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Q: Hoarding? Have you noticed this?
My in-laws (yes wife included) won't throw anything away. Shoe boxes, small appliance boxes, wrapping of all sorts, bags from the clothing shops, old clothes, stuff that they don't use anymore, old rags, old shoes, ...junk. I try to get rid of things secretly but I swear they can smell when I try to do it and they miraculously appear to save the day. More than once they have brought things back inside when I slip them outside for pickup by the cleaning lady.
Its normal well in China anyway
My Father in-law is the same. last year I found a cardboard box full of plastic bottles that had dates on them from 2001 . The scary part is they only moved into that house in 2007.
I hate to think what will turn up in the fridge / freezer
It is not really HOARDING, but in a way you may call it recycling. All type of cardboard boxes, paper, bottles (plastic and glass), plastic bags from stores to pack merchandise. etc, gets saved and kept until one day they feel they have enough and call someone to haul all of it away and they get paid for the so called "garbage".
My GF is in charge of that department, and every three or four months she calls a lady on a tricycle who rides around making funny noises with something on her hand, and she comes up to the apartment and gets everything out and they pay my GF. The most we got was around 43 Rmb once, the rest of the time is between 17 and 25 Rmb.
If it makes her happy, I have no problem with going along with it, and so far when it gets to be too much, she will call the lady within a couple of days.
And that is done by just about everyone in China. Greed or concern for the environment ? Your guess will be as good as mine..........
I think it is a habit formed by necessity. Many of the Chinese who those on the forum know are only one generation removed from a time when by necessity there was a need to eek out every resource you could use to get by. But there are still many more who need to continue to collect and sell things. So hoarding is still carried out by many but once the current generation of spoiled children grow older I doubt this will continue.
Yeah I've seen it a few times. I think it comes from being brought up in the dark poor days, they just can't throw anything away, who know when you will need that broken table leg or that worn out toothbrush
