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Luke's story of living homeless on Los Angeles's Skid Row is powerful and heartbreaking. No one should have to live like this. No one should have to fight just to survive for food and shelter and live in constant in fear.
Luke came to LA with his wife. Her family invited them to come to live with them, so they jumped on a Greyhound bus. They started calling, and their family never answered. When they arrived in Los Angeles the couple was forced to go to Skid Row where they are now stuck.
[...] "Skid Row is by the bus station. It's where all the shelters are. It's where all the food is. It's where all the resources are located. But Skid Row is a very nasty place" Luke shares in this interview. He goes on to say "[Skid Row] will make it so you are just constantly worried about what you need to survive because everything is being taken from you."
Luke talks about how gangs tax homeless people in Skid Row for living on the sidewalk or in a certain area. If you don't pay, they beat you up or burn down your tent with all of your belongings in it.
Her family invited them to come to live with them, so they jumped on a Greyhound bus. They started calling, and their family never answered
originally posted by: SummerRain
Ha ha. What does he think? That he's living in some sort of CIVILISED country?
Nah uhh. You'll hear it here.. "Hyuk, I aint not paying fer no nothing I didn't work muh faingers to tha bone just sos someone can comes steals my hard earned stufff.. Nah uhh."
It takes a village to raise a child.. It takes a society to destroy a future.
So, they hopped a bus to a known nightmare town, and didn't bring enough resources to go back to where they came from? And her family just... Abandoned them mid trip?
Doesn't sound like we've got the full story here.
originally posted by: CriticalStinker
adequate housing could be part of the compensation .
originally posted by: rexsblues
hell is only but a few tragedies away from us all.
originally posted by: SummerRain
a reply to: CriticalStinker
That there is a discussion about it, is the best thing ! I do know one thing, it's not about giving things - it's about allowing things. Most of this world is set up to disallow people. I can't set up a tent in any area, illegal camping. I can't hunt for food, etc. All in all, for myself, if I wanted to become off grid, I'd basically be breaking laws. And those laws are not laws protecting anyone or anything, but laws that fall beyond the rights of a person to when born, to live free.
originally posted by: CriticalStinker
a reply to: SummerRain
I try not to comment on something I don't like unless I play with the idea of a solution. While it may not work, or is a horrible idea is besides the point, it starts discussion.
I worked for a logistics company years ago, all of management had a lot on their plate, my boss got bogged down by people just coming to him with complaints, so he said don't come to me with problems, come to me with solutions, and that has always stuck with me.
Some people are just like this though.
originally posted by: MerkabaTribeEntity
This one got me right in the feels, MODS, I've done a search and it didn't come up, so if this is a repost I apologize.
Luke's story of living homeless on Los Angeles's Skid Row is powerful and heartbreaking. No one should have to live like this. No one should have to fight just to survive for food and shelter and live in constant in fear.
Luke came to LA with his wife. Her family invited them to come to live with them, so they jumped on a Greyhound bus. They started calling, and their family never answered. When they arrived in Los Angeles the couple was forced to go to Skid Row where they are now stuck.
[...] "Skid Row is by the bus station. It's where all the shelters are. It's where all the food is. It's where all the resources are located. But Skid Row is a very nasty place" Luke shares in this interview. He goes on to say "[Skid Row] will make it so you are just constantly worried about what you need to survive because everything is being taken from you."
Luke talks about how gangs tax homeless people in Skid Row for living on the sidewalk or in a certain area. If you don't pay, they beat you up or burn down your tent with all of your belongings in it.
Luke's Wife has ended up feeling the desperate need to sell her body simply in order to survive the streets, through which she became pregnant. At the beginning of her pregnancy, she began having seizures. She has since been diagnosed with brain cancer which has left her terrified, as, if I'm understanding him correctly, the treatment carries an 80% risk of infant mortality. (Someone please feel free to correct me if I heard or understood that part wrong)
Towards the end of the interview, Luke was asked: "If you had three wishes, what would they be?"
His response, after a moment of reflection, was:
"It's hard, I haven't wished for anything in so long, because I'm just worried about getting what I need, it's a hard one."
"I wish for my Wife to be better, and I wish I had a family, and I don't know what I'd do with the third one, I'd probably give it away".
I can't imagine having to live this life. After watching the video (08:55), which honestly teared me up, I went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. That hit me, how I take a simple cup of tea for granted.
While waiting for the kettle to boil, I stood and looked out over my family garden, through my kitchen window, looking at the huge marquee at the bottom, from a large Christening party last weekend.
I think sometimes it's all too easy to lose sight of what we have right in front of us, to take it all for granted.
"Skid Row hurt me in ways I can't ever explain. It made me do things and made see things I wish I would have never seen." ~ Luke
“He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her.”
The bottom line is that these folks are either junkies or can short of a six pack upstairs. It is that simple.