Oink Twice And Let City Hall

If anyone is accustomed to living with pigs, it should be me. I am from Arkansas, home of the famous University of Arkansas Razorbacks. Nevertheless, the "Hogs" I have always known wouldn't put up with living in the pig pen called West Philadelphia. The smell is terrible. The trash is atrocious. In short, it is filthy. After two months of acclimation to my new sty, I am beginning to "waller" like the rest of the 32,000 Penn students, faculty and staff, in the filth that at first shocked me. It doesn't take long to learn to kick it all aside, to bed down in just enough room to call home within the walls of my domain and to become oblivious to the rest. What has happened to me? What has happened already to that anger I first felt in August when I arrived? What made me decide to lower my standards to my environment, rather than raise my environment to meet my standards? What made me give in without a hint of a fight? Rumors of corrupt city government, that's what. When trash pick-up is undependable and most of the time two or three days late, when two days of scattered debris are left on the sidewalks week after week, why should I bother? This isn't my city. I am only passing through. Instead, I have joined the ranks of the complainers. "Filthadelphia" is here to stay. But four years and I'm out of here. More recently, however, I have been thinking about the pig sty I now call home. Do we let City Hall stand in the way of a problem that directly affects us? Not me. My usual response to problems caused by City Hall is to cause a stink in my own way. As an Arkansan, I know about pigs. We have pig paraphernalia you would not believe. We have pig noses, pig hats, pig boots, pig purses, pig overalls, even pig recreational vans. If we, as Penn people, are expected to live like pigs, we may as well look like pigs. The folks back home will gladly ship us all the pig stuff we need. It comes in red and white, so all we have to do is add a little blue, and we'll be the Penn Pigs. Next, I'll teach you how to call the hogs. Oooo-s-o-u-i-e! How can the community of an Ivy League school acclimate to the standards of filth? We are the community. Few residents of University City are not affiliated with higher education. Penn is the largest employer in the city. The idea that we don't hold power in our hands is preposterous. So who is setting the standard by which we live? Who has decided that trash trucks are to run only once a week? And who is in change of a system of delays in trash pick-up that leaves filth on the sidewalks for days? And who has let standards lapse as to how trash is to be contained? I'll tell you who. It's the suburbanites who are free-riding on city services to the tune of $100 million a year. We should either build a wall around the city and not let them come here for work or pleasure, or we should start asking them to pay back that money so we can get our sanitation department (among other departments) back in order. Those who have lived in Philadelphia for some time know the answers to those questions, but I am not interested in the politics of the suburbs versus the city. We send missionaries, peace volunteers, and humanitarians to third world countries and poor states like Arkansas to teach them how to clean up their communities, rid their neighborhoods of disease and gain self-esteem in their environment. Much of our Penn research branches in those areas. Yet an Ivy League school "wallers" in filth in the fifth largest city in the United States. Excuse me. Something does not compute. Arkansas has one of the lowest per capita incomes in the nation. The education standards are still below the national standards. The state is considered poor by most economic standards. Nevertheless, pride is something that is found in the communities of that state. That seems important to me as I continue to acclimate to Philadelphia filth. Is it time to put out a worldwide alert that we need missionaries, volunteers, and humanitarians to come to West Philadelphia and clean up our act? What can they say and do to instill the pride that most of us have apparently left in our home communities? Four days, four months, four years -- whatever length of time is our stay in Philadelphia, for a while it is home. It might not hurt to ring a few phones and oink a little bit. When pigs stir, they cause a terrible stink. A few key numbers to ring this semester are: Trash & Bulk Collection: 686-5560. Garbage-Food Waste: 686-5564. Street Dept. Administrative Office: 686-1776. Mayor's Office for Complaints: 686-3000. Mayor's Office for Administration: 686-9188. Governor's Office: 800-932-0784. Office of Regional Health Administrator: 596-6637. When someone answers the phone, oink twice, identify yourself as a Penn pig, and tell them we are "wallering" in filth. See if there is a missionary caravan that can be recalled from Africa or Central America to come save us from our filth. Sheila Witherington is a first-year graduate student in the Annenberg School for Communication. The Gadfly appears alternate Thursdays.