When I was fourteen years old  my church “Victory” did a mission trip in Downtown Atlanta. During this trip we remodeled and cleaned up the homeless shelters. We also made dinner and served it to all the homeless people at the shelters and on the streets. We also gave them  used clothes because winter was approaching since it was the middle of November. This experience gave me the opportunity to get to know the struggle of how homeless people live and survive on their day to day bases. I was able to ask some of the people how they became homeless and you tend to hear many different answers as to what choice or mistake brought them to their living condtions they live in now. My church did this big prayer circle where everyone was welcome to join even the homeless people. Every single person who ate dinner with us that night joined in and shared how they were thankful we helped them with their dinner and giving them clothes and blankets to survive the weather conditions. It seemed that even though  they did not have much and did not get to eat everyday, they would still thank God for another day everytime they woke up and everytime they went to sleep. This showed me they are just regular people just trying to survive. Now I am a Freshman at Georgia State University, where I walk from my apartment to school and see homeless people every single day. Homelessness effects the pedestrians and students in downtown Atlanta. 

The weather is 38 degrees in downtown Atlanta  near the campus of Georgia State University, and the clouds loom over the highrise rooftops.  The intersection of Decatur and Central Avenue Southeast is buzzing with herds of people. As, students and pedestrian hurry to and fro the crosswalk being directed by the policeman in a bright yellow vest with neon orange stripes through it while the sound of his whistle pierces the ears of people nearby. A whiff of wind runs through the breezeway of the tall sky scrapers with a retchet smell. As the crisp wind hits people’s faces their noses begin to run, eyes tend to water and start to get rosey cheeks. They close their jackets and hold them tighter trying to keep their body warm and shield their torsos’ from the cold. 

There is a store located adjacent to Langdale Hall called Walter’s that has a substantially large cherry red, sign that reads, “sells brands of shoes and clothes for a cheaper price than regular.” There is man who has a Walter’s charcoal gray pull over on with a  black beanie and burgundy gloves on trying to bring costumers into the store to look at the new merchandise. Some of the pedestrains would walk in and look around but most would come out empty handed. Meanwhile, there was a little boy with black long hair braided to the back and his father with short, curly, black hair who were walking past and the young boy sprinted to the window where black Adidas shoes with three orange stripes sat on the seal as eye candy. Then the little boy wrapped his tiny arms and legs around  his dads’ like he was holding on to a firemans pole at the playground. He was begging his father to buy the shoes for him. After two minutes of the dad shaking his leg and could not get the boy to stop he laughs and says, “Fine, lets go in.” As the dad was getting the change for the shoes he handed the son the coins he had recieved back. The toddler was so estactic he wore his new shoes out the store with a grin from ear to the other.

A man sitting with a shopping cart filled of his belongings and his dog.

There is an older white man in ragged, musty clothes that has two different colored shoes on. One was a white shoe that was dirty and dusty it looked as if it was brown now. The other shoe was black but now looked gray from all of the filth that it had collected from the ground. He did not have much with him except the clothes he had on and a bookbag on his back. He was shaking an old, dirty cup at people as he asked for change or money to the pedestrains as they walk by him. Some people would stop and give him their pocket change or maybe a dollar or two. The little boy who had just got shoes skipped to the him and gave him all the coins he had just recieved from his father, while other people as they walked by him would try not to make eye contact by looking the other way or down at there shoes.

Meanwhile,  a crowd of students is scurrying from out behind the tall silver, metal fences that are up on the side walk for construction next to Langdale Hall. A short, scrawny boy with a light grey bookbag on, looked as if he was about to fall backwards  trying to carry all the books he had. He proceeded to try and make it through the herd of people as he was tensely looking at something on his phone. He was so stuck at what was on his phone, he was just walking one foot in front of the other without looking up at all. While he was furiously typing on his phone he took a step with his left foot and then his right foot got stuck on a

People sleeping on the side walk by GSU

women sleeping on the ground, bundled up with jackets and a filthy thick brown blanket. The boy stumbled with his bookbag flying over his head causing all the books to come out as he collapsed and banged his knees on the concrete. He avoids looking at the lady and scrambles up all his books into his bookbag and rushes off looking around to see if anyone else saw. 

To recapitulate, homlessness is an issue all over America but has viciously increased in downtown Atlanta. It is to the point homeless people have started to mark their territory all through out Greorgia State University. This is an issue because no one should be living on the streets and outside in these weather conditions. People tend to just ignore the homeless community as if they are invisable. Which they clearly are not, they have card board boxes, beds, sleeping bags and tents lined up under each tunnel in downtown Atlanta. Homeless people beg for money or food outside of most buildings or at intersections. Most people just hurry and get in their cars when they see a homeless person. Meanwhile, homeless people only have the clothes they are wearing and a bookbag or suitcase or even a shopping cart if they are lucky. They are truly just trying to survive because they have already lost everything they had. The society has played homeless people out to be the villains when they just need a hand to get back on their feet and become finacially stable.

As I walked step by step, one foot in front of the other on this clumy, chilly day. I was unable to find the perfect spot on I could call my “space.” Every where on campus was so simlar just a bunch of students scrambling around trying to make it through that day. But then as I was walking back from Aderhold, I saw just a bunch of stuff going  on right next to Walters, the store basically on campus which is right next to Langdale Hall. So I chose that cross walk between Walters and Langdale Hall to be my space. As for me I am a people watcher and honestly so nosy about whats going on. Also, I am very into details when listening or just watching what is taking place around me. Luckly I attend Georgia State University, the college literally in the middle of downtown Atlanta. All I can say is I personally never have  a boring day at school, I always something intresting occur. 

As I slowly observe from across the street, the first thing I notice is the street cop in the bright orange vest the shines as the sun bounces of it. He is stopping the cars from turning right to allow the pedestrians and students to cross over the crosswalk. The car who gets stop, angerly waits as a huge crowed of  people crosses from one side to the other. As I am looking at this crowd of people I see many different races, genders, hair styles, outfit choices. One girl with long black hair stuck out to me because of her bright, neon, lime green sweat shirt she had on. Another guy caught my attention with his style, he was pale skined with a blonde buzz cut and had all black on. Although he had stitchings of differnt things all over his paints of skulls, guns, smiliy faces on it, it was basicallya bunch of random pathes all over. There was a lady dressed in a nice beige two-piece suit with a breief case. I wondered if she was a  professor or just walking back from her job to get to her car where she parked. There was also, a guy in Georgia State football sweats running as if he was late something and youy could see his book bag go up and down as it was hitting his back. My eyes were seeing many different things but nose was also smelling a bunch of things. Everytime the wind blew I smelled something new the georgia state food truck was next to me. Their food smelled Delicious but as a new head of wind hit my face it smelled like trash or almost like sewage. As a car skirted around the corner quickly, I could smell the burned rubber from the tires of the black, Honda Accord. My ears heard things non-stop, there was never a quiet momment. You constantly hear drivers honking at people riding on birds as they almost get hit by the car. You hear a million differant converstations between all types about the most random things. I heard a guy telling this other guy how he likes to eat diced up garlic, when i heard him say that I could not help but laugh because I know how strong garlic is in food let alone plain. Also, you hear the crackheads talking to themselves or to walls as if someone is talking to them. I always watch and hear as homeless people beg  for change from anyone who walks by. Overall, I chose this place because it is very intresting and kept me well intertained. You never thing about how many people are in the world and how each human as a differnt life than the person next to them. 

While I was observing I couldn’t help but keep looking over to the left at the older, homeless man begging for change like coins. It really  caught my attention because the further you look down the street the more homeless people you see digging through trash, sleeping, or trying to get money. Homelessness is huge society promblem in America, let alone in downtown Atlanta. I truly hate to see anyone struggle let alone elders because there bodys are already old and weak. While sitting on the corner of that crosswalk for thirty minuites, I realized how many homeless people walk up and down the streets filled of trash if littering themselves. I feel like homeless people just need  little it of help to get back on their feet so they can get a real job. The city could really knock out to birds with one stone by paying homeless people too pick up trash all over the steets. This would give them money so they would not bother the pedestrians for money and city would not always look so dirty. 

I experienced my first interaction with literacy when I was in kindergarten. I was probably around six years young. This was when I was first introduced to books. I  will never forget being so very excited to get to pick out my book to read for the week. Although they were picture books with very few words, there was alot of excitement to read those very few words. It was like when  you come down the stairs the next morning after Santa Clause came. The feeling behind reading and writing was being proud of myself because I finally knew what literacy was. I have not always been the best reader but when I was younger; all the learning tools my teacher used helped me. When learning words or as they called vocabulary for the week, my teacher Ms. Williams (best elementary teac

2005

her) would do ryhming words each week.  For example, one week was “at” words… like cat, bat, rat, nat, and fat. Then there would befive more words but a little more challanging, like flat, chat, brat, boat. Finally she would give us a bonus word for the week that would be combat. So each week we would learn about Elven words that all sound and are spelled the same. This made literacy easier to understand at such an early age. But as the years go on literacy gets more difficult to understand  as a whole. Because there is so many rules you have to follow while reading and writing through the english writing. Furthermore, I’ll never forget doing my first big essay. That was around 7th grade in middle school when I wrote my first five paragraph essay and i actually think it was a narritave as well. But when I heard five paragraphs I was nervous and confused hopw i would write that much but once the teacher broke down how to write the essay correctly it was not as bad as I thoughtit would be. Overall, literacy can seem  like a lot at first but its like a puzzle and you just have to take one step at a time at your own pace to fully get the understanding.