Pictures and Words

And now we are back on numerical track! Here we have Day 4, which was Thursday last week (for those of you playing along at home).

12:48am – Woken up by a security guard. “Sorry mate, can’t let you sleep out here. They’re watching you on the cameras”.

I’ve no idea why I was only woken up 4 hours after I’d already been asleep for 4 hours (actually, the last guy who woke me up at Fed Square did so at about 1 am as well), but he was polite and friendly about it, so I packed up and moved along.

I should point out that with the exception of the one unfriendly and unhelpful Tram Information Man, all authority figures so far have been polite and friendly. Perhaps it’s because I’m young and agreeable? I’m not sure, but I was expecting a lot more hostility than I’ve received so far.

1:10am – Wandered away from the building in search of a public loo. Couldn’t find one, so used a discrete back ally instead. Briefly considered sleeping in a concealed churchyard, but still curious to see what sort of attention (from police) sleeping in public in the city would draw, so I settled on a park bench.

7:30am – Woken up by the traffic, I lay on the bench for about 10mins before getting up and starting my day.

Most of the time, passers-by ignore me (with the exception of when I’m asking them for money), but when you’re sleeping in the middle of the city, you get glares of contempt, disgust and down-right revulsion. People really dislike people sleeping in their city.

When I was on the ground outside the building, people either didn’t notice me, were mildly curious when they did, or shied away in fear. My mere presence seemed to indicate that they were in “a bad part of town”, and they’d walk a bit more cautiously for having seen me.

7:40 – Got up. Walking past the church I saw a guy asking for change, being ignored by everyone who went in. That seems a little incongruous, doesn’t it?

I gave him my last dollar. He’d seen me get up from the bench I’d just slept on, so he was shocked and asked me if I was sure. I’m hardly having trouble surviving, so I told him to keep it and kept going.

Pulling out my map, I decided to check out the Queen Vic markets, both for begging potential or the possibility of cheep food.

8am – Passed the State Library of Victoria, which someone recommended to me as free entertainment. It opens at 10am, so I sat outside and did some writing.

On the way to the library I got $2.05 from a lady smoker, and 95c from a guy at the traffic lights.

10am – Library opened. They only allow “small bags” inside for our safety and convenience. I don’t fully understand what they mean by this, but I paid the dollar required to use the locker service.

10:15 – Used the internet for 15mins, checking out the homeless forums (forums.homeless.com.au) and found a particularly interesting thread on why people “choose” to be homeless, which I sent to Gavin to repost (Gavin: You can find it here).

10:30 – Spent a couple of hours reading a biography on Jim Henson. If I could have my lie reflect any entertainer’s, it would probably be Jim Henson. Amazing, fascinating man.

I also learned that Candice Bergen (Shirley Schmidt in Boston Legal) is the  daughter of famous ventriloquist, Ed Bergen.

1pm – This isn’t a “library” in the sense that I’m used to. 95% of the books are in “archive”, with the remaining 5% being randomly chosen. To access the bulk of the library, you have to become a member. (As I’m not in possession of a library card, I’m unlikely to become a member any time soon.) (Gavin: I’m not sure if he actually meant “library card”, as having a library card usually means you’re a member already.)

The book that I really came in to read is Justine Larbalestier’s latest novel, “Liar”. I’ve read her blog for years now, and when I came across her novel “How to Ditch Your Fairy” in a bookstore last year, I loved the first few chapters so much that I bought it straight away. To my surprise, there’s a shelf of Young Adult fiction here, and one of the first books I came across was “Liar”.

2pm – My 4 hours were up, but it was raining outside, and I was so keen to finish the book that I went and found someone to give me 85c so that I could stay for longer. Great, great book. I thoroughly recommend it. I’ll probably buy a copy of it first chance I get. Afterwards, I started through Humphrey Carpenter’s biography of Spike Milligan.

6pm – Didn’t particularly want to pay another dollar to stay in the library for the last hour. It was still raining out, so I stayed undercover at the library.

I wanted something a bit different for dinner, so I got enough change from people to get a piece of sushi: 25c from one guy, a dollar from another and 45c from a girl. I’ve never had so many people give such small amounts (I’m not complaining, that was all they had. It’s possibly an effect of asking people outside a library).

On the way up to “Sushi Sushi”, I saw a homeless guy with a cup out, so I gave him 50c. A piece of tuna sushi is $2.30, so on the way back to the library, I gave him the rest of my money: another 55c.

9pm – Lying outside the library thinking (I’d already grabbed an MX and done the sudoku by this point), a girl came up and, unasked, gave me $1.20. She must have been someone who said no earlier, then had a change of heart?

My phone finally died (straight from 2 bars to dead. What is the point of the bar system if it goes from 4, 3, 2, 0?) but fortunately there’s a power-point outside the library.

9:30 – It’s still lightly raining. There are plenty of undercover space outside the library, but again, I don’t want to risk taking up valuable real-estate. When it’s raining, this would be the first place I’d go, so I leave all the covered areas, and set up on a park bench under a tree. It offers partial cover while it’s raining lightly. Only the occasional drop comes through.

10pm – I drift off to sleep.

Up Next: Day 5

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