Ecologue

The volunteers for the Repair Fairs come from an varied backgrounds: from students and OSU staff, to D.I.Y. enthusiasts from the Corvallis community. Following each Fair, we’ll provide insight into the people behind the repairs. This is…

Meet the Menders

For the January Repair Fair, we interviewed Chris Moser, a long-time repair volunteer for the housewares, appliances, and electronics sections.

What do you do outside of the Repair Fairs?

I am a retired oceanographic assistant. I still go back to work a little less than half-time doing oceanography.

How did you hear about the Repair Fairs?

It was a Master Recycling class that I took at OSU several years ago, and as a continuation of that Master Recycler class, you could gain community credit and Master Recycling credit by volunteering for things like the Repair Fairs, so I started doing that.

What repair skills do you employ?

A lot of luck, and a lot of counting on my other friends to help me out when I can’t figure out what the problem is… skills of just being confident enough to take some things apart without breaking them, and try to put them back together fixed.

What are your thoughts on the Repair Fair?

The Repair Fair is wonderful! I think it should be encouraged, it should happen more often, I think that people are easily enticed into a one-way-throw-it-away mentality in a lot of the things that they use in this world and that is exactly what I don’t want to support. I want to support the repair side of reduce, reuse, recycle, repair. That should be the other r in the cycle of things.

Would you like to add anything else?

Never take broken for an answer.

This post is a part of the “Meet the Menders” blog series, where we feature the volunteers of the Repair Fairs. Interested in becoming a repair volunteer? Contact Kyle Reed.