Lars Eighner “On Dumpster Diving” Summary: In Lars Eighner’s short essay “On Dumpster Diving”, he describes his experience of being homeless and the art of dumpster driving. Eighner prefers being referred to as a scavenger rather than a dumpster driver. Eighner stated “I like the frankness of the word scavenging. I live from refuse of others. I am a scavenger.” (383) He describes scavenging as a full time job, that requires a lot of effort. He believes that if one follows certain guidelines and rules, with doing so this could possibly help one to become efficient. One rule is knowing good place and time to look for food and other items, that could be useful. Another rule is knowing how to eat safely from a dumpster . Eighner said …show more content…
They would view all their findings as trash, while Eighner sees it as treasure. The typical wealthy consumer would definitely view Eighner findings as trash, due to the fact that they are accustom to buying everything brand new. In this sense I feel that Eighner feels a bit better than the consumer. Maybe because he can survive in the worst condition and still be happy, while other people are pampered and only seek comfort. Even though Eighner seems to be ok with the life he is living, I get puzzled by the thought of why is Eighner homeless in the first place? Is it by choice or was he left with no other option? I know some writers like to experience certain situations, which make writing their piece much easier. Could that be Eighner’s excuse? It’s easy for one to make assumptions about what it would be like dumpster diving, but it’s nothing like having background. A quote often used is, "One person’s trash is another person’s treasure.” This describes Eighner’s feelings perfectly. At one point he stated, "People throw away perfectly good stuff, a lot of perfectly good stuff."(384) This proves the point that once someone throws something away, it doesn't mean it is trash, just ready for a change of ownership. Eighner few dumpster diving as an art because of all the cool stuff he finds on a regular. Things such as: clothes, type writer, love letters, ragdolls et cetera. He mentioned that he hardly ever pick up things without envisioning the
We often choose what world we live in, who is associate with provolone what kind of lives we live. Choice is all around, but by choosing one life, another is missed out on. The book "On Dumpster Diving" by Las Eigher describes a man who went from the infinite, yet meaning choice of consumerism and academia, to the difficult, fulfilling and possibly more infinite world of homelessness and dumpster diving and conveys just how deprived humanity's consumer life has left it of critical thinking and general appreciation for what we have.
When you drop your Doritos bag or In-N-Out cup, or even a whole Domino's Pizza box out onto the street or sidewalk; you may not think much of it. You might not even think about it again. Because once it’s out of sight, it's out of mind. These things you throw out onto the street can take hundreds, thousands, and even a million years to decompose. Although people don’t dump all their trash in the street; a lot of them throw a few pieces each time, and eventually, it all just accumulates into large strips of trash alongside the street. All this trash in the streets has the potential to cause detrimental effects to our environment.
In the American society, a lot of things are being thrown away. Sometimes those things that is been tossed are still valuable to us. There are also times that people that dumpster dive are not all homeless or poor anymore. I don’t think this changes people’s thinking dumpster diving will raise awareness neither will reduce the amount of stuff thrown away. I think is it simply showing that we can not control what is being thrown out and from being a throwaway society. The essay “Dumpster Diving” by Lars Eighner talks about his own experience of living out of a dumpster. In his essay, it illustrates how wasteful people can be sometimes. people not only throwing food but also furniture, clothing and other household items.
My summary about “Serving Florida” by Barbara Ehrenreich and “On dumpster diving” by Lars Eighner.
Although Lar Eighner, writer of “On Dumpster Diving”, began dumpster diving when he became homeless, he believes the act should be referred to as scavenging. When first beginning to dumpster dive, he felt scavenging was not very challenging, rather he felt that he could find what he needed with simply looking. All it would take is a fraction of athleticism just to lower their body into the dumpster, but also knowing how to distinguish if the food they were about to consume was decent or better just to leave it where it was found. Not thinking highly and becoming frustrated with those who would ask if the food found in the dumpsters were acceptable for eating. I am fond of his offerings of ways to succeed. One example offered to visit a pizza
In the essay “Dumpster Diving,” by Lars Eighner tells the story of a homeless man who speaks of his survival on the streets. Eighner was not your everyday, typical type of guy. He has an interested in Dumpsters, the year he became homeless he took pleasure in ‘dumpster diving’. Eighner gives information about what it takes to be a professional scavenger. Eighner talks about his success scavenging “Except for jeans, all my clothes come from the dumpster” (192). He talks about how he is a consumer but a ‘less wasteful’ one. Throughout the essay Eighner shows the importance of one man's trash is another man's treasure. Diving has made Eighner realize things that people got rid of by throwing away, still have good use in it. He gained a lot of
In Chapter two Edward Humes writes about New York in the 1890’s. He shares with us how the people of this time period handled the trash condition. He explains how the trash was so severe that pigs could dispose of garbage for eating purposed. People were using them like a part of a solution to get rid of trash little by little by letting the pigs eat the trash but at the same time using them as meat providers. He also mentions the different methods that people throughout the years came up with to dispose of trash and failed as proper solutions. Some of these methods we still use today, like burning trash, burying trash, even building more landfills. However as Humes says about landfills they eventually get filled up. The thing that surprised
Dumpster diving has been going on for decades all around the world. In Lars Eighner’s article, “Dumpster Diving,” he talks about his life struggles and what drove him to dumpster dive. The life he lived was not perfect, but he did everything he could survive. Sometimes life can be a struggle but not always. When life hands you lemons-make lemonade.
The offenders came up with a new method of stealing information in those early ages, called “dumpster diving”. The offender would usually scout the trash of an individual who is under target and would just look for vital information or bank statements that may help to claim the person’s identity and receive benefits under someone else’s name. Yet, in a long run this was identified and people began using personal shredders (See www.spamlaws.com).
“On Dumpster Diving” by Lars Eighner the author starts his piece by saying what dumpsters mean to himself, other people and hobos. Then he goes on telling his story of when he began Dumpster diving. He mentions that he prefers to call it scavenging rather than dumpster diving because he lacks the ability of lowering himself into the dumpsters. Eighner savings ran out and he put all his income into rent. To get all his life necessities he turn to the dumpsters to get everything he needed except for jeans. After saying that he goes on talking about “What is safe to eat?” (Eighner). He says that they use senses and common sense to evaluate the found material. Later he mentions the types of foods he tries to avoid and the one they consider safe. The dumpster they love to go scavenging is the ones from colleges, because the students throw away many valuable things and food. After that the author talks about the stages a person goes through when they are learning to scavenge. First they are shy and disgust, but later after finding things they began liking it; the shyness starts going away, but some could end up being psycho. They start believing that all glass is silver and all glister stuff is gold. Later, he says how they gain weight because of the type of food they mostly find. After, he says that they could find really interesting stuff and lots of information in a household trashcan, but they try not to judge the person by the things they find in
Garbage is something that gives meaning to the phrase “out of sight, out of mind.” As soon as the garbage man comes at his regularly scheduled time, our trash is whisked away to be properly disposed of. As long as we put garbage in the trash can and not on the side of the street, we’re doing the right thing (and consequently not wasting Utah). Incidentally, there are those of us who sometimes wonder if there is something inherently wrong with our quick and “proper” disposal of discards. I, myself, have felt the occasional pang of guilt when I drop something in the trash can. I recycle; isn’t that enough? Gone Tomorrow explores this question, and it sheds a dirty light on the reality of our disappearing garbage trick.
The reality of a hoarder’s lifestyle is fairly difficult to comprehend unless one takes a deeper look. Take prime subject Langley Collyer, for
During the class presentation of the article Talking Trash, my fellow classmates presented their facts and opinions. For their powerpoint presentation, the two presenters expressed that when it comes to the topic of recycling, most of us would agree that it is good and necessary. Where this agreement usually ends, however, is the question of time. Whereas some are convinced that recycling is worth the extra spent seconds, the majority maintain their laziness. The presenters had personally admitted to this statement being true for themselves. Furthermore, while they did admit as much, many, themselves included, often take for granted recyclable products and tend to toss them into the garbage bin rather than where they belong in order to be recycled.
One day, my mother made me take a big black trash bag to the dumpster at lunch time. Little did I know, my life was about to change for ever. As I was walking to the dumpster to the, out of nowhere a monkey jump up on the dumpster, as I was about to throw the trash bag onto it. About the time I realized the monkey had a bottle of green stuff, he threw it all over on me. My first thought was gosh monkey pee. Then the monkey ran away with a mocking laugh. I told myself,” mother is never going to belvedere me”. As I stared to walk into the house, I saw mom cleaning the kinsten. Hey, mom I saw a monkey as I was throwing away the trash, and the funning thing is he threw some
Most people have heard the phrase, “Don’t judge a book by its cover”. This adage means that you should not make judgements based off of what you see by first glance. This expression is not only related to books, but to people as well. To clarify, if you see a woman walking down the street with makeup on most people will begin to think either one of two things at the snap of a glance. A. She is a makeup artist or B. She is insecure or hiding something. In reality, none of these answers could be the possible truth. This woman can work at a restaurant as a hostess and just enjoy putting on makeup occasionally. Our covers are can be based on a numerous things like the way we speak or displaying common behavior similar to a group of people. The author of the essay “Mother Tongue”, other wise known as Amy Tan, writes about her mother’s “broken” english and how it has taken an impact on her ability. In addition to this, Lars Eighner composes an essay called “Dumpster Diving” in which he records his experience as a homeless man on the street scavenging through garbage to find his next meal. Evident in both the essays and reality, Amy Tan's mother, Lars Eighner, as well as myself, have all been judged by our verbal, stereotypical, and visual covers by others in society thus affecting how we are regarded.