I first heard about pepenadores a quarter century ago, around the time Mexico City had its big earthquake.
http://es.wiktionary.org/...Personas que trabajan clasificando y separando la basura para posteriormente vender las partes reciclables.
Ámbito: México
Struck me as both a sign of a crappy economy, at least speaking in traditional terms, and as a great idea. I once had an idea for a science fiction story with a rather dystopian background in which two people talk about their metiers. "I'm in plastics," one says. "Dig up landfills looking for PVC. Rip down ranch houses . . . " The other, perhaps, has a job even more odd and, sadly, forseeable.
I was reminded of the pepenador today when my doorbell rang, and a shabbily dressed man with an old pickup truck asked about scrap metal. "Appliances, barn equipment, even old rock piles." He handed me a number, and I said I'd give it to my husband. Then I told him of the numerous places here in the back roads where people had tipped old refrigerators and couches off their tailgates.
I wanted to ask him what made him go looking for scrap metal. I wanted to thank him for thinking outside the box, too, because we'll be needing people like him.