Dumpster Expedition

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Recommended: On “The Dumpster Diving”

"On Dumpster Diving", is a rather odd but interesting piece of writing by Lars Eighner. He is a great writer and craftsman of the senates. Eighner's, "On Dumpster Diving", is considered the best chapter of the book, "Travels with Lizbeth." Eighner describes in his owns words, and tells us about his experiences with dumpster diving and even informs us about wasteful habits of the American population. Eighner conveys, "Students throw out canned goods and staples at the end of the semesters and when they give up college at midterm."(par.23). When he became homeless, he had no other choice but to make a living out of dumpster diving. Through his experiences, he uses ethical, logical and humorous approach to inform his readers about dumpster diving.
Eighner informs us about the time when he began dumpster diving. He notes that he started digging through dumpster an year before he actually became homeless. In the story, he introduces a logical term, 'scavenger', which he describes he was. Eighner tells us about the different terms used for dumpster divers, winos and hobos. Eighner's topics of dumpster diving vary from which food may be worthy to eat to what items are worthy to keep and why they might be there. His life is now spent in these dumpsters, and he finds ways to improve the types of garbage he finds.
Firstly, Eighner explains why he considers himself to be a scavenger and not a dumpster diver. Eighner was able to scavenge his necessities from dumpsters. Before he raided dumpsters, he would use his logic and mostly common sense, which is quiet rare, which was only picking out things that he needed and then leaving the rest on the top of the trash, so that it could be useful to someone else. Eighner portrays, " Most divers come...

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...abeth. Eighner and Lizabeth had a unique understanding with each other. It was kind of like, “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” Both of them would look out for one another, and plus having a dog around for Eighner would give him a sense of security while raiding dumpsters. Lizabeth would have an eye out for anyone coming their way, cats, vermin, and even fire ants. Eighner describes fire ants to be the worst hazards of a dumpster (paragraph 51).
In my opinion of Eighner, I get a sense of wisdom from him. Even though he is homeless we can still learn from him. Even when he hit rock bottom he did not let his decency, self-respect and mostly hope. Eighner is an honorable person, he knows his situation very well and tries to make the best of it. We can learn this from him. Be satisfied with what you have but never give up hope for being able to reach higher.

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