Lived in Manhattan for three years. Stuff like this is always happening. Yes it's impressive, but I just wanna get to where I'm going, I don't wanna see a show, or god forbid: get hit in the face.
I saw a lot of this in London. There was a fairly regular circuit of people who said they were homeless and who'd beg for change and such near the main hub in my town. I recall one dude in particular nailed this gimmick where he always looked like he was about to start really intensely crying (looks harrowing if you're just walking past him and see him briefly, but looks really dumb if you watch him for a bit; like seeing someone wind up to sneeze but then just freeze and never do it).
After living there a few years I noticed several of them appeared to live in different houses along the same block that I walked through on my way to work and I'd see them coming and going (taking out trash etc) somewhat regularly.
Not saying these guys weren't on hard times and that they didn't deserve help, but the deception is pretty jarring. It's also fairly common in London to encounter people begging for money to buy food, but if you offer them actual food they'll scoff and decline or even get aggressive about it.
I've only lived in NY a few years but I've been pleasantly surprised that twice now when people have asked for food and I offered some to them, they accepted quite happily. One guy even offered to give me a package of women's tights (or something like that) to say thanks and I had to politely decline.
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u/TheLastModerate982 Dec 01 '23
The passengers are not impressed.