Large trash day is here! HUZZAH!
Every year, since I was in college, I’ve gone out for large trash day and trash hunted. I’m not a “digger”, I’m more of a quick glance person. If anything looks interesting, I’ll look closer. I’ve found a lot of neat stuff in the garbage–bicycle wheels, ceramics, platters, even a tv which I gutted and put an aquarium in. But this year’s haul was by far the best one yet.
I got a serving dish shaped like a fish, a meat platter that has a Pier One stamp on it (it’s big enough to hold a 20+ pound turkey), a bulletin board, a barstool that swivels, a safety orange plastic chair, a metal bookcase that’s about 4 foot tall with scroll detail, and a green faux leather armchair.
All out of the garbage. It’s amazing what people will throw away.
And with all of this new stuff, it’s just like Christmas (but a bit messier).
Americans living in Japan REJOICE at “large gomi” day once a month – gomi shopping is a favorite pastime. When we lived there, we knew one guy who made a regular route around the neighborhoods and picked up furniture, which would be thrown out upon a person’s death. He shipped back a whole house FULL of gorgeous furniture to then resell at exorbitant prices.
My husband regularly retrieved bicycles – tossed because they had a broken chain, fixed for a few bucks and sold to a young sailor – VCRs – tossed because they had a broken belt, fixed for a few bucks and sold to anybody willing to try to operate a VCR with Japanese writing on it – and a whole assortment of furniture with which we basically furnished our entire apartment. Oh, and dishes – the word for the number 4 is the same as the word for death, so 4 is a VERY unlucky number, so when one dish, which would be part of a set of 5, would get broken, they’d toss the rest and some ignorant American would then pick up a nice set of 4.
I wish we had large gomi day around here!!