Who gives money to beggars? I do. Sometimes.

Yeah, sometimes they turn out to be scam artists, or whatever, and there's really no way to differentiate between people who really need the money and people who don't. This is true even if you know exactly how they're going to spend the money, or whatever: Which action has the highest utility? Letting someone who's about to lose it ('cause they got kicked out of their home, lost their job, broke up with their significant other, had their grandparents die, etc.) buy a pack of cigarettes or booze, or letting a highschool kid buy some donuts?

When I went to Dawson, there was this fat white woman who hung around the metro-entrance. You might have seen her. She has a sign saying she's pregnant and she really needs money to pay for food for her and her child. Being the naive and idealistic student I was, I was touched, and fished out whatever change I had and gave it to her. It was probably around 72 cents or something like. The thing is, I was a student at Dawson 8 years ago. And she's still there today. And she's still "pregnant". She still asks me for money, waving the sign in my face. I ignore her now.

When I was at Lionel Groux metro station, there was this black guy ahead of me in line for the ticket counter. The woman behind the counter is like "No you didn't. You only gave me one dollar." and he's like "Bitch, I paid you the two dollars. Now give me my fucking ticket." I was in a hurry. I think I was planning on meeting hot girls or something, and I didn't want to be late. So I tapped the black guy on the shoulder, gave him a dollar. He looked at me, surprised, but then took the money, and put it in the ticket slot thing. You're not supposed to do that, you're supposed to give it to the woman behind the counter, who then gives you a ticket, which you then stick in the ticket slot. Yeah, it's stupid bureaucracy bullshit, but I was upset at him for not following "proper procedure" so as to minimize the chance for fuss. Plus, he didn't say thank you or anything like that. But there was no fuss. The woman behind the counter pressed the button, and the guy passed. Then I came up to the counter, and she's like "You know, he does that every week" and I'm thinking "Yeah, I don't give a fuck. I'm late." and I'm saying "6 tickets, please." while sliding a ten-bill her way.

There's this slightly overweight white guy who hangs around the blockbusters near Atwater on St. Catherine street. He asks for spare changes. I got a half eaten sandwich on me, so I offer it to him. He accepts it. This tells me the guy is the "real deal", because if you're not dead broke, you typically don't just take food from strangers and eat it. I mean, that's exactly what your mom tells you not to do, right?

Later on, I see the same guy. I happen to have this shitty tasting chocolate-peanut butter candy thing which I don't like, so I give it to him. He asks me what it is, so I tell him it's some sort of chocolate-peanut-butter stuff. He takes it and eats it.

I see him again, so this time, I tell him I'll go with him to subway, which is just across the street, and buy him something. So we go, and he orders his sandwich, and while we're waiting for it to be done, we make small talk. He asks my name, and I sort of hesitate "Nebu", and now I'm worried he thinks I gave him a fake name or something. He doesn't give any indication of this, though, and tells me his name is Mike. Asks me what I do for a living (programmer), asks me if the pay is good (it's okay). Then his food is ready, and we part our ways. Strangely enough, I've never seen Mike again, and it's been 2 years now, I think.

I'm walking down St. Catherine, same place, and this black guy comes up to me and says with some weird accent "can yuu gimme some money", and I tell him "You want food?", and he says "yaa man im hangry can yuu gimme some money", so I nod to the subway across the street and say "I'll buy you a sandwich." He makes some excuse about now wanting to waste my time, so he'll just take the money. This is when my spider-sense kicks in. We argue back and forth, and he tells me he's a grown 40 year old man, he can handle buying it himself, and I tell him I really want to buy the sandwich for him, and he tells me he doesn't want to waste my time, and I tell him he's wasting my time by arguing with me, and does he want the food or not. So he says he wants the food, so I say okay, let's go to Subway, and he says he doesn't like Subway. I laugh. "Beggars can't be choosers" flashes through my mind, but I say "Okay, so what kind of food do you like?" "Chinese food" he says. "Okay fine, let's go. There's a Chinese restaurant over there". At this point, he drops the accent, and says in fluent English "Forget it, man." Fucker.

There's all these mid-older (40s? 50s?) people hanging around the place where I work, and I treat them semi regularly. I usually head over to the pharmaprix to buy myself a coke, and I'll buy candy bars and shit like that for them. I'm not a millionaire, so I always buy ones that are "2 for 1" and keep 1 for myself, and tough shit for them if it's not a chocolate bar they like. But they seem to be pretty happy about it.

There's this one girl who hangs around downtown, and she looks like she's 16 or something, and she's pretty cute. I usually avoid the cute ones, 'cause I figure they get money all the time from horny male suckers, but this time I become the sucker. I don't know, maybe it's idea that she might have to give blowjobs to earn some spare cash, and I could spare her from that, and then I'll be a knight in shinning armour and then she'll give me a blowjob or something like that. Or maybe it's like "You shouldn't discriminate. That means don't discriminate against ugly people, but also don't discriminate against beautiful people". There's a billion ways to justify it. So I don't know why, but this time I decided to give her something. I had purchased a smoke meat sandwich from Reubens earlier, so I crouch down beside her and ask her if she wants some. She says yes. So I'm opening the styrofoam box that they packed it in, and now the sandwich is inside, packed in foil. I'm trying to open the foil, but you know how these sandwiches are. They basically disintegrate as you pick them up, and I'm spilling smoke meat all over the place, and getting mustard all over my hand and shit. I tell her to just reach in and take it. She then says she doesn't want to dirty my food, and she shows me her hands, which are pretty dirty, I have to admit. I'm thinking "Wow, what a kind and considerate girl" and also "You're being blinded by her cuteness. This is why you don't give shit to cute people." so I try again, and manage to free one of the two halves of the sandwich. I give her some napkins to use as a plate, and then hand her the sandwich. She thanks me. I still see her around sometimes, but I haven't ever given her stuff again. Also, I think she has a boyfriend. And I try to convince myself that those two facts have nothing to do with each other.

I'm going shopping, because I "broke up" with both my mom and my girlfriend, and now there's no one to feed me but myself. There's this old guy, unkempt beard, sitting near the grocery store. I walk in, buy my shit, and buy an extra pack of granola bars. I head outside, and ask if he wants it, and he looks stunned, and suddenly I'm thinking "Oh shit, maybe this guy isn't a beggar", 'cause I never actually saw him ask for anything. But he takes the bars, and I leave, kind of embarrassed. I haven't seen him there since either.