Homeless for a Weekend
Is it possible to survive a weekend in Sydney with just the clothes on your back? Sandra Fonseca takes the plunge and discovers what it is like to be homeless
Love, family, friends and the comforts of home; these are the things that make life livable. But what does it feel like to be without these things? What is life like for someone who is homeless? I wanted to find out, so I decided to go homeless for a weekend. I would stay in shelters and try to eat for free in order to find out first hand whether homeless services were able to meet people’s needs.
The experience proved to be both eye opening and life changing. For the first time in my life I felt the uncertainty of being homeless, of being alone and having nowhere to call home.
In order to undertake this, an element of deception came into play. I had to lie in order to access homeless services. My conscience mud-wrestled with ethics, but ultimately for me the importance of the story outweighed the dilemma of getting my hands dirty.
***
Friday morning, I called the City of Sydney’s Homeless Persons Information Center. After two unsuccessful attempts I made it into a telephone queue. After about 15 minutes of Chopin’s Mazurka, followed by Vivaldi’s Four Seasons Spring, I made human contact.
“I have no place to go”, I said. A cold voice melted into concern.
“What happened?” she asked.
I told her who I was, truthfully: A journalism student living at home and receiving youth allowance. Then I lied and said my parents had kicked me out following a dispute about money. She told me she could probably arrange for me to stay at a shelter in Central, that night.
“You would have your own room, which is lockable. There will be men in the hostel, but they aren’t allowed on the women’s floor. It houses 13 women and 13 men. Would that be okay?”
“Of course”, I said and she put me on hold.
Minutes later she returned and transferred me to a case worker, who asked me questions in a sympathetic voice and promptly stated she didn’t think someone like me would be able to handle the shelter she had in mind.
“We’ll put you up in the YWCA* tonight”, she said.
An hour later, I left home with a small backpack containing essential items, none of which included food, water, money or clothing (I had a phone in case of emergency). I met the caseworker in the lobby and she was exactly as I’d imagined her. Big bosomed, motherly and middle-aged, with short blonde hair. Piercing blue eyes brimming with concern, she asked me a multitude of questions, filling out her questionnaire as she went. Was I on drugs? Mentally ill? Had I been homeless before? I answered as truthfully as my mission permitted and we talked options for my future.
“You can stay here for a maximum of two weeks”, she said. “The next step would be to move you into a medium-stay facility, like Samaritan House*. But it isn’t ideal. There will be people there who aren’t like you,” she said.
“Anyway, just chill out this weekend and I’ll arrange for you to meet a lady who specializes in helping youth on Sunday morning and you can talk over your options with her.”
She gave me a map of the area with locations for the food van; a $10 phone card, two vouchers for breakfast, two $10 vouchers for KFC and two eight-dollar vouchers for Michel’s Patisserie.
“I’m sorry there isn’t much variety but these should take you through the weekend”, she said, breaking my heart.
***
I came out of the lift into a Matrixesque white corridor stretching in both directions, doors lined one after another. My card key opened a room with two beds. Inside the cupboard I discovered a television set, fridge, kettle and iron. My heart sank. I had signed up for a homeless experience and wound up staying in a place ten times better than any place I’d stayed in while backpacking through Europe. Some Irish backpackers would later tell me they were paying $80 a night to stay there.
It struck me that a person like me who was sound of mind, not addicted to drugs, well educated and who had a strong support network was highly unlikely to become homeless and even if they did, they would not be afforded the same treatment as someone without these advantages. While I could understand that the caseworker did this for my protection, to ensure I didn’t fall in with the wrong elements at a time when I was vulnerable I still felt like a some kind of corrupt tourist.
***
Tummy rumbling, I made my way to the KFC on George St, got a meal takeaway and sat on the plastic benches next to Town Hall. I greedily inhaled the roll, gazing at passersby. At that time on a weekday everybody is madly rushing somewhere in crumpled suits. The sun hid behind skyscrapers, turning everything blue.
I spotted him in the distance. His name was Edward and he wasn’t all there, zig zagging from person to person he obtained a cigarette and sat down to smoke. He wore a dirty blue flannel jacket, with a woolen collar, gray trousers and sandals. His gray hair stood up, beard dominating a weatherbeaten face, his eyebrows curled to give him an expression of eternal surprise, brown eyes deep with sadness and kindness.
I walked over to him and offered what was left of my chips. He thanked me, took them and submitted to my questions, which he answered in a disjointed nonsensical fashion. His brow furrowed as he talked, straining to make himself understood, struggling to understand. He told me he had the option to stay at a hostel but that he didn’t want to because he wanted to get a job.
“It’s no good because the people there…I don’t want to be around them. To get a job you need all your things in one place. I need to shave and fix my features. I’ve got hair in my ears.”
Illogical as his answer was, the man was clearly mentally ill, it struck me that if he refused help no one would force him to do differently. Without loved ones and without a modicum of mental health, he had fallen through the cracks.
“I’ve been homeless for a while,” he said, “because my mother abandoned me”. He repeated the phrase three times and with each utterance his gaze turned further inwards and he looked to be in some dark place in his mind.
He hadn’t always been homeless. He had once had an apartment in Kogarah and a job at the AMCO factory.
“I had a nervous breakdown. I’ve lost my grip…I’ve lost my grip on life”, he told me.
“See all those people there”, he said pointing at the rush of people, “Going to work, going home. They have money. They aren’t depressed. Work is an uplifting thing. You’ve got money in your pocket and you can buy an iced chocolate. I want to get a job, but I think I’m invisible”, he said.
I told him I had to go and shook his hand. He held mine tight a moment and pursed his lips.
“That’s okay” he said, injury flashing in his eyes.
I felt his deep longing for company. His heart wrenching loneliness was almost too much to bear. As I turned to walk away two teenagers laughed at us and stared.
***
Later that night, I slowly made my way to Cook and Phillip Park where I knew there would be a Vinnie’s van distributing tea and sandwiches. I walked with a heavy heart, feeling like a seedling in the wind, through the cold dark city.
In a small lit corner people milled around the van. In all there were about thirty, mostly older men with a few women. St Mary’s Cathedral glowed, towering benevolently above us and there was a convivial feeling as people called out to each other and made laughing conversation. Two young guys strummed Pink Floyd’s, ‘Wish you were here’ as I grabbed a tea and sat down. After a time I struck up a conversation with a young Indonesian man who had an apartment in the city.
“By Friday I run out of money so I come here for a drink and to meet different types of people. I practice my English”, he said. He told me that tomorrow I could get a hot meal just around the corner if I turned up at eight.
He introduced me to John , a young Maori guy who dabbled in drugs and brandished a nasty bruise on his now bent nose, fresh from a fight two days earlier. John was sleeping at friend’s houses and was currently unemployed. He was awaiting the outcome of a court case, having been charged with assault.
Then I met David , an Aboriginal man from North Queensland, who looked to be in his fifties. He told me he wasn’t homeless anymore, but he had the face of a man who had suffered.
“I was homeless for about 12 months. That was enough”, he said.
“Bad things happened. I went through hard times but now I got the faith. It keeps me going.”
“One night I was in Townsville and I fell to my knees and called out ‘Our father who art in heaven – help me!’ Then I felt a warmth at the top of my head and it spread down my body. It was the blood – the holy blood of God.” As he talked of his God his face beamed with beauty.
He explained he hadn’t known that help existed and told me how he had survived by sleeping on trains in winter, riding all the way to Newcastle and back. In summer he slept in the park, where one night he was attacked by a group of young men. They surrounded him and he began dancing and calling out to God. One of them threatened him and he said, “Go ahead kick me”.
“And when he kicked me I thought of God and I didn’t feel a thing. I just stood there and smiled and they got scared and ran off,” he said. “If you believe in him he will fight for you. But I’m a hypocrite standing here smoking a cigarette. I’m like the world”.
As I left them, my belly warm with tea and company, I felt better than I had all day. Back at the Hostel, I fell asleep to the distant sound of sirens, the dull roar of traffic, people hooting and laughing.
***
The next day, having missed breakfast, I went to Michel’s Patisserie. A woman greeted me in lofty tones. She eyed me suspiciously, put off by my disheveled appearance. I got my meal and wandered over to Samaritan House*, where I hoped I might find lodgings for the night. I pressed the buzzer, and the answer came.
“We haven’t got any vacancies at the moment. Have you got the HPIC number?”
On my way back I bought a new shirt at Vinnie’s, deciding the one I was wearing was far too dirty. As I walked past a convenience store, an old man on crutches stopped me. With his disheveled white hair, sharp blue eyes and wizard-like oblique nose. He spoke in drawling tones through missing teeth.
“Where do you live?” he asked.
“Around,” I replied.
“You Homeless?”
I nodded.
“There’s a hostel up the road you can come too. I’m staying there. It’s really good. Just $70 a week. That’s not much out of your pension and you’ve got all the coffee you want. They fix you teeth and clean you up. You go during the day and come back at night to sleep. Do you want to come with me?”
The dulled malice in his eyes told me in a past life, when he hadn’t been old and helpless, he might have been an unsavory character. I thanked him and left.
I spent the rest of the day wandering the city, people watching. As I lay in Hyde Park I observed how people walked with purpose, they looked straight ahead and strode. As a ‘homeless’ person not needing to be anywhere, I felt a part of everything and removed from everything at the same time. I felt like I was watching life pass me by. I missed my family and friends.
***
That night I went to the Yourong Parkway at 8pm, where Just Enough Faith parks its van every night. There were up to seventy people there, most were older men, with a few women and young people. I waited in the long line for a hot meal. As people inched along, late arrivals joined the queue. Among the din of chatter, people called each other by name, friends reunited shook hands, patted each other on the back and waited patiently for much needed sustenance, as they do every night.
After 45 minutes waiting I was given the choice of chicken, beef or mince, rice or vegetables. The people ahead of me walked away with two plates, piled high. I happily tucked in. It wasn’t the most delicious meal I’d ever eaten, but it was nutritious. By the time I’d gobbled it, the salad and dessert options had dried up. By 9.30 it was all gone. The volunteers beamed with benevolence as they handed out muffins, clothing and blankets.
I made my way back to the Vinnie’s van for some tea. Characters from the previous night reappeared and greeted me like an old friend. John offered me a newspaper to sit on and we made small talk with the Indonesian man.
They introduced me to Stuart , an ice addict built like a tank. With a bald flat head and beady eyes, he spoke at a million miles an hour, punctuating every sentence by wiping his nose with the back of his hand. He eagerly ran from person to person cracking Borat jokes and laughing loudly.
“You got somewhere to stay tonight?” he asked, “Come down and sleep under the bridge with us. There’s a whole bunch of us that do it. I got a spare mattress and blankets. It’s awesome.”
“I’ve got a room tonight”, I said.
“That’s good. Yeah those refuges are good. But the thing I don’t like is they’re not permanent,” he said.
“We make sexy time!” he laughed. “Just kiddin’ you’re too young for me”, he said walking away, “but we could still have some fun”. He looked back to see my reaction. I laughed.
An hour later, I made my way back to the hostel for the last time.
***
The next morning I had a meeting with the youth case worker. She lay out my options. She could put me in a place like Samaritan House* for a while and then I could go on the waiting list for supported accommodation. She warned me that often there weren’t any vacancies. I asked her what people did when they couldn’t get a place at a shelter. She told me sometimes they were put on waiting lists, or “they go and stay with friends or look for accommodation themselves.” She shrugged.
I asked her what it would be like to be in a proper refuge. “Well when you get a concentration of people who can’t function in several areas of their life, it can make it a tough environment,” she said. “It wouldn’t be like here.”
I asked her why they had put me in such a nice place in the first place. She implied that it was because I was a low risk client and didn’t have the same problems others did.
“We put people here if they can motivate themselves to take the steps they need to take to get their life on track,” she said.
***
People become homeless when their life takes a bad turn and they haven’t the support of loved ones to get them through.
Homeless people live on the fringes of society; they live day to day, moment to moment. In order to survive they form tight social bonds with people in similar situations, forming a kind of underclass subculture. As a pseudo-homeless person, everywhere I went people offered me whatever help they could. It touched me deeply. Even in their most downtrodden moments, people still have the capacity to care for others. Many of the homeless people I met seemed more deeply human than most people.
The hardest thing about being homeless is the feeling of isolation, the feeling of disconnectedness from the rest of the world and the uncertainty of not knowing where your next meal will come from and where you will sleep that night. But the loneliness and isolation I felt was but a tiny fraction of what a real homeless person would experience. After all, I always had a home to go to.
If this experience taught me anything, it taught me the value of relationships. On the surface people appear disparate, but underneath we are one and the same, with the same desire to be happy and the same need to feel valued and loved.
* YWCA is an international non-government organisation, which pledges to support people at ‘critical times’ through a variety of social welfare programs. The Y-Hotel in the CBD provides low budget accommodation to backpackers, with three two-bed rooms reserved for women in crisis.
* Samaritan House is women’s refuge run by the Salvation Army.
* All names in the story have been changed to protect identity.
8 months ago
