Truly Stainless
“Truly Stainless” is a shop on Ap Liu Street which sells second-
hand stainless pots and pans. The utensils in the shop
do not look “old” at all. The owner Mr. Wong lamented that
“Many people would buy new utensils in a department store
at the persuasion of salespersons. When they got home they
would throw away their usable utensils.”
The shop picks up
when other people throw away, and it will find new owners for
the utensils. Mr. Wong sources his pots and pans from various
channels, and then he would clean them and hang them up
for sale, like meat in a meat stall. Most pots in the shop sell for
only 20% or 30% of their original prices. To be able to recycle
expensive branded cookware, Mr. Wong says his shop is the
“Milan Station” for stainless steel.
Mr. Wong named his shop “Truly Stainless”, which is a play on
words because it sounds like “Truly Good-For-Nothing”, a reprimand
in Cantonese. Nowadays consumerism prevails; how
many families will use a pot until it begins to rust? The shop
reminds us that, when we throw away things we should think
not only of our wallets, but also of saving the earth!
