Last week, I attended a freegan book club organised by Kelvin Wee from the Freegan Collective. Before coming to these, I’ve never participated in book clubs.
The first one was held back in January, and saw about 20 participants. This second one was held on Friday, 15 March, at Bishan Community Club. Kelvin explained that he wanted to try something different from the previous time, and instead of reaching out to as many people as possible, he opted to use a more targeted approach. As a result, 4 people turned up.
Quantity, however, is not an indicator of success for Kelvin. What matters more is the quality of discussion. Having participated in it, I can say that we were all so deeply engrossed in the discussion that when time was up for the event, we wondered how it went by so quickly.
From what I understand, these book clubs are not so much about reading books as much as they are about bringing together people from different walks of life to talk about specific issues.
The issues that Kelvin brings up during the course of these book clubs have to do with freeganism, of course, but also capitalism, consumerism, degrowth, lifestyle, sustainability, environmentalism, and many other related topics. In fact, in the course of the evening, he noted that many book club participants know each other with 2-3 degrees of separation. This is because the topics discussed are all inter-related.
Before coming for the session, Kelvin sent to us all a video about freeganism in Singapore. Though the video was published in June 2023, the footage was actually filmed back in 2019 for a Thai TV production. To date, it’s one of my favourite videos that have been made about our community and lifestyle. Having watched the video, participants now have some idea of what freeganism is, and how it’s practiced in Singapore.
So what goes on in a book club?
We sit in a small group, and take turns responding to thought-provoking questions that the facilitator asks. Most of our answers do not seem to be directly responding to the question, but that’s how it’s supposed to work. The questions are but a prompt to get us talking.
When it comes to our turn, we can either respond to the question prompt, or chime in on what others before us have shared. And so, the conversation builds up, with each participant adding their own layers.
To what end? Why do we sit around and talk? Does it result in action?
Actually, the history of the freegan movement in Singapore started out this way. A bunch of us came together to talk about these issues. From there, ideas came forth, and some of us took these ideas and turned them to action.
For several years now, we’ve been putting these ideas in action. But some of us miss the days when we sat around to talk about why we are doing what we do. We decided to bring them back, through these book clubs.
Book clubs are not so much about taking action, but about learning from others and expanding our minds to other ways of seeing things. For me, I had two takeaways from this session:
ONE: It’s important not to be too dogmatic about -isms, including freeganism, which is a means to an end. What matters is your end goal.
In my case, freeganism gives me the freedom to not have to work full-time, and allows me to spend my time doing other things that I enjoy and are important to me.
and
TWO: If you want to change your lifestyle, you may also have to change your friends.
Part of what I do is to introduce this freegan lifestyle to more people, so this was an important reminder that not only am I asking people to adopt this lifestyle, I may also be asking them to change their friends.
If you’d like to join us the next time round, Freegan Book Club #3 will be held on Friday 10 May, 7.30pm to 9.30pm at Bishan Community Club. Join us on Telegram to receive the reading material and updates on our book clubs.
P.S.: It has been 6 years since this blog was updated. I’ve decided to start using it again to share more about what the freegan community in Singapore is doing.
Freegan In Singapore 