Adventures at Midlife

Who knew? Apparently trading in secondhand clothing is big business outside of the U.S.:

When thrifty shoppers in Boston and Miami pick through secondhand shirts at local Salvation Army outlets or estate sales, they are as likely to meet Haitians as hipsters. Some of the immigrants will simply be collecting clothes to mail back to family in Port-au-Prince, but others are part of a large global network trading in used American goods.

The demand for pepe — used materials of all kinds from overseas — is huge in places like Haiti, which has developed its own sort of raggedy capitalism:

Pepe is sold on virtually every street corner in Haiti, yet it isn’t a free-for-all. Some vendors purchase goods by the bales for resale. Usually they have an agreement with an American charity shop, which sorts the items before making the sale. (Coats, for example, go to countries with colder climates.) Other dealers rely on relatives and friends in the United States and run off-the-books enterprises. One person combs the thrift stores for certain items, and another returns to Haiti several times a year to make the exchange. Some sellers specialize in a certain kinds of goods—just soccer jerseys, just sneakers, just bikinis.

Although I knew that my local charity shop ships items overseas to other benevolent outlets, I had no idea that some of my old tee-shirts and skirts might be being restyled for a Caribbean market. It has occurred to me that, were I more clever with my sewing machine — which sits covered with clothes-to-be-mended somewhere in the laundry room — I might be able to give some of my cast-offs a second life.

Instead, like my mother-in-law, I stack the old Singer with tattered clothes until the pile gets so high — and then I bundle them off to Goodwill. The road to my closet is paved with good intentions.

If you’re interested, a pair of New York filmmakers has recently released a documentary, Secondhand (Pepe), describing the path your shoes take from your closet to the streets of Port-au-Prince.