Garbage Police!!!

Just when you thought it was safe to take out the trash. . . you get caught by the garbage police!!! That's just what happened to us the other day! Here, we have to separate our trash into basically 4 categories: raw garbage (food waste), plastics, newspaper/magazine/boxes, and recyclable cans and bottles. And there is a separate trash day for each. There isn't a dumpster, so you have to bring your trash out the morning of. . . not even the night before. We do actually separate our garbage, like good Yokohama citizens, but I guess one day, we packaged our paper-recyclables incorrectly and it was left behind. (Usually we just fill a box up with our paper recyclables, and they've taken them before.) But this time we had the box taped shut, so I guess the garbage people didn't take it. That's when the garbage police came! (Each apartment is supposed to take turns each week to keep the garbage area clean, etc. Although I really doubt people actually do it! BUT, I guess I was wrong!)

When we got home, the box was sitting near our mailbox with a letter attached which read (roughly translated) something like this:

Dear **san,
Today was the paper recycle day, and this box was left behind. We (the members of the apartment committee) opened it up and found out that it belonged to you. Sorry to cause you so much trouble.
From, apartment #000 (the apartment in charge of garbage duty this week)

We were kind of upset/surprised/shocked that they actually opened up the "trash" and decided that it was ours! Usually I don't put anything with our name or address in the trash so I'm thinking how they determined that it was ours. (could have been because it was one of our moving boxes or it could have been the English magazines inside) I guess some people must have seen us throwing it away. I guess we shouldn't be upset since it was our trash, but we were just wondering why the garbage people didn't take it. So, now we have to keep the box in our apartment for another 2 weeks until the next recycle day!