Report on our lunch event on 10/5/22, and on the people we met in the preparation-
On the previous Thursday, we collected the flyers from the printer, and after a prayer, started to distribute them among people in the Byres Road area. Started off at Chez Nous, where they always make us welcome, didn’t get to speak to any of the men as they were decorating, but left flyers with them, then talked to a girl who was outside the M+S store in Byres Road, talking to her boyfriend across the road, gave them both flyers, they both said they would come. There were a couple of sad sights at the top of Byres Road, a foreign gentleman who was completely asleep, and Louise was still begging outside Waitrose, we told her we hoped to have the table out on Monday and we should have a bag of food for her. A young man,Mark, was sitting near to where our table is, and he was saying he was fed up having to go out to beg, but he was sitting in his house with no food, and a young woman with a dog outside Tescos was talking to a male- asked if she could bring a partner- “but it’ll no be him!” We then got talking to two young men outside Greggs in Dumbarton Road- one of them said he’d been baptised in St Peter’s, and would like to go back. We gave the next leaflet to a man who was sitting smoking by himself at Partick bus station, before giving some leaflets to Avanti chip shop, who kindly said they would give them to appropriate customers and possibly put a leaflet in the window. We then got the subway to Dalhousie, and posted some leaflets through their letter-box, and then went down to George Square, hoping to meet up with the Kindness group, unfortunately they weren’t there, but we did get speaking to one man whose face lit up when we mentioned hot food and entertainment. We managed on Sunday to go along to Partick South Church’s evening cafe, and saw some familiar faces from previous lunch events, including Carol, who reminded us that she’d won the Christmas quiz back in 2019. On Monday, we decided to take out the table despite the inclement weather, and Gus very kindly allowed us to use his flat to make up the sandwiches. We started off with the Angelus, and called to mind the fact that this was a mission of mercy- we bring the message to Jesus’ Resurrection to the marginalised- even those to whom we only speak briefly would be blessed by the Risen Lord, their spirituality enhanced. John Bain then took some bags of food and headed off towards Partick subway, hoping to find some people on the streets- as it turned out, he could only give out 2- it seemed the bad weather was keeping people away. At the table, our first contacts were two wee girls, who liked the look of our Oreo chocolate eggs- Jesus himself said, “let the children come to me.” Next, two Ukrainian girls took cups of tea, and creme eggs, it turned out they were students, and they were asking John for directions to one of the university chaplancies- not the Catholic one, they knew where that was- and, despite the language barrier, they eventually got their directions, and were pleased enough to give us a £3 donation. John then spoke to a man who asked what we were about, and when John said we were a charity, the man said, “that’s nice to know- I’m a charity case.” and then we spoke to a man, George, who said he was on his way to see his boys- he took a bag of food, and one of our chocolate cakes, and said he would try to come along the next day, and he would try to invite his boys. Finally, we spoke to a man who actually mistook us for C.N.D.- he was on his way to a C.N.D. rally, and he thought our table was it- but from that, he started talking about the various churches in the Partick area, and the good work being done by St. Silas’ Church, and Partick South, and he also spoke about a memorial garden in Kelvingrove Park for a woman who was murdered in her home about a year ago, and he was impressed by how immaculate it is kept. Also impressed was a very well-dressed man who was on his way to Brel, and who told us it was a really good thing we were doing. On Tuesday, we went to St. Peter’s 10am Mass, then Gus started to take the bags of food left over into the streets, I went down to Tesco’s for the soft drinks, and Tunnock’s teacakes and caramel wafers, then set them up with the cakes, creme eggs, and lollipops. Catherine arrived at 11.50 to prepare the hot food, we said the Angelus, and prayed that the people today would see the triumphant joy of Easter. Karen arrived at 12.50, and our first customers were Betty- who had received a Facebook message- and her friend, Peter. Betty was delighted to be back- she had missed us- enjoyed the events when we did them, and would love to see them back. Talked also about Frances, one of our former regulars, but she said she’s not in as much contact with her as before. Popping out to see who was there, I came across one man who said he expected loads of people to be there. His name was Robert, and when I got him to sit beside Peter and Betty, and the pizzas and the sausage rolls started to be served, he seemed to be quite happy. Gus popped in to say he’d had some really good conversations with people on the streets, and that he would come back at 2.15, and then a group of women came in and said they weren’t sure if they were in the right place as there wasn’t a notice. So I unsuccessfully tried to sellotape one of our flyers on to the railings! But that started a really good buzz of conversation around the table- and amongst this number was the previous Christmas quiz winner, Carol, who actually knew Karen well. All seemed really pleased that the events were restarting, I told them we have a break in the summer, but hopefully we’ll have another one before then. One of them, Brenda, was starting work shortly, so we started the quiz then- for a strawberry Easter egg (called Divine!) which Betty won on a tiebreak from Carol. Carol also said that if we wanted her to help with the dishes in future, she would like to. Gus came in at this point to talk about some of the conversations he had, including one man who tried to sell him a steak- which wasn’t much good as Gus was going away on Thursday!- and also Patrick, whom he met at Partick subway, and was telling about his horrendous injuries, but also talked about the great kindness that was shown him when he got his bag of food. Gus said he was impressed by the amount of times people thanked him for the kindness, and Gus reckons we have to think about both ministries to rough sleepers (who can’t come to lunch events) and those who can come to lunch events)
On