Freegan: How I became a one!

Freeganism is an alternative lifestyle philosophy based on minimizing consumption by recovering wasted goods like food or merchandise. In short, reduce the desire to buy new or upgrade stuff, live with what you have and be happy with what you already have.

Then after dwelling further into it, I noticed that it includes two interesting activities, dumpster diving, and sharing and/or giving stuff away.

Image of Oscar, who likes trash

Dumpster diving is salvaging usable/edible stuff in dumpster or trash. It is unthinkable finding usable stuff here but possible, at least in Singapore and America.

The benefit of dumpster diving is sharing or/and giving excessive usable/edible stuff. A zero cost charity activity. Only time and effort required. Very sustainable.

After I dumpster dives and giving away stuff, I noticed my lifestyle changed dramatically. No desire to buy any merchandise since likely to find it one day and keeping my expenses minimum and not working for a living. I tried giving away stuff through apps, Facebook groups or Colin Lau (Singapore first Freegan)’s "Declutter Squad". They comprise groups of Filipino maids working in Singapore, would gather the free merchandise from freegans and ship them to their home town.

So I officially declared a freegan and retired from work after about 6 months as a happy freegan.