Sunday, March 02, 2008

homeless : anya peters

Anya Peters – yes the first time I heard her name in Reader’s Digest. I wonder who is she… and what had happen.

Homeless… Yes, a situation that everybody afraid of. I can’t imagine how a human being can live without a place for shelter that we called it home.

She was homeless and lived in depression. Her only home was her car and the only place she would seek for warmth was a public library. She lived in her car for 9 months. Her life changed when she started blogging through free internet at the library. She thought she could write whatever she wants about her life and no one would care since there are millions of peoples who wrote blog as well. She was wrong; her story impressed so many peoples in the world including New York Times. Then she was suggested by them to write a book about her life.

Now, she is no more homeless. I’d like to buy her book [Abandoned] soon and enjoy every single word in her story.

What’s your comment?

6 comments:

  1. That is a very old story as far as the USA is concerned. During the period i lived ther i know of stories of homeless famillies; young mothers with their young children living in their old cars. Some even dying in the peak of winter when they try to keep warm inside their car.

    The real question is; is this all so different from what goes on nearer to us? For the past 2,5 years i have seen an old man living on card board and eating handouts at the landing of an HDB building next to a wet market and food market in an area in Central Singapore. Maybe the only difference is that he does not have a car, and his meagre possessions are half a dozen cardboard boxes, and the climate is gentler (for the moment!) without snow and cold.

    If we look into Indonesia, or the Philippines, or Thailand, Burma and Malaysia, I am certain there are stories like this.

    The thing with first world countries, is that their poverty is different. it is a sort of qualified proverty, much along the same lines as qualified illeteracy. In this case we are not talking about people who cannot read or write, but about people who are "PC illiterate",etc .

    In many western First Wold countries, many families are on positions of poverty. Just today reading The Times, i came across an article drawing the British overnment's attention to the need to subsidize about 4.5 million famillies on their heating fuel bills for winters (which by the way are getting very nasty and cold in Europe).

    This is just one type of example of first world poverty. I can quote you another type of example, which is called, loosely translated into English, "Ashamed Poverty". This consists of a person or a familly not having enough to live by or eat, and maintaining a tidy and clean appearance; they don't beg, they don't ask for government help, they just do as well as they can with their very limited resources, because they were taught that being poor is something to be ashamed of, and most importantly they were taught that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

    Maybe this last type of attitude, is a way of thinking we all should give some thought to. No one is born with the right to "free lunches" and the rest of the world does not owe anyone a living. We all must struggle as best as we can.

    Having said this, there is always room for concern for our fellow human beings. This and other higher thoughts and concerns should distinguish us from the rest of the organic life life forms in our planet. Unfortunately it would seem that the rest of those organic life forms in this planet are quickly closing in on us, humans. It seems that more and more we are the animals and they are the humans.

    Piety is a concept which is underrated, and is not reserved solely for religious matters or one's immediate familly members. There is more to the word and the concept than what people are aware of.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Antonio,

    Yes I agree with the facts given by you. The different between Anya and others are she was lucky to be found by NYT, had car to lived in, had notebook to write a blog and had opportunity to be a writer.

    I have no idea about how homeless people live. Yes, for sure I will buy her book to understand more about homeless life.

    Thanks to God that I'm not homeless.

    Thanks for dropping by Antonio =)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous8:59 PM

    I am motivated by this post when I read about the part where her life started changing when she started blogging through free internet at the library.That's cool.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Su Sheng Loong,

    Yes, me too but like Antonio said there are some who are not lucky enough out there, not even have a car but few cardboard boxes.

    We never know our luck tho. Who knows one day we'll be a millionaire? Life goes on, we must keep on surviving. Plus, try harder... push ourselves to the limit.

    I suppose you want to buy the book too? =)

    Thanks for dropping by.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wow, to live in a car for 9 months! How terrible. But at least something great came out of it! Good for her! How old is she anyway?

    That's one thing about Reader's Digest. It has lots of wonderful and interesting stories.

    Yeah, this books seems to be quite hard to get. It's not available in Acmamall and it's out of stock at Better World Books. But hey, it's available at the MPH website for RM44.90. I just checked it.

    ReplyDelete
  6. josette - have you bought it? let me know if you have bought it ok? :)

    i don't know how old is she but must be a mature adult.

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for the comment.

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