Gleaning

The other day, the Professor was out and I had to begin students in on the third unit by showing them the video The Gleaners and I. An interesting video I suppose, but way too long. Whoever edited this video needs to go back to school and re-learn how to edit. While I was showing it, the projector got too hot and shut off. I was sitting at my desk, enjoying the video while perusing the crowd of students making sure no one was using this as nap time when the video cut out. I had no idea how long I would have to wait for it to properly cool off, I did not have anything really for the students to do, and I knew I could not just let them go. I got up to the front of the class, and about half of them looked at me with those tilted faces and coy smiles assuming I was going to let them go. I was not.

I began to talk about the video. Gleaning. It was something - in this video - of the late 1800's and early 1900's. Poor people would go into farm fields after they had been picked over by the machines and pick up any left over product they could possibly eat. Some of the students found this to be slightly awkward. The whole idea of picking up left-over food and using it as your own. I went further into gleaning, and spoke about the individuals that wander around markets after their culmination and pluck any left-over food from the ground.

This last idea really irked some students. They found it "disgusting". However, a few of the students looked on in silence with a look on their face that explained to me that while maybe they were not forced to scrounge food out of the trash to survive as children, they know what it is to not have.

As I continued talking about gleaning I realized that this gleaning of food was foreign to the students and they needed something real life, so I began coming up with examples. The first example I used was my grandparents. My grandparents go to Florida every winter and like most grandparents mine are cheap. A good deal is a good deal and should be taken. I think Florida caters to this. Anyway, for five dollars - or so I have been told - you can get a five gallon bucket and go through a tomato field that the machines have already been through and pick up any tomatoes still there. God bless capitalism, eh? Pay for something that would otherwise rot and go to waste.

After the first example, the students still seemed a bit distant and did not seem to care too much. The second example got them. At least it got most of them:

"I have a friend who is unemployed. He lives at home and has no steady source of income. He makes money on the internet, on Ebay. You know those "trash pick-up days" when everyone throws their junk into big piles for the town to come pick up?" I got some nods of agreement but mostly looks of confusion. "Well, my buddy goes around and picks up stuff that is getting thrown out and could be re-sellable, like bicycles, or gym equipment. He makes some decent money this way. It's gleaning."

With this last example the students all seemed to nod in understanding. Whether they understood what I was saying, or they were finally understanding that they were going to sit in their desks and listen to me blabber while the projector cooled down, I am not sure. I continued to ramble on for a bit and somehow - although, I cannot recall now - I got talking about the Irish Potato Famine, and the lesser known Southern Corn Blight of the 1970's, and then the film started back up.

We finished the film today. The Professor was there and the students acted no differently. All incredibly unenthused about the video, and still slightly disturbed by this idea of "urban gleaning" in markets and along street sides. Maybe we should have watched a few episodes of Sanford and Son instead, but the library probably does not have the DVD's in their possession.