Blog Post #9

   With this past weekend, I feel our project has finally taken a big step. On Friday, April 15, Lissette and I went to Reid park and we saw this elderly man walking with a large suit case. At first we thought, "oh man he's a murderer kidnapper, walk fast" and then I started thinking, "wait, what if this man has Alzheimer's and he's lost?" so I told Lissette, "let's wait at the stop light for him and see if he needs help." As we were waiting, the old man stopped and looked like he was in pain. So I walked over and asked if he was okay, and the man looks up and tells me ," I'm okay, my bones just hurt, I've broken nearly every one of them." And so I asked if he wanted us to call someone or if he needed to use a phone to get home and he looks at me with tired, worn out eyes and says, "this is my home, I'm homeless." I teared up, and my heart broke. I held onto my last dollar in my pocket and gave it to him. I told him "here, its cold, go buy yourself a coffee" and he says "are you sure? I don't want to bother" and I said "of course I'm sure, here." and he took the dollar. Then Lissette says, "I have more money in the car we'll go get it and buy you some food, whatever you want" and the man says, " Just a plain cheeseburger from in n out will be good, please." Lissette and I go to In n Out and come back, and he says, "you know, I didn't think you guys would come back. People don't really come back. Thank you so much, you've made me so happy." Lissette and I decided to stay and converse with the man while he ate. He tells us how he was in the Vietnam war, and how the government put him out on the streets, and how he has been homeless for thirteen years. It was a really touching experience and the man agreed to help us with our project. I can't wait to work with him, I'm glad this happened to us.
   Now the progress on our project is going great. Tomorrow or sometime this week we are going to meet with our mentor and do our interview. Then we are hoping to interview the old man and the park. I really have high hopes for our project to be successful.