One of the
more prominent features of Lahaina, the historic Royal Capital of the Kingdom
of Hawai’i, is a spreading banyan tree outside the old court house. From a
single trunk, its aerial root system spreads over 2/3 of an acre: the roots,
which appear to be branches, dive down into the ground and take root,
themselves; others spread outward and up.
The ficus benghalensis, which was planted in
1873, is a favorite spot for tourists to take photos, and people of all ages
mill about, posing, snapping pictures, and gazing in wonder at the this tree.
And nearly invisible are the half-dozen or so people who actually live there.
By “live
there”, I don’t mean in Lahaina: I mean “live under the tree”. These are some
of the homeless on Maui.
I know what some might be thinking: "So you're homeless - you're on Maui! Sleep on the beach ... under the stars ... must be nice!" Yeah - right.
One man is
hunched over in a wheelchair, with what looks like a plate lunch in a Styrofoam
container in his lap. He seems unwilling or unable to brush away the flies that
seem to be enjoying the lunch more than he. A friend is sitting next to him and doesn't seem bothered by the flies, either. On a bench nearby, a man with a grey
beard is lying on his back, a few shopping bags with belongings and cans on the
ground beside him; a grey-haired, tanned woman is sitting beside him, reading a
book to him.
Another
fellow is sitting on a bench next to them with a dog beside him. Clean-shaven,
tanned, and clear-eyed, he tells me the dog isn’t his: “I’m just watching her
for her mom,” he says.
“Him,” I
say, noting the obvious.
The man
tells me his name is Mike and that he had been a casting director in Hollywood. “It
was a lot of work: I’d go twenty straight days without a break, and I’d be just
about to take some time off when they’d call me and I’d have to go to another
set and work there. When I had my last heart attack, my doctor said I had to
retire.”
“Your ‘last’
heart attack?”
“I had a
mild one, then I had a serious one, and that’s when the doctor told me to get
out of the business.”
But the
Hollywood glamor did not come with a decent retirement plan, so with a Social
Security income of $509.00 a month, Mike headed for Maui. “You can’t buy much
on $509 a month,” he said, “and you can’t afford rent.”
“At least
you don’t have to worry about heating bills,” I offered.
“My brother
in Pittsburgh spends more in a month on heating than I get in Social Security,”
he says. “If it gets ‘cold’,” he said, making “quotation” signs with his
fingers, “you might need to use one sheet or a blanket. So, you know: I could
be in Pittsburgh!”
At another
point, he told me about working for his brother, who’s a lawyer. “I had a job
going around to the pharmacies and picking up medication just before they were going to expire, then taking it to the
homeless people.”
“What kind
of medication?” I asked. “Prescriptions? Methadone?”
He shook his
head. “Antibiotics. People on the streets – “ he looked around him “—they don’t
take care of themselves. They get sick … they need antibiotics.” Around
Lahaina, there are no facilities like The Lord’s Rain. Mike manages to get to
the public swimming pool from time to time to wash up, but for the most part,
it’s a basic human need that’s still unmet.
I thought those who support The Lord’s Rain would like to know that: that it's provided -- and
continues to provide – something not readily available in other parts of
the world. When I see some of the infections suffered by binners on Vancouver’s
Downtown East Side – like the time, a few years ago, when Ron nearly lost an arm
because a “nick” from a dumpster got infected (doctors had to open up Ron’s
entire forearm to treat the infection) – I think how much worse things could be
if The Lord’s Rain weren't there to at least provide an option.
**
 |
| SROs, Maui-style |
The next
day, I learn that there are some individual efforts around Maui to help people
get clean. I got the opportunity to ride along with “A Cup of Cold Water”, a
mobile ministry set up by St Joseph’s Episcopal (Anglican) Church in Wailuku. (And whoever gives one of these little ones only a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple, assuredly, I say to you, he shall by no means lose his reward. – Matthew 10:42) Maui doesn't have a skid row area per se,
so the trick in ministering to homeless people is to know where to look.
ACCW is a
white-and-blue van, which carries a stock of “basic” food items, and “on
request” items like underwear, socks, t-shirts, dog food and hygiene products. In the van
are Lawrence, his mother Juanita, and Dutch. All three are Hawai’ians by
ancestry; Lawrence and another man, Keku, who organized this “ride-along”
for me, are retired police officers. We go first to Kahului, leave the main
road and hit a badly-maintained dirt road near the shore. I had just explained what an SRO is
(single-room occupancy hotel) is when Lawrence said, “Here are our SROs.” He
pointed to a row of derelict cars and trucks along the dirt road.
Each vehicle
had at least one person living in it. I was reminded of the "rubber tramps" that Rudy, a fellow I knew at Rainbow Mission, told me about after he'd finished his hitch in the Vietnam war.
We were first greeted by a small dog, leashed
to a tent that had been made out of the back of a pickup truck. Presently a
young woman squirmed out of the tent, pulling on a dress. We hand her a “single
person” bag – one can each of cocktail sausages and Spam (As the late John
Pinette said, “I love Hawai’i: there, Spam is a vegetable.”) – two bottles of
water, a pudding cup, fruit cup, granola bar and Rice Krispie square.
There was a
familiar pong in the air. Dutch motioned towards the buildings at the end of
the dirt road – the sewage pumping station.
Lucy, a
petite woman about my age, emerges from another truck. “How’re ya doing?” I
ask. “Hanging in,” she says. “Hangin’ in.” She then reaches out to me and gives
me a huge hug and clings to me for a long time.
“The owner
of my place suddenly decided to sell,” she says. “We got 30 days’ notice and
nowhere to go. I went to get a camping permit but you know what? They (the
County) wanted $45 a day! I can’t pay $45 a day! So I’m here.”
We pray
together, then she goes and gets her bag. As we drive away, Lawrence explains
that the County inspectors had gone to the place where Lucy had been living and
found that no one really knew who owned it. When they finally found out who the
owners were, the owners decided to sell rather than upgrade. And Lucy and
others were out on their collective ear.
We move on.
There’s a little shack in a parking area behind the pumping station and we pull
up and honk the horn. A reddish dog bounds out to say hello and in the doorway
we see a large woman hurriedly putting on a robe. She comes out to us with one
hand on her cheek.
“How are
you?” Dutch asks.
“Got a bad
toothache,” she says. “You don’t have any Tylenol, do you?” We don’t. We hand
her the bag and a couple of tins of dog food and move on.
Dutch
explains that there are some areas where they don’t always go – areas inhabited
by known criminals and drug dealers. “We especially don’t let the women go in
alone,” he says. “If it’s me and Keku,” Lawrence puts in, “we might, ‘cause we
can take care of ourselves; but if it’s just ma and some of the other women,
they don’t go.”
“We also don’t
want to be ‘enablers’,” Dutch adds. “If we go to these guys, they’ll barge in
and take whatever and then sell it.” He motioned to a group of tents across the
river from our next stop. “But if they come across the river to us while we’re
here, we’ll give them something. If they cross the river, they’re exposed, so
if they're making that effort, we figure they really need it.”
I ask them
about options for cleaning up. In Lahaina, they point out that there are hoses
on the docks used for washing down the boats (wonderful! Let’s bathe in tepid
sea-water!) and the Family Life Center in Kahului offers showers. Lawrence’s
brother, a lifeguard at the public swimming pool in Kihei, has arranged to
allow homeless people to shower at certain times of the day. Even that was a
tough sell, but he was able to make it happen.
We drive on …
to a spot where two men are living in a makeshift shack in a location where
other shelters had been destroyed by the storms this past winter (yes, Maui
gets winter storms, and they can be nasty). We had gone to see if anyone was
left. As we left, we saw a County park inspector drive by – possibly to “encourage”
them to move on.
We hit
Kalama Beach Park, where a lot of un-housed people set up their homes. Because
it was Wednesday, most of them had moved their vehicles out onto the road so
the County could clean the park, which is done every week. “They call it ‘resting the park’,” Dutch
explains.
We come across one man – probably in his 60s – who’s installed solar
panels on an old pickup truck and uses that to power his truck radio, a TV
(with satellite dish) and a few other things.
A young woman emerges from a
minivan, carrying a little girl – maybe 18 months old. It’s not clear where the
woman’s husband is, although it’s possible he’s at work, and doesn't make
enough to afford a place to live. But where you might think there would be despair, there is love in the mother’s eyes, and joy in the baby’s: the little
girl is still blowing kisses to us as we climb back into the van.
At our next
stop in the park, we find three generations all together.
“There are
actually three or four clans here,” Lawrence says, as Juanita and I throw
together “family” bags.
“Why aren't you in school?” Dutch asks one little boy.
“I'm sick
today,” he says.
Back into
Kahului, we wind our way through the industrial area, past the warehouses and
big-box stores, finding one or two people in various places. Lawrence has a
keen eye: “There’s some (people) there,” he says, as we pull up at a traffic
light. He’s spotted a shopping cart off to the side of the road, with four or
five guys huddled around it. We hand out single bags and chat for a bit, then
head on.
We then pull
up near the Family Life Center, but Lawrence makes sure he parks on County property.
The Family Life Center, which is run by another church organization, has made
it clear it doesn’t want ACCW parking on its property. Whether it’s jealousy
among ministries, a sense that one’s turf has to be protected, or a
misunderstanding, it’s something I've noticed in Vancouver, too. A few couples come over for bags; one fellow pulls up on a bike laden with bags. As we drive
off, Lawrence mentions the fellow with the bike.
“He was a
great athlete,” he says, “but just couldn't handle it all. They get all that
money, and then the drugs and something goes wrong …” Lawrence doesn't mention
his name or what sport he played: right now, that doesn't make much difference.
Families …
drug addicts … the mentally ill … but for the most part, Just Plain Poor –
people who work but still can’t afford a house … others, too old to work but
for whom the “social safety net” has holes a humpback whale could jump through …
A Cup of Cold Water, like The Lord’s Rain, is “Jesus With The Skin On,” a
reminder that they haven’t been forgotten, they are loved by people who hardly
know them – and especially, that they are still precious to God.
That may not
seem like much, but neither does a seed, until it’s planted.
