INTERESTING: If you are a student then you need these 'tricks' to save you money
A student shares his money-saving tricks which got him free food for two years...
Student life is not easy. With all the excitement of getting into that life of independence comes the added stresses of managing your finances without the help of your parents.
This is especially so if you are studying away from home and have to deal with cleaning up after yourself, feeding yourself, and making sure you make time to stay healthy, alert, and mentally aware for your classes. The main thing that helps when it comes to staying alert has got be a healthy meal or any meal for that matter.
Very rarely do students find the time to come up with money-saving hacks or tricks that they willingly want to share, but not this student. Jordan Vidal, who has been named the money-saving hero, managed to go two years without paying for a single meal...
Hooked? So are we. Just as a disclaimer, Jordan is from the University of South Wales in Cardiff, which is located in the United Kingdom. So anything that we cover today, there is no guarantee that you can do it here in South Africa, but it's like that saying, you won't know until you try, right?
Jordan learned early on that the bills can pile up when you are at university. He realised that he needed to come up with a way of dealing with being a student and making it work for him.
"When he found his student loan and a part-time job weren’t enough to pay for rent, partying and the supermarket shop, he established an ingenious system that kept his stomach full and his fridge stocked." (Metro)
"According to research released by the Save the Student website, 76% worry about making ends meet. One in ten students said they had never budgeted before starting at university, and 74% said they wish they better understood their finances."
His discovery happened whilst he was at a casino in the early hours of the morning, when he found out that casino members were entitled to a complimentary buffet that hosted soft drinks and an eat as much as you want option. So he signed up for free and got to it...
After three or four plates of noodles, spring rolls, sticky fried rice and sweet and sour chicken, I’d have eaten enough to keep me going through the next day. I had so much to eat that when I woke up I still felt full.
Read more: #AppreciationMonday: Food For Life Africa on a mission to eliminate hunger in South Africa
Jordan started his freebie hunting finding restaurants and cafes, becoming friends with the owners and the staff and eventually asking them if he could have the food that they were going to throw away from that day's business.
Legally, they have to bin any food that was made fresh that wasn’t sold, even if it’s perfectly fine to eat,’ he explains. ‘I’d ask if they were going to throw anything away. And if they did, they’d give it to me. My fridge was constantly stocked up with sandwiches, cookies, slices of cake.
Jordan managed to leave University with £3,000 of savings, which was "made from a part-time job in hospitality, which paid just over £7 an hour. He had plenty of money left over for partying, and graduated with a degree, cash in the bank and having not paid a single grocery bill in two years." (Metro)
It goes to show that anything is possible with some innovation and thinking outside the box. Jordan also brought some light on the fact that there are so many people who go without food and there are so many food outlets and eateries that throw away food when there is absolutely nothing wrong with the food.
Image Courtesy of Facebook