Day Laborers

Today we got up really early (on our staff day I might add) to go and make lunches for the day laborers that stand outside Home Depot everyday looking for work. We were each assigned a food item to bring so that we could put together the lunches. Although a few people forgot, so I had to make a couple of extra trips to Food for Less before we could complete the 50 lunches. At around 10am we set off with sack lunches, hot chocolate, and bottled water to hand out. At each place we went, we spent a little time talking to the day laborers about what their life was like. At one home depot, a man confided in us that he lived in a tent he had built in the nearby canyon and then he showed us where he lived. We took a short walk until we came upon a hidden neighborhood of the homeless. There was a wooden table with a fire pit, pots, pans, and remnants of food. There were piece of foam taped and tied to rocks as makeshift pillows and plastic trash bags opened up amongst the trees to make walls. As much as we see homeless people everyday, it's strange to think that people who are technically "working" are still forced to sleep on the ground with rocks to rest their heads on. The man was so kind and allowed us to take pictures and explained to us how many people lived with him and told us of how he had left his family behind in Mexico. As hard as it was to comprehend, he said that he was the sole provider for his family and that living in the canyons and working as a day laborer here in the United States made a better life for both him and his family than it had been when he was in Mexico.

**6 Hours