Scraping for food in France

"I learnt that Eugene waits until dark to unload his bags of food from the trunk of his car so as not to be seen by his neighbours."

One evening as I was returning home I came upon a scene I had never imagined in a country as rich as France – people rummaging through supermarket dumpsters looking for food.

Despite the difficulties I would encounter, I decided that I wanted to meet these people. That day I saw an elderly man waiting on a public bench and I quickly realised that he was waiting for the trash container from a nearby neighbourhood supermarket. I approached him with my camera on my shoulder, and started a conversation. It broke off abruptly with a curt: “Leave me alone, don’t take my photo”.

I sat down beside him and changed the subject, hoping to build trust. I knew that what I was asking him was difficult to accept.

We spoke about other things when suddenly he opened up and gave me his name, Eugene, and his age, 87. He told me that he first rummaged for food during the war when he was 12 years old. “Times were difficult,” he said, sighing. Eugene revealed that the money he saved from rummaging for food allowed him to pay for a flight to Thailand once a year to see his girlfriend.

Suddenly a supermarket employee arrived with the trash and, in an instant, nothing else mattered. In spite of his age, Eugene jumped up and quickly moved towards the bins, in competition with two other individuals who were also waiting for this moment.

I followed with my camera and he turned and said, “Don’t show my face”. I respected his wishes to remain anonymous and started to photograph in spite of the others, who began rummaging through the bin looking for food. Quickly everything was removed and then returned to the container. The haul was not too bad: fruit, milk, and a box of eggs.

I continued to photograph Eugene as he arranged the food into bags. He said nothing. I followed several steps behind and asked if he was returning to his apartment. To my surprise he loaded the bags into his old car and told me that he was now off to another supermarket. I asked if I could follow him, and he replied: “Yes”.

When we arrived at the second supermarket he told me: “There is a band of Romanians who wait like me and they are mean. We need to be discreet”. For a year now, there have been more of these groups who compete for food with people like Eugene. I arrived with my camera in clear sight. Glances said everything – I was not welcome here.

I remained to the side and, after an hour of waiting, the trash containers arrived from a hangar. Eugene was slow to move and the Romanians jumped on the container with a vengeance. Eugene did his best to harvest food from the fray. I had the impression that I was watching wild cats or sharks at feeding time.

I saw Eugene for several days and as I photographed him sorting through the trash from neighbourhood supermarkets, I had one idea in mind: to have him invite me to his home and watch him cook a meal from the salvaged food. In the end, I was able to persuade Eugene to let me photograph him in his kitchen.

While I was there, Eugene proudly opened his fridge to display his findings. It was stocked with food, some of which I recognised from following him the last few days. He took out the box of eggs and showed me his recipe for an omelette. We spoke for a little while, then he asked me to leave. Eugene wanted his privacy back.

With my reporting reaching its end, I asked Eugene what would please him. “A photo of myself” he replied. “What kind of photo?” I asked. “Well, a photo of me looking for food in the trash. That will be a good souvenir for when I am older.” The next day I presented him with four photos. He was excited and showed them off to his fellow “trash binners”. He spoke to me with the familiar French form “Tu” and we made a final round of supermarkets looking for food.

I learnt that Eugene waits until dark to unload his bags of food from the trunk of his car so as not to be seen by his neighbours. He preserves his pride, but is practical because with only 1,000 euros ($1,300) he has to be inventive to get by.

He confessed that during all these days we had spent together he thought that I was a member of the police. With his savings from gathering food he hopes to leave one day – in the direction of Las Vegas.