A Difficult Side Of Travel

Beggars And The Homeless

A long time ago I spent some time in Florence, Italy and got to be friends with an Italian girl. As we walked around the city, every few blocks there would be a beggar, mostly older women, just sitting on the sidewalk usually on a blanket. As we passed each one, my companion would drop a 10 Lira coin or two on the blanket and suggested that I do the same thing. Those women weren’t doing much except just quietly sitting there and my companion said it was Italian tradition to not walk by a beggar without dropping a coin or two. Besides it also brought good luck. In the nineteen sixties a ten Lira coin was a small aluminum coin actually worth only a small fraction of a US cent. They were often used to ride elevators or use a public toilet, so the cost of dropping a coin was negligible in value. Just giving did actually have a good feel to it though…

Times seem to have changed since those days in Italy and not for the better. In much of the world. Homelessness appears to be growing a lot and officials seem to be reluctant to acknowledge it let along suggest solutions.

Recently, in South Africa the Sun had just set and we were making our way up a narrow side street in Cape Town into the courtyard where our hotel was located. A young woman, maybe late teens to mid twenties, approached us begging and said “I’m not a bad person. I just need a little help”. With a quick sorry, we moved on but that encounter has stuck with me.

At that time we’d been in Cape Town for four or five days and had been warned about straying away from the major areas, especially after dark. There were also many travel warnings against engaging with street beggars. While we’ve spent time in a number of sketchy places around the world, Cape Town didn’t seem to be living up to needing those warnings and we had seen less than a dozen beggars around. But, being extra cautious is still our habit when traveling to unfamiliar places and street people can be a threat.

Homelessness may be one thing and crime infested areas another but the margins, at times, can seem to get blurred. And over the past decade or so it does seem that homelessness is a growing issue. Often when we travel we have people warn us against engaging with beggars on the street. And recently in Mumbai the hotel front desk warned us not to even acknowledge street beggars. Just look straight ahead and keep walking, claiming that if we even stopped to say sorry we would begin to attract a crowd of beggars. One hotel manager said that a recent couple had actually been giving beggars money on the street and a large group had followed them back to the hotel and waited outside for hours waiting for the couple to come out again. After a few days walking the streets in Mumbai that seemed to be good advice.

We’re still conflicted on how to deal with beggars and the homeless as we travel. First, what we are able to give seems like a drop in an ocean and often, at times we’re not sure that it is even helpful to give money to street people. That being said we’re not sure we’ve seen any government anywhere offer serious solutions or ideas or even indicate that they understand there is a problem.

“It’s the best of times, it’s the worst of times” and so opens Charles Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities. “it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity.”