Ravic sweeps the market square every day: ‘I buy 60 weed brushes at the same time at Action’

If you pass the Market every day, you cannot ignore the 69-year-old Ravic. Almost every day he sweeps there with brooms and dustpans and dustpans the bicycle path and the sidewalks. “Especially after the weekend, there is a lot of work to do.”

In the morning after getting up, the very first thing Ravic does, from his apartment on the Markt, is to see how the square looks like. “I walk out and quickly estimate how long I’ll be busy that day and usually I start right away. Then after a while I think ‘let me have a cup of coffee and have breakfast first’.”

Lead by example

With his clean-up work, Ravic hopes that other residents will also contribute. “There are neighbors who also occasionally do something. But if you see how much junk is in here. The municipality keeps the Stadshart clean up to the South with a broom wagon. But I don’t see them on the Market. I like to look at a clean square. And a lot of rubbish on the street invites even more rubbish.” The Zoetermeerder has some problems with his legs and knee, but the doctor has advised him to keep moving.

Over time, Ravic has built up an extensive collection of cleaning supplies. “The hairs on this brush are all over the place, but I’ve been using it daily for over three years. I bought a large, sturdy broom and a smaller version. I buy my stuff myself at Blokker, Action and Big Bazar. I sometimes buy weed brushes per sixty pieces at a time. I click it on a stem so that I can remove the weeds between the stones.”

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Brooms stolen

One day Ravic fills one to two bags of waste, the next day three to four. “I dump mountains of leaves into a big bag and fill garbage bags with waste. I put them on the street side at the end of my work so that they can be picked up.” Ravic keeps his expensive brooms in his storage room. “They were on my balcony at first, but they were stolen. At the weekend there is a lot of nuisance from nightlife crowds. Besides making a lot of noise, they knock things over and sometimes things disappear. I now only remove my hydrangeas from the edge of the balcony in the evening.”

A bowl of fruit

Many passers-by appreciate Ravic’s clean-up campaigns. “I have a lot of claim on the street and it’s nice to hear when people are happy with my efforts. Once an unknown girl came to me. She gave me a bowl of different fruits as a thank you. She said she liked that I’m always cleaning up here. Those are nice things.”

De Zoetermeerder hopes that the Markt will one day become a beautiful, green place. “I think the benches can be moved towards the middle of the square and I would like to see more trees. But only if the municipality also maintains the greenery. Otherwise I have even more work to do.”