The waste is all mixed up with food trash hanging around its edges and the top of the bin has been melted by cigarette stubs.

The words of the director of the Singapore Environment Council, Howard Shaw, and founder of Waterways Watch Society, Eugene Heng, rool through my mind: "Singapore is too efficient, its people are used to being tidied up after so they don't see litter as a problem," both have said.

As countries try to figure out the best way to get recycling going — whether it be financial incentives or fines, limited refuse collection or door to door pick up — I remember an experience I had in Japan eight years ago; one which, I think, would get everyone doing the recycling thing sharpish.

I had been in Japan for nine months, working as an English teacher when my family came out to visit. I'd got used to the comprehensive recycling efforts, the washing and sorting of my rubbish into three different clear plastic bags which was explained to me on day one.

But as the process had not really got going in the UK, my parents and brother were not used to this and I guess I didn't really labour the point. About a week or so after they arrived I walked out of my door to a couple of full trash bags. My trash bags. My week old trash bags.

I knew they were mine because everyone in the town had to write their names on these transparent bags. Perhaps there was a note written in Japanese explaining the situation. I forget.

But it was clear as I looked at the bags that our sorting had not been up to scratch and the bags would stay where they were until I remedied the situation.

I remember going through my week old rubbish: Slimy banana skins, mouldy food — that general rotting cabbage smell that goes with all rubbish; my dad valiantly by my side donning the rubber gloves; my mum's raised eyebrows that such a thing could occur; my brother's squawks of hilarity at his sister up to her elbows in rubbish.

It was a stinking lesson to learn but one that didn't need repeating. It was extreme, it was distressing, but it worked. I felt the responsibility of my waste, I felt ashamed at my attitude to it.

It's clear that rubbish is on the agenda in Singapore as the National Parks Board and PUB the water authority have launched separate campaigns in the last three weeks to tackle littering.

Nparks’ 'Love Green: Just Bin It!' campaign offers cash prizes for short anti-littering films posted on YouTube and PUB is hoping to get artists to design drain covers which spreads the message of keeping reservoirs clean when it runs a competition later this month.

NEA will also launch a nationwide anti littering campaign next month complete with a study on the psyche of a litter bug and it's looking into placing more recycling bins around Singapore.

These plans are certainly better than nothing but they will probably speak to people who are already quite engaged with the issue whereas those who drop litter and cram the recycling bins with the wrong rubbish do not care – although the social study from NEA may provide extra insight on this.

I am not sure how easy or hard it would be to implement the system I encountered in Japan. No doubt logistics and cost would initially outweigh the savings. But surely the threat of having your week old rubbish returned would be a strong motivator to many.

I wonder what the waste consultant, who the NEA advertised for earlier this month, will say?

They passed down their old values of "waste not, want not" to my parents who dutifully schooled me in finishing food, not buying things only to throw them away and not to bin something that could be used again.

They didn't do this because the world was getting warmer they just didn't think it right to be wasteful.

But I wonder now what I will pass on to any future kids I might have?

Recently my iPod broke. I have zero tech skills so I headed to the apple store to get it fixed. I was told it was an old model and it would cost the same to fix it as it would to buy a new one. Why repair and reuse when it cost you less to chuck it and buy a new one?

I can't help think its a similar thing when it comes to bottled water vs tap.

I'm no Captain Planet, I've bought bottled water and I will probably do so again if given no alternative but soda. However, what I will never do is buy bottles and bottles of the stuff to drink at home when I have perfectly good tap water to hand.

I think it’s crazy and totally wasteful. Why create all that extra rubbish and spend all that extra cash to buy something which is readily available in your own home!

Let's have a bit of respect for the tap.

Clean safe drinking water is just footsteps away in Singapore. We never have to worry about being thirsty, the long walk to the nearest well or disease from dirty water.

We get to just go to the tap and take a drink of the PUB's finest.

That is kind of amazing when you think about how, throughout history, the availability of water has played a huge role in the development of societies. Forget wide-screen TVs and surround sound - the tap is the ultimate in must have luxury.

A Unicef and World Health Organisation report says that 54 per cent of the world has water piped into their premises. Can you believe that?! Just under half the world cannot walk into their kitchen and turn on the tap and take a drink.

Okay, so your water may be a little rusty.

First, look to your pipes... second buy a filter if you must. Surely that's a better alternative to carting in bottles and bottles each week.

If you want to spend a thousand dollars or so on getting your perfectly clean, safe tap water bubbled through permeable rock from a secret volcano in a land where everyone lives to a hundred, go ahead. It is at least better than helping to top up landfill at a faster rate.

A friend told me that boiling water in Singapore has been passed down from older generations and just become a sort of habit. I can understand that but it is time to put away the kettle and move into the present. The water is safe!

PUB carries out more than 80,000 tests each month and this includes samples from taps.

An average kettle uses 0.16kWh to boil 1.7 litres of water which cost 3 cents per use which in itself is not much but done once a day that's $11 per year... which is still not a fortune, granted, but with about 1.2 million households in Singapore that's just over $13 million wasted on power. This is probably a drop in the energy ocean but its still totally unnecessary.

Also it should be noted that there is NO health benefit to drinking bottled water over tap water.

Singapore's best seller, Ice Mountain, is not a mineral water and even if it was it wouldn't make you healthier as minerals are obtained from food.

I won't even start on restaurants so far up their own a--- they won't serve tap water.

I don't think Singapore should ban bottled water. It would be far, far better to have a tap water revolution where people just turned their backs on the bottle and opted for tap water at home, at work and in restaurants.

Imagine a day when rationing returns and we tell tales of clean water straight from the tap but then explain we bought bottles instead... what will future generations think of us then?