For the last two years, a homeless man who refuses to give his name or even converse with anyone has been living in a phone booth in Dalian city, Liaoning province, China.
Despite his stark, cramped and unappetizing surroundings, this man has managed to make a home for himself. He has found a spot to neatly stack a pile of food boxes and bottles of mineral water; his spare clothes hang from the roof of the booth.
Those who see him claim he is well groomed, has good personal hygiene and washes himself in public facilities.
“He wears old and patched clothes, but he looks very clean. Quite often he checks his appearance in a mirror to tidy his moustache. He talks to himself in the mirror, but he never speaks to anyone else. Sometimes we offer him some food but he won’t accept, and he won’t speak a word,” says the janitor of the neighboring building who sees the man every day.
The man is in a world all by himself and does not appear to even notice the throng of curious passersby in heavily traversed Zhongshan Square. After two years, he has simply learned to ignore them as they pass to and fro commuting to work and living their busy lives.
“We want to find his family and send him home. But he never talks to anybody. It’s hard for us to know how to help him, said a community worker.
This is a very sad commentary on the plight of the human condition; a fall from a place of secure grace where we are all balanced rather precariously in these times of economic hardship.
As a civilization, we need to look harder at things in a way that really matters; that is, we need to see them.
Maybe we need to make a phone call.
Excuse me, sir….
What do YOU think about this?
0 comments:
Post a Comment