It's one of the first things you learn when living in Korea, and that is you must separate your trash down to every little piece. Food scraps can't be thrown in with your regular garbage and sometimes require a special bag. Often, though, buildings collect the food scraps in one large bin, which is then sent off to someplace to incinerate.
The real problem, I feel, comes down to how you personally collect your food scraps without stinking up the house. For my first few years in Korea I put my food scraps in a separate and bagged waste basket and threw it out every few days. This worked, but during the warmer seasons things would get stinky and buggy.
Finally, this year I came upon a miracle plastic device that seems to help do the trick.
I will have to call it the "food scraps dehydrator", because it does a good job from keeping your food scraps moist. However, it doesn't exactly dehydrate them and turn your stuff into corn flakes. I found mine at a local Lotte Supermarket so I am sure you can get these pretty much anywhere that sells household goods.
It definitely makes the household chore of collecting and disposing of food scraps a heck of a lot easier. After it gets half-full or all the way full, I dump the contents into a bag and the wash the whole thing out. Never do I experience nasty smells wafting through the house or flies flying up in my face.
Thank you Korea.....and plastic!
Editor's Notes: More info and commentary about trash and recycling in Korea at:
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