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I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

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Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#91

Post by josefresco »

alnwlsn wrote: post #39

It's not just students. Where I live (admittedly wealthy) people throw away everything they can't be bothered to do the slightest bit of maintenance on. I have found, and made functional: - a snow blower - various weed eaters - vacuum cleaners - a generator (higher capacity than the one I already had) - a log splitter - pressure washers (nozzles usually clogged with dirt) - a chainsaw - multiple typewriters (the Sele…

Our town has a "swap shop" at the transfer station where people bring in items not quite "trash worthy" to offer for free to the community. It's quite popular.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#92

Post by kevinsync »

ty6853 wrote: post #17
pknomad wrote: post #8

This is not surprising to me a graduate of a school with a similar profile to Duke. The student body is composed of highly wealthy domestic students but also insanely wealthy international student body.

Insanely wealthy international student seems to be a pretty common component of the competitive STEM universities. I vividly recall every fall the crazy number of wrecks by fresh students after "Daddy gave me a Maserati" with no idea how to drive it -- always asian. And then in the spring a couple of the poorest international students would commit suicide when they flunked out and all their families savings back home…

There's some kind of 6-converging-storylines movie script in here somewhere.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#93

Post by madcaptenor »

matthewowen wrote: post #68

I live near UPenn. Some locals call the end of the academic year "Penn Christmas". I definitely see some resentment, but having made an international move in my life I have sympathy for it. You need to buy things to live, shipping that stuff when you move away is often very expensive and time consuming, so you condense your life down to a few suitcases and do the best you can.

As a Penn grad student I definitely looked at the piles of stuff the undergrads threw out hoping I could get something good from them. (I don't recall if I ever did.)

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#94

Post by suzzer99 »

mrguyorama wrote: post #65
suzzer99 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went through several pairs of crappy wireless headphones until I gave in and got airpods, which just work.

For a year, and then the internal battery is useless. They are engineered like consumables. Utter insanity. For over $100.

I've been wearing my AirPods pro since Covid with no issues.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#95

Post by ryandrake »

ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote: post #66
alnwlsn wrote: post #39

It's not just students. Where I live (admittedly wealthy) people throw away everything they can't be bothered to do the slightest bit of maintenance on. I have found, and made functional: - a snow blower - various weed eaters - vacuum cleaners - a generator (higher capacity than the one I already had) - a log splitter - pressure washers (nozzles usually clogged with dirt) - a chainsaw - multiple typewriters (the Sele…

A co-worker was telling about a student he knew who would never do laundry and just constantly buy new clothes while getting rid of the worn ones.

I knew someone like this back in college, too. Absolutely wild.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#96

Post by anyonecancode »

matthewowen wrote: post #68

I live near UPenn. Some locals call the end of the academic year "Penn Christmas". I definitely see some resentment, but having made an international move in my life I have sympathy for it. You need to buy things to live, shipping that stuff when you move away is often very expensive and time consuming, so you condense your life down to a few suitcases and do the best you can.

Once upon a time, this was a thing for pretty much the entire city of New York:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_Day_(New_York_City)

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#97

Post by FuriouslyAdrift »

timewizard wrote: post #27
FuriouslyAdrift wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"UChicago is not known for being a party school"... lol The unofficial motto is "where fun goes to die"

Why does fun go there to die?

It's known as one of the toughest schools to have ever existed. The dean who set the tone for the last few decades recently left and the current generation of student don't seem to appreciate the 'rigor' so we'll see if it stays that way.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2023/06/30/no-longer-the-plac...

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#98

Post by throwforfeds »

My friend is a professor at NYU and, to make a long story short, one of his international students messed up their scheduling and tried to get my friend to change their final meeting time because his flight home for the summer cost >$10k and he didn't want to change it. Like, that's clearly an international first class flight, for a 19 year old. My ass was lucky to catch a $20 bus that may or may not catch on fire.

That's all to say, I'm guessing for many of these rich kids they're not thinking twice about throwing out a table or some slides their parents bought for them.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#99

Post by bigyabai »

albedoa wrote: post #89
matthewowen wrote: post #68

I live near UPenn. Some locals call the end of the academic year "Penn Christmas". I definitely see some resentment, but having made an international move in my life I have sympathy for it. You need to buy things to live, shipping that stuff when you move away is often very expensive and time consuming, so you condense your life down to a few suitcases and do the best you can.

> "Penn Christmas" There is a Wikipedia article for the Allston (Boston) version: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_Day_(Boston)

There's something perniciously funny seeing a yellowed Art of the Deal at the top of the giveaway bin. Really, no takers?
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