Learning to 'see'...

In the Guardian today, there are some exquisite black and white photographs of homeless people taken by Lee Jeffries - view them here

In his Facebook profile here Lee explains how he started taking these beautiful images of homeless people and that he tries to get to know the story of each subject before he photographs them. He talks about really 'seeing' the person rather than passing by the familiar. It's a strange world where homeless people have become invisible. A year or two ago there was a documentary - I think it was called Return of the Tribe - which showed a small number of Papuan New Guinea tribesmen coming to Britain to see our totally different culture. When they learned about homeless people, they were totally shocked. The concept simply does not exist in their culture; community is so strong there that the notion of resources not being shared - from food, to shelter, to companionship - seemed utterly bizarre to them. We could learn a lot from them. Lee Jeffries photographs of raw humanity help to get this message across.

Sweet-toothed Dawn in a not so sweet situation

This evening, on my way along Victoria Street to Victoria station, I saw a woman sitting next to a Pret in a sleeping bag. I had been walking along thinking how freezing my fingers were, so when I saw her I stopped and asked if she wanted a sandwich or anything. It must be horrible to be out in this cold and insanely windy weather.

She said she had stitches in her mouth and pulled at her lip with spiny dirt-covered fingers to show me, and asked for a capuccino, which I brought out to her with loads of sugar - something I've learnt over the years of working with homeless people or doing this sort of ad hoc thing is that they invariably have an extremely sweet tooth.

She started talking about a hostel around the corner that she'd been offered a bed in by "outreach workers", but she couldn't get the bed because they were asking for a service charge of £8. She's been on the streets for 3 months now, taking showers occasionally at a day centre. That means she's been sleeping rough all over Christmas, through the harshest time in our climate. She was extremely thing - huddled up in multiple jumpers and jackets, with just tiny bird-like wrists and those dirty fingers sticking out, and cheekbones jutting out of her face. I'm not sure how old she was, 30s or 40s. She said she is from Wales, and came up to London with "a man" who proceeded to beat her, hence the stitches. She ran away from him 3 months ago and since then has been living rough. Her parents are dead and she doesn't know anyone in London.

She was very worried about the hostel. She said that if she didn't pay the service charge, she wouldn't be allowed in, and would lose the chance of a bed for the next 8 weeks. She seemed to think that the reason they were charging her was to check she was serious about wanting the bed, which sounded like a very odd policy to me.
The hostel was St Mungo's (not to be confused with the Harry Potter institution), and once I've published this, I'll be getting in touch with St Mungo's to see if this is really their policy, or if she was spinning me a tale in the hope of striking eight pounds worth of gold.