Whilst walking past and admiring the famous Edinburgh Playhouse this morning, I almost tripped over a homeless guy sleeping in the middle of the pavement in a sleeping bag. He could only have been about 24 I’d say. He certainly didn’t look like a drinker. Not the often seen Edinburgh ‘jakey’.
He had a Polish look about him. I don’t want to sound like I’m stereotyping the Poles in the city, but after a while you get to recognise them. Had the poor bloke come to Edinburgh thinking the streets were paved with gold? It’s not necessarily an incorrect notion. This is and always has been a wealthy city. A grandiose project such as the New Town didn’t come about without a bob or two being spent. Maybe he’d come here with his girlfriend and they’d had a row and she’d thrown him out. I don’t know.
The point here is that I felt immensely sorry for him with the suited and booted stepping over or around him. Edinburgh isn’t like a big city in so many ways. There is still a sense here of community and the desire to help others. Edinburgh is sometimes portrayed as a mini London. To some extent that’s true. It’s a cultured, articulate and diverse city. We have more restaurants per head of the population than any other city in the UK. We buy more books than anyone else according to a recent Waterstones survey. However, we’ve not become an uncaring capitalist hub in the way big cities like London or New York can sometimes seem to be.
The abiding feeling I have today is there but for the grace of God go I. I have a job, a wife and a child on the way. I eat well, drink well and sleep well. I’m healthy. I have no money worries. We own two properties in the city centre. All of that could be gone in a flash though and this time next year maybe I’ll be the guy in the sleeping bag and maybe he’ll be the one almost tripping over me and then posting about it in his blog.
It’s all transient. I think I’ll live a little.
on Jun 1st, 2007 at 7:48 am
I was actually quite surprised about the number of homeless people I spotted in Edinburgh. Somehow I thought it was a London thing, how ignorant. And yes, it breaks my heart to see them too, I pass them every day on my way to work, where they get woken up by the street cleaners near Victoria station. It certainly makes you realize how lucky we are.