New York 'Mongo' Hunters Find Treasure in Trash
Date: 14-Jul-04
Country: USA
Author: Aleksandrs Rozens
In addition to finding a faux leather arm chair, sofa and table, the South African writer discovered he was not alone. He began to chronicle a little noticed part of New York life - the people who reuse what their neighbors discard.
Botha has presented the lives of these New Yorkers in a recently published book, "Mongo: Adventures In Trash." Mongo is American slang for any discarded material that is retrieved.
Among those who scavenged the city for unnoticed treasures was Sarah, who found a U.S. Civil War-era baby crib, and her fourth husband found enough building materials at construction sites to build an entire house.
Botha also profiles Christiana, who likes to power up discarded computers to peer into their previous owners' private lives. Steven trawls Manhattan's affluent Upper East Side neighborhood for books like first editions of James Joyce and Thomas Wolfe.
Collectors of soda cans and bottles that can be redeemed for a few cents claim they can make $10,000 a summer in Central Park, while other New Yorkers survive on food thrown out by restaurants, delis and grocers, according to the book.
Like good mongo, the New Yorkers of Botha's book were hard to find. It took him two years to collect the cast of New Yorkers portrayed in his book. Some were open to talking about collecting other people's trash and reusing it, others were more reserved.
"It was a gradual process. I approached a lot of crazy people. They swore at me, they chased me away and they started running. You start to know how people are going to act," Botha said while on his way to visit one of the collectors in his book - a New Yorker named Dave who uses a metal detector to parse through silt from sewers.
GOOD FINDS
The author said he hoped to visit other cities in the United States to investigate their recycling cultures.
"Anywhere you have a wealthy population you will find it (mongo)," Botha said.
He said there are some good finds in poor neighborhoods where people throw out things unaware of their value.
Botha, whose parents encouraged a thrifty attitude, said he still keeps an eye out for treasures in the trash to use in his own apartment.
He likes to find discarded wood, particularly old doors. But he admits, "I have reached a stage where I have just too much stuff."
Although many of the New Yorkers Botha profiled in his book spend many hours looking in trash cans and other places, he says many discoveries are just lucky.
"My ideal was to furnish an apartment with things entirely off of the street. But that's not possible because you cannot find things you need at the right time. You cannot predict what you will find," Both said.
The New York-based writer recalled that some of his best discoveries were in the company of his pet dog. The dog made Botha's walks down New York street's more random - a key to discovering some great pieces of mongo.
"Having a dog really helps. Your dog takes you down places you normally would not go because they want to follow a scent," he said.
But eventually, Botha's dog began to resent having walks cut short by the discovery of usable mongo and would urinate on items Botha went to pick up.
A WALK INTO THE PAST
Aside from the thrill of finding a piece of treasure, mongo hunters find other satisfaction in their work.
One of the collectors in Botha's book, Dave, has crammed his Queens apartment full of stuff found when he explored land fills and sewer deposits with his metal detector.
Display cases are laden with clay pipes and glass bottles that glow under special display lights. The oldest of these bottles is from the 1820s, according to Dave.
On the living room table are some two dozen rings and bracelets taken from sewers.
"I love rediscovering the past. I'm wearing some of the things. I love to give it another life," said Dave, toying with some of the rings now nestled on his fingers.
