talk back

Q What else can be done to reduce food waste?

Most people are aware that we are running out of room for our rubbish. All of us should do something to help. The catering outlets discard 700 tonnes of leftovers every day. The culprits probably are the patrons.

The restaurant trade admits its customers are wasteful as they leave much food behind. The customers should ask the waiter for less if they can't eat so much.

Many restaurant owners have never fined customers, as they fear losing business. However, introducing legislation can help. If every outlet does the same, the owners need not be afraid of offending customers anymore.

If the owners fear someone may hide food, they can ask the waiters to oversee the patrons. For the visitors booking a room, the owners may ask them for their ID numbers in advance like at karaoke centres. If hidden food is found, the proprietors can inform the police and ask for a fine.

At school, the canteen should provide different sizes of lunchboxes (large, medium, small) and each of them should be charged for accordingly. I cannot eat all the food offered to me and I find that wasteful.

All the landfills are almost full. If we keep producing more rubbish, where is it going to go?

Fanny Yu, Tseung Kwan O

Q What do you think of minibus services?

I am a westerner who drives her children to school and play dates across Kowloon.

The arrogance of minibus and taxi drivers is unbelievable. These drivers are the most inconsiderate and dangerous drivers in Hong Kong. It is a stress test just to get the children to school and it is less than 10 minutes away.

In most countries you leave a safe space between yourself and the vehicle in front. In Hong Kong, that means: 'Ooh, a space, let me force my way in!' If you use your indicator as one should to indicate you want to change lanes, the other drivers quickly speed up and cut you off!

Forget about beeping the horn to prevent them from cutting you off or not letting you in; they will only look ahead and don't have the social grace of embarrassment. Just sheer arrogance.

Minibuses are death traps. In nine years of living here, we have used a minibus exactly three times. They pull out and stop without any warning, cut you off and erratically swerve from lane to lane without indicating - cutting through service stations to beat the traffic lights, running red lights, even though they have caused deaths and severe accidents.

I won't mention the poor passengers trying to find a seat while the driver accelerates at breakneck speed.

We see it a thousand times a day. Why do the police not do anything? Surely most of the above constitutes either dangerous driving or at least breaking the rules of the road.

Why not have an undercover police traffic department driving as 'normal' motorists to start booking these guys? We hear the token statement, 'Yes, we are doing something'. But honestly, the effort is ineffective.

Donna Shepherd

Q What do you think of the class-size findings?

I agree with the government's findings that there is no marked difference between small and regular classes in relation to students' attitudes, motivation and academic performance.

However, it is the mindset of teachers - open-minded or conventional - that makes a difference. If teachers accept being questioned by students, they have already created an atmosphere that stimulates students to participate in lessons and interact with teachers, even without small-class teaching.

This also has nothing to do with the methodology of teachers. Even if teachers use the conventional style of teaching, as long as students are willing to raise questions and teachers are giving responses nicely or even humorously, I am sure students would still feel involved and motivated in class.

Students' attitude and academic performance hinge on many factors. Whether they are motivated relies on the atmosphere of the lesson, which depends on whether teachers are open-minded in the first place. The atmosphere in class is not necessarily a function of its size.

Open-minded teachers - not smaller classes - are what local students need most. Regrettably, authority rather than liberty is often prized in Hong Kong.

If the government is to enhance education standards, it should be focusing on training teachers to be willing to answer students' questions in class.

Ken Soo, Wan Chai

On other matters ...

I salute the Broadcasting Authority's recent upholding of the judgment on the talk show Super Adult & Child. Moreover, I am very concerned about the proliferation of religious programmes on public TV.

The contents are overwhelmingly Christian.

Public TV should be secular in nature, free of religious content. But if we are to have shows with religious content, we should have a balanced presentation of Buddhism and Taoism, whose followers outnumber Christians in Hong Kong.

Michael Lew, Mid-Levels

An excellent article by Holly Suan Gray in Thursday's First Person on the subject of eating meat. She is right to focus on the appalling cruelty inflicted on pigs, in particular, when being raised, during transit to the slaughterhouse and during the slaughtering process.

What may smell delicious at your barbecue and look appetising on your plate represents a complete disregard for fellow creatures on this planet. Think about it and cut meat from your diet. You can hasten the process by going to a slaughterhouse, incognito, and see what lies behind that tasty pork chop!

Paul Kuantan, Malaysia

I refer to the article on February 15 on 'Speak and Span' which reported that pop stars incorporated English phonetics into their Cantonese and set a bad learning model for youngsters. Local starlet Christine Ng Wing-mei of the Cantonese sitcom Welcome to the House on TVB Jade pronounces the English imperative 'relax' with the stress on the first syllable.

At first I thought it was a slip of the tongue, but I later found out that she actually pronounced it that way episode after episode. Nowhere in any dictionary, and I suppose in any accent, would the word 're-LAX' be pronounced as 'RE-lax'. The actress should be aware of this peculiar pronunciation. One wonders if she did it on her own initiative or as told by the director.

I do not know when making incorrect pronunciation becomes stylish or cool. In any case, it shows a low regard for correct speech and reflects badly on TVB. We do not expect entertainers to educate the public, but they should at least refrain from making our teachers' jobs difficult. Idiosyncrasy is fine, but we should avoid being idiot-syn-crazy.

Jonathan Man, Kwai Chung

I refer to your article 'Driver jailed eight months for killing man, baby' (C1 yesterday). The Filipino maid who took passport photos from pop star Jacky Cheung Hok-yau was jailed for six months. If you kill two human beings, a jail sentence of eight months is applied. 'Third-world country' justice in Hong Kong, the 'world city'.

Rolf Eggers, Central