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[Kagus]

I bought a guy lunch today when I was waiting for the train. Was waiting in line to buy a ticket, this guy comes up and starts asking me in English if I could spare some cash. Not your stereotypical "this guy is so homeless his cardboard box got foreclosed on" fellow, and also not your typical Romani mafia beggar with the five different scarves either. He had short-cut hair, reasonably clean-shaven and a clean shirt. I lied and said I'd used up the last of my cash and coins, and he replied with "That's okay, I don't really need money, I just need some food". Okay, sure, why not... We head into the nearest kiosk and I ask him if he wants anything in particular, end up getting him a slice (or square, rather, because YURP) of pizza. While I'm ordering he also picks up a soft drink, so I add that on as well.

I was kinda having a hard time hearing him, but while we waited for everything to get rung up and served he was asking about maybe I could take out some money so he could buy some food at a grocery store, because he had a little gas oven in his tent and could thus make his own food. I mainly only heard the "Buy raw food to make it myself" part first, and said that "This (the kiosk) wasn't really the place to do that". He apparently took that to mean that this wasn't the place to take out cash, so he asked if we could maybe head over to the local grocery store then, but I needed to catch the train leaving in 5 minutes, so a shopping trip wasn't exactly gonna happen.

Then once he'd gotten everything and we were on our way out of the kiosk, he asked if maybe I could get him some gas. I said, again, "Sorry, but no. My train leaves in 3 minutes". He repeated the same deal about God loving me and Jesus thanking me, I wished him good luck, and we parted ways.


Like, I'm pretty sure I got scammed (again), but fuck it... I'll buy someone lunch, I don't mind. Hell of a lot better than shelling out 8x as much cash for "An emergency train ticket so I can go home" or "I need to go to the store to buy milk for my babies", or whatever other absolutely-not-a-con reason I get served. And if he really was needy, well, I still helped a little bit.



It's just... Helping someone should feel better than this, shouldn't it? I really only felt empty and kinda mildly perturbed after the whole thing.

[Doomblade187]

Eh. Giving to panhandlers varies in terms of experience, and if you feel like you may have gotten scammed, that typically worsens the feels. In my experience.

Edit: autocorrect messed me up

[Dunamisdeos]

Hell, I'll buy someone a lunch if they have the balls to ask a stranger. The off chance that they really need one is a plus.

[hops]

Yeah I'd give money to panhandlers when they give sob stories because that officially means they're spending more effort than they would've if they just went to a job interview instead, which imo prove their innocence.

[Kagus]

Yeah I'd give money to panhandlers when they give sob stories because that officially means they're spending more effort than they would've if they just went to a job interview instead, which imo prove their innocence.

There's legitimately a beggar mafia here, with practiced sob stories, defined begging spots, and a strict hierarchy. They make money hand over fist, because Norwegians are gullible as fuck and have large coin denominations (the most common pocket lint type coin being worth more than a dollar, smallest paper bill is closer to $6).

People come onto the subway cars and start handing out these bulk-printed paper cards about their such-and-such sick children and such-and-such not having enough money to buy food, despite apparently having enough to print out a couple hundred leaflets because you can't speak or understand the language.

I've been hit up by people giving me the same one-off sob story ("I was visiting a friend and now I need to go home but I don't have enough money for the return ticket to fucking nine-hours-by-train-land") multiple weeks in succession in the same place because apparently I have a very forgettable face.

There is absolutely a massive scam network going on, especially considering that we have an actual social system that can help a lot of legitimately struggling people. Not everyone, of course... It's still a fucked up bureaucracy, but some.

However, I'm more inclined to believe the plight of the somewhat bashful, very disheveled fellow who asks politely if I might have some spare change for the bus, and who repeatedly insists that he would have had enough to buy a ticket but "some coins must have fallen out of my pocket" than I am to believe the round little woman shoving a family photo in my face (none of the people in said picture looking even remotely like her, and I've already seen the same picture farther up the road) and who points me to the closest ATM when I say that I've got nothing on me.

[hops]

Scamming people is work.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[scriver]

They do use violence. If an actual (or just one who doesn't pay his dues) beggar shows up in their territory, for example. Around here a guy was driven to the middle of the woods, beaten and left tied to a tree, for example, because he had begged at the wrong place.

It's not the actual beggars that make the most money, of course. The guys who do don't actually do any begging of their own.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[scriver]

Here in Sweden, and probably the same for the rest of Scandinavia, we didn't have any problem like this until beggars started coming up from Romania by abusing the EU system. Our own homeless and similarly impoverished people were cared for by the welfare. It was basically impossible to be homeless here unless you chose to, had mental or drug problems which made housing difficult, or had fallen through the social security net by mistake. It happened, of course, but they certainly didn't need to beg for their sustenance as a rule.

[Rowanas]

I never give to beggars, but I never refuse a hitchhiker.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[Dunamisdeos]

Eh, I mean don't get me wrong I don't *literally* hand out stuff to everyone, but if some dude is like hey man I ain't got food I'll be like ye man u want an orange or a hot dog or something?

The places I've lived I usually end up getting to know the folks. One guy used to turn me down. I was delivering food around town as a side job and if he didn't see me pass by enough he would figure I was having a slow day and refuse to take any money from me.

I also work literally adjacent to the most popular train-jumping spot in the area, so I do see alot of people who dressed up as a poor from a clothing catalog so they could have a train jumping romp across the nation.

[Kagus]

I also work literally adjacent to the most popular train-jumping spot in the area, so I do see alot of people who dressed up as a poor from a clothing catalog so they could have a train jumping romp across the nation.

I originally parsed this as "jumping in front of trains" and was wondering why suicide tourists felt the need to dress up as hobos beforehand.


EDIT: Oh yeah! More horror stories: In India, we were advised by the locals not to give money to certain beggars (and holy shit there were a lot of beggars), because "They break their children's legs to make them seem more pitiful, so they make more money".

Always fun having an old hag come and latch onto your clothing, shoving her hand in your face for money when her ears and wrists are full of gold earrings and bangles. We also had a fun moment at a banana vendor when another beggar crone hopped over to us and started pleading for money to keep herself from starving. The vendor tried to offer her a banana to make her stop bothering his customers, she told him to fuck off.

[Loud Whispers]

EDIT: Oh yeah! More horror stories: In India, we were advised by the locals not to give money to certain beggars (and holy shit there were a lot of beggars), because "They break their children's legs to make them seem more pitiful, so they make more money".

In SE Asia, they just pretend to have broken legs... That's hardcore messed up to do it for real

That said I can concur with the organized begging scammers. Got them in London only instead of postcards, they use postcards & tissues, and don't even have the common sense to not wear designer clothes and fresh faces whilst begging.