Cardboard Mattress

I took some beautiful photos on my walk home tonight but as I neared my apartment, I saw this man asleep on my street. It's the second time I've seen him there and tonight especially, passing this man on his concrete slab of a bed with cardboard mattress on my way to my air conditioned apartment and comfy mattress, it hit me like a punch in the stomach.

I've seen increasing numbers of homeless in the past year and though there are far fewer than the various places I've visited or lived in the United States (homeless are much more prevalent in San Diego and San Francisco), they impact me far greater in Hong Kong. There aren't very many here, so few in fact that you recognize nearly all of them and there are rarely new faces. But the homeless here are almost all badly injured, maimed, or handicapped. While the homeless in the US or elsewhere seem to be in their situation due to falling on hard times or a lack of motivation to work, in HK, they seem to be where they are as a result of hard work - many having endured a severe chemical burn which in as many times as I see them never seems to heal. No matter how many times I pass these same faces, the impact is never lessened. I walk away every time choked up and fighting back tears, often unsuccessfully. It pains me to know that such suffering exists, such inequality in life's gifts. And while it reminds me to be eternally grateful for my lot in life, my health, my happiness (no matter what curveballs life throws at me, it can never compare) - it also reminds me how unfair this world can be.