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Walking downtown as I have been doing lately has put me in front of a dilemma. I was raised to ignore beggars and other form of sidewalk solicitation. I gave to recognized charities and felt righteous, but now that I meet homeless people everyday, I am beginning to re-consider. I see the same ones everyday: the guy who stands in front of the Starbucks where there is old rock music blaring and where the sidewalk is always freshly washed like in Paris in the morning, everyone cleaning his piece of sidewalk. Then there is the smiling man who stands in front of a flower cart and always greets me with a hello. There is the handsome clean-shaven man wearing a raccoon hat who plays \u201cwooden spoons\u201d to a background tune of folkloric music. He is famous as the city wanted to forbid him to do his thing and there was a petition to keep him there\u2026he is part of the scenery\u2026sometimes when I am very lucky I get to see him and the bag pipe player circling the store at the same time\u2026All these men are pleasant and not threatening. Others play the pity card by exhibiting physical handicaps such as missing limbs. I think these attitudes back fire as I was (again) raised not to stare at handicapped people, I avoid looking at these men thus diminish their chance of getting money. Then there are some beggars who look menacing, cursing and swearing at you. Those have completely failed the effective begging 101 course. It is all about marketing\u2026Anytime someone wants money from another\u2026marketing is what makes or breaks the deal\u2026Squeegees (those who wash your windshield on street corners) aggravate me as I feel assaulted especially when they ignore my refusal. I also feel less sympathy for them, as they are usually young and relatively healthy, thus capable of holding a more traditional job. Besides, the water they use is dirty and they streak the windows rather than clean them. As for the musicians in the subway, I am told they must pass an audition before getting a permit\u2026 my favorite is a south American group who play the flute\u2026I have also been impressed by a lone performer who changes his tune according to who is coming his way\u2026he must have a psychology degree\u2026as most passers by smile when they pass by him\u2026 I must confess I have a hard time with girl beggars, especially those with tattoos, piercings, dirty hair and ratty clothes\u2026but that is my own sensibilities\u2026 I know the reasons for begging are as diverse as there are beggars. Some are emotionally disturbed people who got discharged from hospitals and sent off to fend for them selves, some are drug addicts, some apparently just cannot or will not play by the rules. I am told some do this as a job for a boss who must offer some kind of protection\u2026it does seem organized as the same people are always on the same spot\u2026I know that in some cities you can give them tokens redeemable for coffee or food. That is interesting\u2026I know some people give their restaurant doggie bags to beggars\u2026this ensures that the gift does not go to buy drugs or booze\u2026I know there are shelters that offer hot meals to homeless people\u2026but not all beggars agree to play by the rules and pass on those freebies\u2026I wonder if something more or different could be done for these people\u2026I wonder if my loose change makes a difference\u2026I wonder what does\u2026<\/p>\n
I wish I could photograph them…but there is something holding me back..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I have been pursuing my exploration of downtown churches and walked to St George\u2019s Anglican church the other day. It is famous for the clock on its fa\u00e7ade, but what […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=848"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":853,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848\/revisions\/853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flyingplates.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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