Dealing with Beggars on Dominica

I don't know what it is about this semester, but this is getting ridiculous.

I have about a 12-15 minutes walk to the main campus from my my apartment and on my route there's students going back and forth all the time.  Last semester I was begged for money roughly 5 times.  This semester it's been 2-3 times a week.

One time it was a little 5-6 year, skinny little girl approaching me in one of the grocery stores asking if I would buy her a bag of chips.  Another time it was an elderly lady spotting me going into a store and waiting for me outside the door as I paid for my stuff repeating over and over, "Ross University... Ross University... Ross University... Ross University..." with a smile on her face.  Another time I was with a friend walking home and a little boy, probably 10 years old, stopping us with a ragged piece of paper asking if we would sponsor him in something.  (I wasn't listening.)

But those were only one time things.  I come from the San Francisco Bay Area and like any other major metropolitan cities in the United States there's a homeless problem and you just deal with it.  And if you remember back to my EC's for getting into med school, I even volunteered at a homeless dining hall -- homelessness isn't new to me.  But over here they're just in your face.

The main problem is that they know that all the students have to pass through the main road and they all know that all of the students have tens of thousands of dollars (East Caribbean Dollars) in loan money and they're just asking for a couple dollars at time.

The problem is that when you first get here, everything about being here is all very new and you've very much alone.  Sometimes I'd skirt by as one of the beggars saw me.  It wasn't really a problem because I was just trying to start school on a positive note.  I gave a couple dollars here or there and it was so infrequent it wasn't a problem.  And the thing about Dominica is that everyone is very friendly.  Everyone says "hi", "good morning", and "good evening" for the most part.  And a lot of these people are nice, hard working people.  After a while it's easy to spot the beggars from the legit citizens.

Two beggars have approached me multiple times and one in particular.  I swear I'm about to go off on him next time.

Let's call him Bob.

At the beginning of this semester I may have given a few dollars to Bob.  Some people have different attitudes towards this kind of stuff and in general I don't have a problem with it.  I mean, everyone's got to eat.  I didn't give money every single time, but after the first couple weeks Bob's face just completely got on my nerves.  It got to the point where he'd see me way down the street and go straight for me giving me his sob story.  Sometimes it was, "please, please, please."  Other times it was, "I haven't eaten in days."  More times it was, "Please bro.  If there's anything you ever need, just ask."  And even more times it was, "I have fresh fruit, please bro."

After those first couple weeks I decided not to give him anything else and just kind of see what happened.  Most of the time I'd just say, "Sorry, I don't have anything."  And I'd give him the "fuck off" body language and just keep on walking.

Studying for Mini 3 and now the Fina, before yesterday I hadn't been to campus for at least a week and a half.  I was just studying on my own and watching a few lectures online.  I go to campus for the first time in a while yesterday and there Bob is again, showing his face right before I make the turn on to campus.  He popped out from behind a van and it looked like he just crossed the street just for me.  He probably saw me coming half way down the road.  I give him the "I don't got nothing, man." song and dance and head right on to campus and try to pull my grades out of the mess I've gotten myself into.

I just want to pass my classes.

Today I head back to campus and on the way home, there Bob is again with a box over his head, carrying some fruit.  The thing is that it's not the hassle of having to say "No. No. No. No. No." over and over, it's that it makes me uncomfortable and annoyed having to think about Bob in the back of my head whenever I think of walking to campus.

I have enough things to worry about.

Today I made the mistake of giving him more money and I can't stand myself for me right now.  He dropped the box of fruit and began his own song and dance.  But at least this time he actually had something to sell.  And I buy fruit from some off of different people all the time.  I didn't want what he was selling and I just want to get home so I can study for what it probably one of the most important exams of my life (so far).  Again he starts with the, "Please... please... please..." and then he moves into the, "I'll pray for you.  I'll pray that you'll do well on your tests."  (They all know finals week is coming up.)  And you know what?  If one of my main problems throughout all of this is him making me feel uncomfortable then I'm not going to be the only one.

"You're going to pray for me?" I look at him and repeat what he said.

"Yes, man. Of course, man." He senses my weakness.

And I know I'm being weak.  I know I'm about to give him some money and I can't stand it.  "You're going to pray for me." I repeat again, this time stepping forward, pointing in his face, making sure he's serious (which of course is a lie).  "You better pray for me."  And I'm kind of being a jerk because I kind of feel like I'm making him dance for his food, but come on.  I'm going to be here a long time (hopefully) and he's going to be here a long time.  Him hunting me down the road every time he sees me isn't going to work for me.  This is not a good way to live.

Next time I'm probably going to yell at him and tell him to get a job and fuck off.  I mean, this might be a third world country but there's a lot of hard working people here.  There are construction workers, store owners, bread makers, and taxi drivers all over the place.  There are people employed by local business and many other people employed by Ross.  The nicest bunch of them are probably the Ross security guards and the taxi drivers.

Last semester was okay.

This semester was ridiculous when it came to the beggars on Dominica and I don't exactly know what I'm going to do next. I'm obviously very frustrated and stressed right now and however you may think you would deal with this, the students here all have to live with these people. It's not like we can just go completely negative and throw a public tantrum because we're going to see the same faces on a regular basis for a long, long time.