspired by this and helped me. I took everything I could fit along the way. And I always mentioned that I was doing this as a Rotarian for EndPlasticSoup.
Truly, my efforts were ultimately rewarded with the “environmental ribbon,” a green ribbon for those who care most about the environment during these days. So now they’re also aware of the wonderful work of EndPlasticSoup in Wadi Rum.
