25 March 2008 - 'Picking'

Tuesday the 25th of March
Today Martha and I were up very early to prepare for going out to pick up some new Residents from the streets. Steve the House Parent and the Amaudo driver, James, were arranged to take us. Steve is very experienced and has been with Amaudo from the beginning. According to Steve it is best to ‘pick’ Residents up in the early morning hours as they tend to be calmer and easier to talk to.

It took us a while before we could find anyone to approach. We saw several people that Amaudo has tired to help on more than three separate occasions but they were determined to return to live on the street.

How ‘picking’ works is that first you have to interview the homeless person to asses if they are mentally ill. Then if they are mentally ill you have to try and persuade them into the vehicle. Once inside they are usually happy. Then the Resident is brought to Amaudo and offered a shower, given new clothing, a new hair cut (often their heads are shaved due to common head-lice) and shown to their new home.

Then they are fed and introduced to every day life at Amaudo. There are no fences surrounding the centre so residents are free to leave if they wish. If a Resident leaves and is found on the street again the staff often bring them back to Amaudo two or three times before eventually leaving them on the street. This hardly ever happens and there are plenty of stories of Residents leaving for a short while but bringing themselves back here because they know they will be fed well and cared for. There was even one woman who ran away to her home but returned to Amaudo because the food was better and more plentiful!

Anyway we spotted a man sitting in the middle of the road with some sacks. He was smiling and waving at the vehicle so we went to interview him. He said his job was collecting scrap to sell and showed us the items in his bag. His speech was good and clear and he seemed to know what he was doing. The only odd thing he said was that he was not wearing his sandals because they were too heavy so he preferred to carry them in his hands. We decided he was doing fine and was not yet in need of Amaudo’s support.

Steve with the man we decdied was not in need of Amaudo's support

Next we spotted a very dirty man wearing an old hat with a pony tail attached to the side of it. He was carrying a bag and walking through the traffic. I was pretty excited because he definitely looked mentally ill, we even tired reversing round a round-a-bout. (the traffic here in Nigeria is pretty crazy, I have only driven on two marked roads since moving away form the airport. I can’t recall seeing any traffic lights and there does not seem to be any speed limits!) Luckily we were able to find him again crossing a car park towards some shops. Steve went to go chat to him and found him to be mentally unstable. A crowd was building to see what we were bothering ourselves with the ‘mad man’ for. When they saw we wanted to take him with us they were laughing so much. I filmed the scene so I hope I can get up on this blog soon.

Steve talking to the man who we ‘picked’ and took to Amaudo

He was very disorientated and resisted entering. However as soon as he sat down he was still and quiet and settled instantly so we decided that we did not need to return to the centre immediately and could go and look for anyone else who might need the support of Amaudo.

Next we found a woman singing and chatting to herself. Steve spoke to her in Igbo and she found him to be very funny and got in the car laughing. She chattered and sang all the way home, making jokes to herself and laughing lots. I got a lovely picture of them both in the car. I was surprised how well mannered they were. We stopped a few times and did not lock the doors so I knew they were happy to be coming with us.

The new residents in the car

Once at the centre the new residents had a sit down before having their hair cut and being sorted out. The women we had picked seemed to really enjoy getting a haircut for free and Steve even let me do a bit of the barbering.

Me giving the new resident a hair cut

After the hair cuts we sorted through their belongings. The man had lots and lots of ‘junk’ on him like lots of bits of metal and had on some strange jewellery. In his hand bag was the burnt-out part of a photo copier machine. His total money was 10 Naira. If one sterling pound gets you 235 Naira then you can see it is not a lot.

The woman had a sack containing lots of clothing, food and quite a lot of money stashed away in little bags and tied into the clothes. The money was taken from them and put into the safe to be returned to them at their discharge ceremony.

This is a photo of our new resident now she is refreshed and cleaned up