Cochise
Priest of the cult of the Dog with the Broken Paw
- Joined
- Jun 17, 2011
- Messages
- 8,474
No robots in this but I'm pretty shocked by the amount of homeless people in my part of N.London. There's definitely more in the past year or so. Under the railway bridge near the train station there's now a small encampment. It's a grotty place on a main road with pigeons roosting above & people walking by, but drier than outside.
What's especially shocking is the increase in quite young people on the streets. There's a girl of about 20 regularly in the bridge encampment. I had a brief chat with a lad of about 16 - 19 begging outside Tesco on a bitterly cold night. He had no income & couldn't claim benefits without an address & was trying to raise £12.50 for a night in the YMCA. Said he'd been sleeping in the park the last few nights. He said someone had dangled a tenner in front of him then when he'd gone to take it, the guy snatched it away & called him a dirty cunt.
He seemed to have a bleak future. Nowhere to live, no chance of finding somewhere with no money. All he can do is beg & hope to get enough for a room for the night or try to find a squat somewhere if he hasn't got family or friends to help. There's another guy in the same predicament probably late 20s early 30s who begs regularly outside where I work to get enough for shelter for the night. I've seen him go downhill in about a year. These truly are desperate times for those people who slip through the net.
I was equally shocked last time I visited my hometown. Had a chat with a couple of guys in their 20's who were camped in a shop doorway. Something's gone badly wrong.