Bali scavenger praised for returning gold jewelry

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Archipelago | Sat, April 06 2013, 2:52 PM

A young scavenger named Ahmad found three boxes of gold dumped in the back of a garbage truck in Denpasar, Bali, on Tuesday. Rather than selling the gold, he insisted on returning it to its owner.

Ahmad reported his finding to his boss, Made Raka, and they decided to wait until the owner arrived to meet them,

 “At first I thought they were boxes containing toys but then it turned out they were filled with gold jewelry,” Ahmad, who originally comes from Situbondo, East Java, said as quoted by kompas.com on Saturday.

After a long wait, a woman named Desak Ayu arrived at the garbage compound and asked Ahmad and Raka if they knew about her missing jewelry. Ahmad and Raka returned the jewelry to Desak after she correctly described some of the items, which together are worth around Rp 300 million.

As a token of her appreciation and admiration for Ahmad’s honesty, Desak then gave the youngster a sum of money and a bag of staple foods.

When asked why he had returned the jewelry to its owner while he could easily have slipped away and sold it, Ahmad replied that he would sooner live a humble but honest life rather than taking a slice from other people's good fortune.(dic)