Why are there no enterprising homeless ... - Thorn Tree travel forum

Why are there no enterprising homeless guarding your forbidden items?

Replies: 17 - Last Post: 24-Jan-2008 03:25 Last Post By: soylentyellow

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Posted
21-Jan-2008 21:02
by: soylentyellow

Posts: 1,449
Registered: 22/02/03

Why are there no enterprising homeless guarding your forbidden items?

There are some places you can visit that don't allow you to take certain items with you (for example no knives for example for the Circle line tour to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty or no camera or camera phones for example the US Mint in Philadelphia or no food (as well as no knives, and I think no camera unsure for example Congress in Washington DC)

The forbidden items either go into a large rubbish bin (food, knives) or you don't go/don't visit at all, or someone from each party has to stay behind to guard the stuff (usually the case with no camera/camera phone allowed).

There is no place to store your stuff, unlike places to visit in other countries. (For example, if you visit the German Bundestag knives aren't allowed either but they will hold them for you and you will get them back when you exit).

I don't want to debate the reasoning behind banning certain items (like banning factory wrapped American Chocolate Chip cookies in the US Congress) or why they don't hold them for you as they do in some other places outside the US.

I wonder why no enterprising person (a homeless may be?) offers to store the forbidden items for a fee.

All of these cities house lots of homeless persons. Why doesn't a single one of them open up a business and stores your stuff for a dollar? I'd rather pay a dollar than to throw away my pocket knife...Sure, in the case of giving my camera to a homeless person I'd hesitate, but once he has been there for a while and built up a reputation why not?

For example in Egypt, you often have to pay a fee (in addition to the entrance fee) if you want to take pictures. If you don't want to take pictures/avoid the often substantial fee you aren't allowed to bring a camera. Instead, you give it to some chap in front of the entrance and he will look after your camera (for a small fee) and you get it back once you exit.

It works every single time.

Sure, he could run away with all the cameras he is guarding, which may be worth a few thousand dollars. But he can only do that once. Once he has done that once, no body is going to trust him anymore, so he won't do it. Sure, many people don't trust him anyway and pay the camera fee but there are still enough that do in order to make it a viable business.

Posted
21-Jan-2008 21:12
by: soylentyellow

Posts: 1,449
Registered: 22/02/03

1

And no, I don't now why some bits turned blue? May be because they were in those [ brackets?

The reason I ask is not because I had particular problems (no knife, no camera, I hid my lunch or fished it out of the container after I was finished visiting), I ask because I saw other people having problems (such as being turned away from the US Mint because they either had a camera (sure, they've got one, they are tourists) or a camera phone (which current phone doesn't have a camera - not many) or their knife (for peeling apples etc) being thrown away.

Edited by: soylentyellow

Posted
22-Jan-2008 01:05
by: grichard

Posts: 175
Registered: 12/08/05

2

I don't think I'd trust a random homeless person who'd decided to go into business. But I wonder why the attractions don't "franchise out" the business to somebody, homeless or otherwise.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 01:15
by: shilgia

Posts: 6,154
Registered: 28/11/01

3

#2 -- Well, if the alternative is that these pocket knives are going to be thrown away, trusting a homeless person with it is not a bad choice, is it?

Having said that, I don't think "But he can only do that once." applies to stealing cameras at a tourist destination. You can do that only once if you're a guard at an office building where the same people go in and out every day, but not many people would visit your example Ellis Island on several consecutive days.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 02:00
by: FireArm

Posts: 30,306
Registered: 23/09/07

4

In the US embassy they take your phone and knife, but they give it back when you leave. Homeless people would just steal it.

"Hang your chemistry and electricity! If you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable those Europeans to cut each other's throats with greater facility."

Posted
22-Jan-2008 02:37
by: NYRed

Posts: 915
Registered: 15/04/00

5

Yes, I think the answer is, "because Americans assume a homeless person would just steal the stuff."

Posted
22-Jan-2008 03:02
by: jamesdenver

Posts: 1,070
Registered: 09/03/05

6

Back when the TSA banned lighters I wondered why that could just have a "give a lighter take a lighter bucket" as all smokers are dying for a cigarette upon exit. At security stations where the exit is adjacent to the entrance I thought that would be a good idea.

The more you know who you are, and what you want, the less you let things upset you.
- Bill Murray - Lost in Translation

My blog with travel journals and Denver info

Posted
22-Jan-2008 04:22
by: evening

Posts: 1,270
Registered: 13/06/03

7

this post is really cute, albeit completely idealistic!

Posted
22-Jan-2008 06:29
by: Websterella

Posts: 28,531
Registered: 22/10/03

8

Because the US is an evil place and Americans are fat, lazy and wait, what was the last one?

Oh yeah, insular.

365 Photoblog I am not posting in your thread because I don't want it to keep popping up on my "Recent Threads" list.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 08:34
by: VinnyD

Posts: 20,894
Registered: 06/10/04

9

I think if a homeless person were to start doing this on the grounds of the Capitol he would be shooed away by the Capitol Police. I strongly suspect that it's not legal to set up a business -- a deposit service like this, a lemonade stand, whatever -- on the Capitol grounds, at least without a permit that won't be forthcoming.

For pocket knives, what I did once when I forgot to take mine off my keyring before trying to get into a courthouse was: I bought a newspaper from a newspaper box, tucked my knife under the bottom paper, and then bought another paper when I left to retrieve it. That's as cheap as what you would give a homeless guy. Not without risk, but neither is the hypothetical homeless guy. My first thought, and probably everyone's first thought, was to hide it in the bushes outside the courthouse. I bet there are a people who make a living from picking up the knives, radios, guns, drugs, that people leave there.

I paid somebody to "watch" my bicycle in the Valley of the Kings. I imagine it was a form of extortion, that if I hadn't paid my bicycle would indeed have vanished, into the possession of the guy who offered to watch it.

Meet VinnyD.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 09:00
by: bannedintheusa

Posts: 2,449
Registered: 19/10/05

10

this thing is all fu**ed up. My messages are going in the wrong branches. Thorn Tree sucks.

Edited by: bannedintheusa

"There is scarcely anything in the world that some man cannot make a little worse, and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey."

Posted
22-Jan-2008 11:12
by: Kahua

Posts: 2,146
Registered: 08/02/06

11

enterprising and homeless are not usually seen in the same sentence.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 11:42
by: Websterella

Posts: 28,531
Registered: 22/10/03

12

bannedintheusa wrote:
this thing is all fu**ed up. My messages are going in the wrong branches. Thorn Tree sucks.

Edited by: bannedintheusa

Clearly a User issue

365 Photoblog I am not posting in your thread because I don't want it to keep popping up on my "Recent Threads" list.

Posted
22-Jan-2008 14:55
by: DianaHaddad

Posts: 3,621
Registered: 17/10/03

13

What Kahua said.

In the US, homeless people are generally homeless because of a variety of problems, which often includes mental illness. That means that people don't consider them the most trustworthy people to guard their stuff, and that they're not coming up with ways to start a business. It's not a very entrepreneurial group of people. Maybe a church youth group could start up that type of business and people would be more trusting.

elimi sallasam ellisi biri gider gelir birisi

Posted
22-Jan-2008 16:56
by: windy

Posts: 2,237
Registered: 05/07/00

14

Oakland is now looking at hiring the homeless--to dismantle their encampments.

Can't wait to see which check cashing joint they'll need to go to to collect their $30, but I have nothing against Goodwill Industries.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/21/BAN6UJ3PK.DTL

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