Begging

Posted on 2002/07/10 09:34:38 (July 2002) by john.

What's the right thing to do?

The day before yesterday I was stopped on the way to the station, in the rain, by a fairly respectable looking girl, saying she needed money for the train because she'd had an argument with her boyfriend or something, and she was stranded. Yes it sounds like a cliche, but I thought at the time it must occassionally happen that people get genuinely stuck somewhere without any money and have no means of getting back, and lets say you live away from your parents, and don't know anyone with a car to come and pick you up. Well she seemed pretty genuine, and the weather was pretty terrible, so I gave her the small amount of change I had in my pocket and quickly walked off. This morning, to my frustration, I saw the same girl and she asked me for money to get the train again. Either she'd spent a day and a half trying to get the remaining 30p she needed for her train fare, or it was a bare faced lie from the start. When I informed her she'd asked me before, she seemed unphased and continued to ask for money anyway, so I walked off.

I was quite annoyed by this. I basically believe charity is not only a good thing, but an essential thing, and I'm sure there must be some situations when people genuinely do need money, and have to resort to begging for whatever reason. How are we ever supposed to know when they are genuine? I suppose the answer is you just can't. Nobody likes being lied to and conned, me especially, it leaves a nasty taste in the mouth, and the chances are I'll be much more reluctant to part with money towards people that may genuinely need it now. So what an incredibly selfish person this girl must be.

Madness, John! I also hate it when the beggers are better dressed than I am. Which happens often.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2002/07/10 11:52:23.

We had a simlar experience outside Notre Dame. We were approached by some foreign girls claiming to be "Assylum Seekers" from "Bosnia". So we gave them some cash (about £1!!) that we had in coins. About three minutes later, two more girls came with the same story - and an American woman ran up and shooed them away. She said that she had been going into her purse the day before and been robbed of a package that she put down... She said as we had helped the first lot, they would target us for the hit! Nightmare!

Posted by rowanboy at 2002/07/12 17:51:18.

Did I ever tell you about my donkey purse? It's a little leather affair with a red donkey embroidered onto the side. I've had it since I was 5 and started using it again when I was living down south. The basic premise is this: the donkey purse is full of copper coins and the odd five pence piece. When a beggar asks me for money I stop and look them in the eye and say that: 'i'll have to have a look'. I then proceed to slowly count out my copper pennies from my pretty donkey purse, making the whole event as pained as possible. The occassional twitch or period with my eyes closed, as if working some impossible mathematical schema, helps too. Most fake beggars will leave after a few seconds whilst the real ones will wait patiently whilst you count away. It's the only obvious solution really! Isn't it...

Posted by Rusty at 2002/07/15 24:32:06.

Good idea Rusty...! I may do something similar. Perhaps put copper coins in one pocket and proper money in the other.

Posted by rowanboy at 2002/07/16 17:06:02.

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