KAMLOOPS - Volunteers participated in a multi-national movement to teach people how to make simple repairs to their household items this past weekend.

Nicholas Adams helped organize Kamloops’ first Repair Café as a part of the Green Living Expo at the Sandman Centre Saturday, Apr. 28.

Locals brought in their broken things; toasters, nightstands and bicycles to name a few. Then the skilled volunteers not only fixed the items, they taught people how to diagnose and make the repairs themselves.

Annie Maki brought in her decades-old Mixmaster. She was matched with Don Olson who is retired and fixes electronics for fun. He repaired her old mixer as she watched and helped.

“I think it’s extremely important that people realize repairing things is not only a good practice environmentally, but really easy and fun to do," Adams said.

Volunteer Graham Specht described a concept called “planned obsolescence” as he helped to fix bicycles.

“Nowadays we’re so consumer and turn-over oriented, that things are made to break," Specht said.

He said it is “not environmentally sustainable,” as it creates electronic waste and pressures people to consume.

“And in most cases, a repair is relatively simple,” Specht said. “If you just learn to do it yourself and have a couple tools.”

This Repair Café concept began back in 2009 in the Netherlands, according to the event's website. The following year journalist and publicist Martine Postma founded the Repair Café Foundation in Amsterdam. Today it helps groups around the world host their own event. In March this year the website boasted of supporting 1,500 local initiatives worldwide. 

Though it is a social event, Adams said there is a personal sense of accomplishment that follows the act of repairing your own possessions.

“Every time you use it, from now on, you’ll go ‘I fixed that.'" he said.

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