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Ilona Baliūnaitė

“I’m Playing The Long Game”: Woman Plants Bamboo Seeds To Get Back At Jerk Landlord

Whenever you think of revenge, it always entails some sort of plan, right? Even if you don’t formalize it on paper, there is always an idea that you follow to execute it.

And while some revenge plans take some time to realize, you wouldn’t expect it to take years. Or five. If it does end up taking five years, it shows a new level of dedication.

Well, that happened. Ish. A woman is 3 years in on her petty revenge plan, with another 2 left to go, but anticipation of the payback is killing her.

While it doesn’t apply to all landlords, some are ruining the party for everyone by being notorious in what they do

Image credits: Oleksandr P (not the actual photo)

And what they did this time around was promise a rental option, but didn’t go through with it, cuing some petty revenge

Image credits: shotprime (not the actual photo).

Image credits: eldee17

But it was no ordinary petty revenge—it was 3 of 5 years of waiting for some very tricky bamboo to sprout and be a pain to remove

Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)

A single mom of an eight-year-old recently shared a petty revenge scheme that’s short and not yet in fruition, but sweet nonetheless.

The story goes that she lives in a 1-bedroom apartment with her daughter. The landlord promised her a bigger accommodation he had some time ago, only to backpedal on his offer. Turns out, there’s a couple that moved in and they were favored all because they had dual income, whereas OP was a single mom with a single income.

In response, OP decided to to something quite devious. So devious, in fact, that it would take roughly 5 years to fulfill. As of this article, she’s 3 years in with only 2 to go. Well, OK, “only”. It’s a long time to wait, honestly. But you can’t rush bamboo.

The post now sits at 10.3K upvotes on Reddit with some folks suggesting other devious tactics

Image credits: Valeriia Miller (not the actual photo)

Folks were quick to react to the story, with one commenter—a student of ecology—saying just how much they cringed at the idea of the invasive spread of the bamboo.

Another commenter, whose neighbor did this on purpose 25 years ago, seemingly thinking it’s gonna be great, elaborated on the future. The neighbor moved away, but every other person living there has declared war on the bamboo at some point in their existence there and the bamboo still sits undefeated. It will surely last forever.

Others suggested other equally annoying plants, like yucca or the Japanese knotweed. Though, depending on where OP lives, this sort of deal can be considered an environmental crime, so caution was advised.

If you do end up backpedaling on that bamboo revenge, there is no easy way of removing it without compromise

Image credits: Lutfi Elyas (not the actual photo)

A lot of folk think that applying some Round-Up salt and other herbicides will kill bamboo. Unfortunately, bamboo is hella resilient, and using Round-Up will poison the soil so much that it might make replanting new stuff in that area next to impossible. So, it doesn’t come recommended.

What does come recommended, and probably the most effective method out there, is meticulously digging out the entire root and rhizome mass (the creeping rootstalk clusters), including its fragments. Water the area several days in advance to help the issue.

Start on the outside of the clump and work your way inward. The roots shouldn’t grow deeper than 1.5 feet. You can also chop them up into chunks and pull them out.

And if you can’t be bothered by that, just hire an expert.

But what you can definitely do on your own, without any linguistic intermediary, is share your thoughts and stories in the comment section below!

Folks online shared their reactions as well as similar stories and words of warning

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