Hi, I'm Alyssa, one of the 5 students that did the 24 hour homeless experience. I of course understand that this whole thing was far from real. How can it be real when I know about my home, and the comforts of my life waiting?
The reason why I wanted to do it though was to get as close as possible to the problem of homelessness. I feel that you cannot truly help a situation without asking the people in need exactly how they would like to be helped, and be on the same level as much as possible.
It wasn't comfortable for me to leave my life and most possessions. But, hey, life is not all about comfort. It shouldn't be. I've always made it a point to be uncomfortable to extremes every so often.
The most I got from this experience in Montpelier, was meeting and talking with the people at Another Way. It blew me away, all that I learned about the mental health system, lack of job availability, and people's personal experiences of being homeless, and depressed. I've never talked with people about these kinds of struggles so much before. I felt welcomed at Another Way. Truly amazing people with deep philisophical minds there. Real thinkers.
Being out in Montpelier at night was hard, I had a lot on my mind. I was cold, and tired, and hungry, and I don't particularly enjoy any of those things. I was constantly thinking about things I would do if I was really homeless, how I would live from day to day. I'm not sure, but I think I would travel a lot, always keep moving until some opportunity came my way.
It excites me to think that Sterling may have a connection with people at Another Way in the future. We would definately like to help in any way possible, one way being to teach survival skills. I think we could learn a lot from each other, as all people can who are coming from different places in this world.
I really appreciate your guidance and direction Morgan, on our first "night out". And thank you to everyone else who helped open my eyes to situations I'd been blind to.
Peace---Alyssa
