HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam—Dam Chan Nguyen saves dead and dying computers. When he first started working two decades ago in Nhat Tao market,
Dam Chan Nguyen saves dead and dying computers.
When he first started working two decades ago in Nhat Tao market, Ho Chi Minh City’s biggest informal recycling market, he usually salvaged computers with bulky monitors and heavy processors. Now he works mostly with laptops and the occasional MacBook.
But the central tenet of his work hasn’t changed: Nothing goes to waste. What can be fixed is fixed. What can be salvaged gets re-used elsewhere. What’s left is sold as scrap.
“We utilize everything possible,”
Bao Loc eats his lunch in his shop packed with refurbished gear motors in Nhat Tao market, the largest informal recycling market in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Monday, Jan. 29, 2024. AP/Jae C. Hong
A Buddha head statue sits atop used electronic devices while shoppers browse for items at Nhat Tao Market, the largest informal recycling market in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, on Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
Tu Chi Vy tiptoes through his shop packed with refurbished motors in Nhat Tao Market, the largest informal recycling market in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, on Monday, Jan. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
Hoan moved to Ho Chi Minh City over a decade ago from the coastal Binh Dinh province in central Vietnam to try to escape poverty. She wakes every day at 4 a.m. in the tiny room she shares with two other people. She pushes her scrap cart—her biggest investment, costing $40—around Nhat Tao market from 6:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., collecting scrap from shop owners.
Electronic waste is the most valuable and she still remembers the time somebody sold her an old refrigerator. But all waste, ranging from aluminum or iron to the ubiquitous plastic and paper, has some value. On rare good days, she can collect up to 30 kilograms and make around $8.
She rarely takes breaks, but sometimes stops for water out of exhaustion from pushing the heavy cart around in extreme heat. At those times, she enjoys reading Doraemon comics—Japanese comic books about a time-traveling robotic cat—that she finds on her routes or gets as gifts from those who know of her fondness for the comics.
“I have to devote myself to this job as it’s my only option,” she said.
