Papaj came to the auction ready to haul.
David Yaffe-Bellany Photos
Late sister’s belongings.
John Papaj had $100 in his pocket, a Dodge 4x4 waiting outside, and a look of quiet intensity in his eyes.
“She said, ‘Come get it,’” Papaj recounted. “I said, ‘Yes, baby, I got you.’”
Papaj, a tall, burly man who runs a construction company in Stamford, drove his pick-up truck to the State Armory on Goffe Street Monday to seek to recover a pile of cardboard boxes that belonged to his girlfriend’s recently deceased sister.
The sister had been evicted from her home on Hotchkiss Street shortly before her death last month, Papaj said. Now her belongings lay in a city warehouse inside the armory, where they were set to be auctioned off in a Department of Public Works eviction sale.
On the third Monday of every month, a small group gathers at the warehouse to bid on belongings taken from the homes of evicted tenants. A public works crew facilitates the process, recording bids and helping participants transport their purchases to a truck or van.
“We’re not trying to profit from someone’s loss,” Public Works CFO Marc DeCola told the Independent. Anyone can reclaim their belongings before the monthly sale, he noted, as long as they have somewhere to put them.
“People get laid off. People get divorced. Spouses pass away. Sometimes people drag their feet and get evicted,” he said. “It’s a sad story. But we try to make it as peaceful as possible.”
Papaj was joined at the auction by around five other bidders looking for good deals on second-hand furniture and used appliances. Public works keeps all that in roughly two dozen storage units, known as bins, that are grouped by the address from which they were taken.
Papaj had never attended a Public Works auction before, because he’s “not really interested in other people’s stuff,” he said. On Monday he was on a recovery mission.
“I just hope these people don’t jump on my bin, because I’ll raise the price on their bins,” Papaj added. “I’ll up the bid on their shit. And we’ll see whose money’s longer.”
Papaj said his girlfriend tried to take control of her sister’s belongings through the probate court, but the date of the auction arrived before that legal process had fully unfolded. She was out of town, or she would have gone to the auction herself, he said.
“Now she’s all depressed, and she wants her sister’s stuff,” he said, before gesturing to the other bidders. “I brought my ATM card if they want to play games. I’ll go to the ATM and hit them in the head.”
DeCola surveys the auction.
DeCola, clipboard in hand, walked the bidders from bin to bin, where cardboard boxes were stacked next to chairs and tables, desk fans and kitchen appliances. Any belongings that didn’t attract a buyer would go straight to the dump, he said.
“What’s sad about it is valuable things get thrown away,” DeCola said. “It’s people’s personal belongings. You get people coming here to buy other people’s stuff.”
Some bidders lingered over the bins, inspecting the furniture for cracks and eying the sealed boxes with curiosity.
Papaj, however, was in a hurry.
He’d taken the morning off to attend the auction, paying one of his employees, Alvaro, to watch his girlfriend’s dogs while he bid for the boxes. He bounced from foot to foot, checking the time every few minutes, desperate for a cigarette.
About ten minutes later, DeCola motioned to Papaj: He was about to introduce the bin Papaj had come to recover, with bids starting at ten dollars.
“I came for one bin, guys,” Papaj told the other bidders, explaining his situation and promising not to bid for anything else. “If you make me stay after, I’ll stay after.”
He stood in front of the bin — a relatively small arrangement of around a dozen cardboard boxes, one medium-sized fan, and a flat-screen television — waiting for someone to make a move.
One man put both hands in the air and walked away from the bin. Another stared at the ground.
“Ten dollars, going once,” DeCola said. “Going twice …”
He paused. “Sold.”
Papaj was delighted.
“If they’d made me pay, you would’ve made a lot more money today, believe me,” he told DeCola.
He stayed silent for the rest of the auction, keeping his promise to stay away from the other bins on sale.
Despite his earlier claim that “other people’s stuff” held no appeal, Papaj couldn’t help admiring the other items on sale: a television stand, a kitchen cabinet.
“These boxes are the key,” he said. “Imagine if you found a Gold Zelda game in a Nintendo box. Do you know how much that’s worth?”
Papaj’s truck pulls away.
After the auction ended, Papaj drove his pick-up truck to the entrance of the warehouse and loaded his boxes into the back. He had enjoyed himself, he said, and would consider coming again next month after all.
“We’ve got a lot of beautiful things here,” he said before pulling away.
