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Saturday, 10/17/2015

We got together early Saturday evening to prepare sandwiches for our first community outreach that night. Tatiana spread on the peanut butter halves, as I spread on the jelly, and Jenifer placed the sandwiches into plastic baggies. We put Ronald and Doug to work placing the sandwiches into individual brown paper lunch bags with bags of chips. We made as many sandwiches as four loaves of bread would prepare. I was wondering if we had made too many, I didn’t want anything to go to waste, but I was assured by Doug that they would all be taken, no problem. We loaded them into the car, along with three cases of water bottles, and we headed out to ‘tent city’ in downtown Vancouver, WA.

As we pulled up where Lincoln Avenue meets West 13th Street, I knew instantly we had not prepared enough. We parked the cars, gathered the boxes of sandwich bags and cases of water bottles and began walking the block around where the men’s Share house stands. There were tents set up lining both sides of the block as far as we could see in both directions. So we just decided to start walking down Lincoln Ave and make our way around the block. As we began walking it hit hard and quick the reality that we faced. Men and women cuddled in tents, all their personal possessions in there with them. Garbage lined the streets also, filling the corners of the streets and gutters. In this dark place, the brightest light came from the faces that lit up as we walked around announcing, “Sandwiches and water bottles. Would anyone like a sandwich and water bottle?” People started coming out of the tents eager to receive what had. With every “Thank You” and “God Bless” it warmed my heart more and more. We hadn’t made it half way down the first side of the street when a lady yelled towards me, “Can I have two?!” I turned around to see a lady walking towards me quickly, repeating, “Can I have two?” I gave her two sandwich bags and she told me there are people around front of the street too. She was very concerned that they would miss out. Such a caring women, I asked what her name was. “My name is Nancy.” I asked Nancy if she knew how many people were living in tent city and she said at least 150 people. She talked about some of the challenges they face and the hardships of living on the streets. She explained that everyone is staying around the Share house because of the food program that is available. They serve three meals a day for the homeless community, although the first meal of the day is at 6:00AM, so if you miss it you don’t get to eat until 12:00 noon. They also allow 6 women to shower each day, but it is first come, first serve, so there are many women who miss the opportunity every day.

After chatting with Nancy for a while, I caught up with the rest of the group and we continued to pass out sandwich bags and water bottles. It amazed me that not one person was concerned about what type of sandwich or flavor of chips we were handing out, they were simply thankful for receiving the food. It was humbling for me, because I can be so picky when it comes to what kind of food I have to eat every day, and these individuals were simply thankful to receive whatever we had brought for them…

Michaela Byers, Founder/Executive Director
Jeffrey’s Dream

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The Columbian wrote an interesting article about Tent City also:
http://www.columbian.com/news/2015/sep/21/vancouver-officials-tour-growing-tent-city/

One thought on “Tent City – Part 1

  1. Thank you so much for the work you are doing. Your writing and photos touch my heart, and inspire me to do more for our community.

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