My friend Jonathan Gray and I went on a mission tonight. We ventured to Telegreph Avenue, the well known street in Berkeley, California, where you find yummy food stores, tons of shopping, and of course, hippies, pot smokers, drunkards, and many homeless. Our goal was to capture the "street life" of Berkeley, to enter in last month's Global Gallery competition... which we missed by about a week. We brought our digital cameras, pockets full of change, and an open mind.

We were at first pretty shy, and we just asked a couple of interesting looking kids on the street if we could take a picture of them. We said that we were doing a chronicle of Berkeley street life. They were wearing black, gothic looking clothes, with cut pants and a nose ring... they had their packs with them and were clearly living on the street. Later on, when we walked a block to take a picture two girls sitting on the street, with a sign saying "Out of work Pornstars," the guys came back and we chatted for a bit. They were from North Carolina and had just been traveling around for a while, and ended up in Berkeley. I asked them where they sleep, and they said in shrubs and other locations where the police don't bug them. Not staying much longer, we moved on and walked down the street until we reached a group of 3 people. One black man who was in his mid 30's, very well dressed, and clearly very intelligent, another younger guy, who was stoned and didn't speak much, and an older hispanic guy who was quite drunk and spent 20 minutes trying to tell me his life's philosophy (but not very successfully), and trying to tell me where he grew up in NYC and New Jersey. These guys definitely didn't want their picture taken, but they were interesting to talk to. They didn't accept our change, making a joke of it by passing it around among themselves until it reached back to us... they said that there were more needy people. The drunk dude told me that he was only half-homeless, that he has an uncle whose place he can go to. And the guy who was well dressed has had a job in the area, and he seemed to just around to smoke some pot. We spoke politics for a while, specifically about illegal immigrants coming from Mexico, and whether their children should have education provided by the state. The general consensus was yes, because they are working and contributing to the US economy. It took a while to peel away from these guys, because the drunk dude kept on trying to put his arm around my shoulder and talk nonsense to me.

We continued walking down the street until we met a young (I would guess mid 20's) kid named Justin, who was dressed in some interesting clothes, and was happy to allow us to take pictures of him. Justin has been living in Berkeley for six weeks now. He is from Mississippi, and chose to come to the city of Berkeley because of the University and the intellectual atmosphere. We chatted for over an hour, about a range of topics: from how to feed the world's population with 250 greenhouses to the five basic needs of humans (according to him, health, food, shelter, communications, and transportation). He's held a variety of jobs - web designer, graphics designer, dish washer, and 6 others. Apparently his decision to come to Berkeley and live on the streets was part of a desire to "rough it out," envisioned during an episode with Mushrooms (drugs). He was an extremely intelligent person... We learned a lot from him about street life in Berkeley. He said that he sleeps with two other people, most nights in shelters at local churches. He said that *no one* in Berkeley, unless they're very dumb, goes hungry. A homeless person could be hiding in the most remote location, and some local Berkeley resident will find him to give him food and/or money. Everyone on the streets seemed to know each other's names. They have a strong sense of camraderie. While I was talking to Justin, another (much more disheveled looking) homeless guy walks up and hands 3 small (new) tubes of toothpaste to Justin. He doesn't ask for anything in return. Then he says that he'll be back in 15 minutes, and returns carrying a blanket, sweater, and a very old-looking Indian shirt (corta). The sweater ended up getting passed on to another guy sitting on a skateboard next to Justin. I was astounded to see so much sharing! Justin told me that Berkeley shop owners, knowing that their trash cans are sifted through, leave items that are good either towards the top of the trash, or right next to it.

I learned so much. For example, these guys are perfectly welcome on the streets, so long as they stand to the side (there is actually a clear separation between the sidewalk and the location where they are allowed to loiter). However, they're not supposed to lie down, and he was telling us about a nearby shop owner who has recently been calling the cops because of one guy who, far away, was innocently resting his legs. Apparently these homeless guys keep a good repetoire with the Berkeley police. They want to keep the streets safe just as much as the police do, and they do what they can to keep them safe. Most of these guys smoke pot and do some other drugs, but the Berkeley police don't seem to really care. I mean, in past times I've seen homeless people with signs saying "please give me money to feed my pot addiction". Safety is a bit of a concern though, and Justin had slept his first couple weeks with a weapon in his hand. He said it is safer because he has two other persons that he regularly sleeps with at night.

Ok, that's all for tonight. I'm waiting for Jonathan to write up his observations; maybe I'll edit mine later. I walked home around 12am at night, but then since it was such a nice night I decided to go walking through campus... so until about 1am I was strolling through the Berkeley campus by myself (it is pretty safe, there are cops driving by very frequently), taking pictures and reading a book.