More and more volunteers in safety vest are distributing food on the streets of Porto. Overlap sometimes trample it.
They begin to align themselves before 19h, standing one behind the other, on the promenade of Dr. Alberto Aires Gouveia Street in front of the emergency ward of the General Hospital of Santo Antonio in Porto. Often, the line around the corner follows the slope of the Restoration Street, where José Alberto Santos, known as “Caló” jargon of the Gypsies of the Iberian Peninsula, there is so much bed.
Every night around there stops us to distribute food. They arrive in private cars or the name of an organization painted on one side and take part of the tour or Carregal garden, a little above. Some wait in silence, others with a shout, sometimes tense, sometimes fun.
– I heard you will end up with reforms – causes “Caló” when he saw approaching a man down, spiky hair, cranky in his hangover, whom he calls “Gandalf” character of the British author J. R. R. Tolkien.
The conversation is interrupted barely three men they spot a white van to do flasher right. Inside they bounce people who are distinguished from all the others that are there for wearing reflective vest. Open the back doors and take whatever there is inside.
A ride banking where the queue started to form and try to serve a vegetable soup. Other assemble another bank just above. They will deliver a coffee in plastic cups and a kit (a soft drink and three or four croissants that now they stick in plastic bags).
Night after night, in various parts of the city, several hours pass volunteer groups to offer a soup and / or a main course and / or a kit: Bom Sucesso Market, Rua Júlio Dinis, Restoration Street, Carregal Garden , Avenida dos Aliados, Joy Street, Batalha, Rua Sá da Bandeira, Goncalo Rua Cristóvão.
Who are these, reflective vest, who have served “Caló” and Jose Maria and now serve those who followed them? “We have come to love domesticated, went to Pansy and now we are a group of volunteers friends supporting the homeless,” said Alda Pires, 48, canteen employed.
The crisis – or awareness of its effects – is carrying more volunteers to the city streets. This will do well, unite, separate themselves sometimes trample se.O-unnamed group appears in Dr. Alberto Aires Gouveia Rua always around 21h Monday. That was the night wanes. He even assured him who waits in line. After all, now there was a CASA group – Support Centre for Homeless bring soup and first course. When confronted with these concentrated, to satisfy those who waited in line, others moved to the Battle Square.
CASA volunteers were for a town that knew discovered, but there are here who speak in their change as if it were a tantrum. It is as if they could fit both at Rua Dr. Alberto Aires Gouveia, in front of the emergency room at the Santo António General Hospital in Porto. As if they could not join one to give a soup and a kit, others the main course and coffee.
“What we bring does not give to all,” laments Carla Nunes, 40, a volunteer in this group focuses best raising of food contact. “They are some without eating.” At least until about 23h, when the area passed by the Rosary College volunteers.
Not part of the Core Planning and Intervention the Homeless (NPISA) of Porto, which brings together 64 formal and informal structures. “We are just a group of friends who come together to do this,” explains Carla Nunes, without stopping to prepare the kits. “We willingly. It is a thing that is in the blood. ”
No one knows for sure how many groups come together to distribute food, where, when, what, with that quality. There is a rough idea: at the request of NPISA, the routes were registered by the Social Porto Action Group (GAS-Porto), a non-governmental organization for development.
Early last year, the GAS-Porto contacted all voluntary organizations that are part of NPISA and asked them if they distributed food, what, what day of the week left, they passed, with whom crossed. In the summer, began to check the routes: did 27 rounds.
What stands out is the lack of joint. Some do a regular job, with day and time. Others appear when trough, someone who, from time to time, goes around distributing feijoada. Some want to kill hunger. Others use food as a means to reach those who are sleeping in the street. Some feel part of the National Strategy for Integration of People Homeless. Others have never heard it.
There are still few signs of cooperation, as played by Embrace the Night, alternating with another group of volunteers with reflective clothing, the heart in the street on Saturdays. Now one, now another, share a meal with anyone who wants to appear in three strategic points of the city: Garden of Carregal, Antas and Rua Júlio Dinis, the latter in partnership with the Evening Sun group. Assemble a tent and there are, to talk, to serve, but also dinner.
From that set of maps, NPISA any member may submit proposals. For now, there is talk about finding ways for people living on the street can dine in a sheltered place, aside from the looks of passers-by, and not on the street, standing with bowl in hand. Through a system-wide, voluntary organizations could make the distribution of the food they were raising. It is accepted, above all, the need for coordination between the various groups so there is no waste in some days and other wanes.