My goal was to observe the interactions between people who pan-handle Downtown Bellingham/perceived to be homeless, and other individuals. I moved down Railroad Ave trying to find groups of homeless people. I could only locate a few during this time. Railroad Ave was really busy with street traffic making it difficult to classify individuals. I spent an hour and half at various locations on Railroad.
1. Bagelry Location
a. I sat watching people walk past the Bagelry
b. White Women in her 40s with a cardboard sign walking down Railroad
i. Sign reads: Need Food
ii. She was dressed in a jacket, sweater and jeans that were clean
iii. She was not actively asking for change or food
iv. People avoided eye contact
v. People did not away from her
c. Very busy with people, around 40 or so people coming and going down the street
d. Primary people on lunch break, or young college students
e. Native Man in his 60s walking up and down, dirty clothes
f. A lot of white, mothers with young children
g. A white women in her upper 40s walks past with a big, black eye behind sun glasses
i. Her appearance was middle class
2. Corner of Railroad Ave and Magnolia
a. Notice construction- utility work had shut down car traffic on the corner
b. Loud street work
c. I observed from the Everyday Music Store window
d. 2 white males in their 20s
i. Wearing baggy pants
ii. Dark Sweatshirts
iii. Shared a cigarette
iv. Leaning against the wall
v. They were hanging out for about 15-20 minutes
vi. Both left together
e. Pregnant teen, white, smoking
f. No panhandling
3. Corner of Railroad Ave. and East Chestnut near Starbucks
a. Native Women in her 50s talking to a man
b. Dog tied to a tree
c. No street traffic
4. Little evidence of drug activity
2nd Field Notes
My second observation was at November 20, 2010 on the corner of Railroad and Magnolia at 2:15 PM until 4:00 PM. I was eating a late lunch at Taco Lobo observing the corner of Railroad and Magnolia. Then I moved to bus terminal. My final position was against a brick wall near the Rite Aide. My goal was to observe youth interactions on the corner. Later I walked down four blocks to see if I can locate any other street activity.
I notice a black male, around 50 years old standing on the corner smoking for about thirty minutes. He walked around the block talking on his cell phone. His tone of voice appeared agaitated. An older white male in his 60s was roiling his tobacco. At 3 o’clock teenagers appeared on the corner. Nine girls around the age of 15 were talking and sharing a cigerate. A lot of laughing and giggling going on. Four older teen men appeared. They were dressed in dark color hoodies. Two were wearing insane clown posy knecklases and hats. Thirtteen individuals hanging out on the corner, now they are not stepping aside to allow foot traffic use the sidewalk. A pair of people gave each other a large hug.
I walk past the group to a tobacco shop on Magnolia street. I overheard a blond teenager ask his friend if he knew anyone who buy his foodstamps for 50 cents to the dollar. This is obviously welfare fraud. I notice people struggling to make it through the crowd of people. One pair of women in their 40s dressed in office wear continue their conversation without interacting with the teens while dodging the mob of kids.
My last location was leaning against the brick wall on Magnolia street. I first wanted to observe how many people walk past in thirty minutes. I was dressed in jeans and sweatshirt listening to music. I was trying to look like the people who hang out on the railroad. I tried to hold people’s eye contact who walked past me. Out of the fifteen random people who walked by me, only one person locked eye contact for longer than a second. This individual was young man in his middle twenties.
3rd Field Notes
I feel that my field studies to date lacked understanding of Downtown population. I went Downtown at 8:00 pm. I spent around forty-five minutes walking down Railroad Ave to E. Mapple down to Three Tree’s Coffee House. The weather was extremely windy. The sidewalks were slippery and icy. The amount of street traffic was low. A man who appeared to homeless was sitting next to the Starbucks. He had a large yellow lab. He appeared to be listening to music on his headphones. A Native women, in her 50s was standing across the street.
Disappointment, I moved to the Three-Trees Coffeehouse. The Three-Trees Coffeehouse is unique in Bellingham. The coffeehouse is run by volunteers. The profits are donated to local nonprofits (The Whatcom Dream, Old Town Christian Miniteries, and the Opportunity Council). The owners also support bible studies classes at the location. They strive to build a sense of community, according to their website. I was previously aware of the coffee house’s mission targeted to Bellingham’s homeless and low-income individuals.
I notice that Three Trees was not very busy. A white woman in late fifties was handling the coffee stand. I ordered a cup of coffee with milk and sugar. I notice a Hispanic women in forties humming to herself. She appeared to be mentally ill. A group of two college students appeared to be studying in the far end of the room. On the walls hung art. After thirty minutes, the owner came to me to see if everything was alright. He was a white, “hippy” looking male in his early thirties. I told him my project. He seemed highly interested. He went on to describe how interacting with the homeless has greatly improved his view point on things. He believes that he received a calling from God to serve the needy in Bellingham. I notice the owner met with everyone who walked into the coffeehouse. My observation was around an hour and half.
4th Field Notes
It is a dark, windy Tuesday night at Downtown Bellingham. I’m eating at my favorite dive 24-hour diner called the Horseshoe. The Horseshoe Café is located at 113 East Holy Street. The diner is hundred twenty-five years old—making it the oldest continuous running restaurant west of the Mississippi River. The restaurant shows her age. The décor is dark, old cowboy themed. The Horseshoe Café is both sit-down restaurant, and bar. The wait staff is tough crowd. Tonight is a calm night; however, I’ve seen the servers have to call the police on diners. The ‘shoe (as locals like to call it) offers cheap, no frills food and alcohol. I was here for about 2 hours.
Why am I observing activity at this restaurant? The ‘Shoe offers a rare social change to observe the interaction between socio-economical classes in Downtown Bellingham. There tends to be three primary groups: “hipster” college students, white men over the age of sixty, and people are most likely homeless/low income. “Hipster” college students make up the majority of the current customers. The “hipster” students are often dressed casually in tight ‘skinny’ jeans, have tattoos, funky haircuts and often using the free wifi on their laptops. The “hipster” movement is about alternative music, and nonconformist lifestyle. Some older generations may confuse a “hipster” as being homeless at first glance. I can recognize the twelve “hipsters” total; six studying by themselves and four drinking/socializing.
I selected the ‘Shoe due to the large windows that face a busy Downtown street. There is a lot of traffic in and out of the ‘Shoe due to their public bathrooms. I notice three ‘street people’ just coming in to use the bathroom. Those individuals were not customers. One sixty year old, African-American man with a large camping backpack was drinking coffee at the bar. He bought a pack of cigarettes from the waitress. He was only person who appeared to be homeless inside the restaurant. Directly in front of the ‘Shoe there was about four ‘street people’ hanging out on East Holly Street. They appeared to be pan handling for cigarettes.
The four ‘street people’ were socializing with ‘Shoe’ customers who were smoking outside. Two of the people were forty year old, Native American couple. The other two appeared to be teenagers dressed in baggy clothes. It appears that majority of customers are cigarette smokers. I notice that customers were giving eye contact to the non-customer, ‘street people’. They appeared to be giving polite conversations with the homeless group. I could not hear what they were saying to each other by my location. Body language suggests a positive social interaction. Previous observations showed that the majority of people tend to avoid eye contact with panhandlers. I notice the Native American couple walking up and down the block. I theorize that maybe socializing in the same restaurant breaks down someone of the social norms of social interaction.
I left the restaurant somewhat disappointed. Late nights at the ‘Shoe can be often wild. I notice something important as I was walking to my car. I was walking on the corner of East Holly and Railroad. There was a homeless Caucasian man sitting with his large dog on the corner. People were walking right past him without saying anything to him as he panhandled. Cross the intersection was a large group of what appeared to be college students waiting to go into the Glow dance club. I was struck by the great divide across the street intersection. It made me wonder how great the social divide between the haves and have nots.
Field Notes/Interview #5
The interview took place at noon, December 1 in my living room. The individual I’m interviewing is a friend of mine. She spent a lot of time a lot of time hanging out downtown. I’ve changed her name to Sarah to protect her anonymity. The interview took about an hour and a half. This is the highlights of the interview.
Me: How old were you when you started to hang out in Downtown Bellingham?
Sarah: I think I just turned 12 years old. I was hung out there off and on for the last eleven years. I stopped when I got clean last year.
Me: What reasons do you think you hung out downtown?
Sarah: I think because I didn’t fit in at school. Plus the drugs.
Me: Where did you hang-out?
Sarah: On the corner on railroad and magnolia during the day. The night corner was at the Little Cheerful on railroad and Holly. Sometimes I spent the night under the bridge near Georgia Pacific.
Me: What time of the day you do that?
Sarah: After school, and all day on the weekends.
Me: What did you do downtown?
Sarah: hang out, socialize, “spange”: ask for spare change for food, cigs, drugs, booze.
Me: Were you ever harassed for “spanging”?
Sarah: Yup, it’s city law that you can’t sit down on the sidewalk until 9 pm. So we were harassed. The story owners would tell us not to harass our customeers (the little cheerful café, and sweetheart candy). Some people would yell at us for panhandling.
Me: What about the police?
Sarah: they harassed us for sitting, and minor smoking. I was never searched for drugs. I was scared of the police.
Me: who did you hang out with so young?
Sarah: There were only one or two a few kids my own age. The majority of the people I hung out with were late teens and adults.
Me: That’s a scary thought that grown adults hanging out with teenagers.
Sarah: Yeah, well I was more scared of the police then anyone of those people. They were like my family.
Me: Where did you friends live? Where they homeless?
Sarah: A lot of them were homeless, or “couch serfing”. If they did have go, it was usually really crowded, like four people living in a one-bedroom at the Mt. Baker Apartments.
Me: I think majority of Bellingham citizens are unaware of the amount of illegal activity going on Railroad Ave.
Sarah: (laughs) I think the drug dealing is rather obvious. If you hang out on the corner, soon or later someone will ask you if you need a hook-up. It’s common for people to shoot-up in the alleyways, or the business entryways at night. There is drug dealing throughout Bellingham, but downtown is like 7/11: everybody knows a one stop shopping for whatever you need, at all times of the day.
Me: What can you buy downtown?
Sarah: pot, crack, coke, heroin, meth, pills are a big. The designer drugs (like ecstasy and LSD) are harder to find unless there is a random supply in Bellingham. And of course prostitution.
Me: Tell me more about prostitution?
Sarah: Late at night you can see them walking over by Starbucks, up and down wearing skippy clothes. Where Bob’s Burger and Brew Restaurant is, it use to be a crappy motel. The women try to make eye contact with people driving past. Prostitution is more active in the crack world.
Me: Do they have pimps?
Sarah: No not really, my friend’s mom was a ho’ing. I think a lot of the traffic has moved to the hotels on Samish. The higher end hookers run ads on craigslist.
Me: What other types of crime did you or your friends do Downtown?
Sarah: We would smoke and use drugs in the alleyways or right on the corner. We would steal food at the Rite Aide. People public pissing on the store fronts.
Me: Did you ever feel afraid?
Sarah: (pause) Yeah, at night I was afraid of the cops.
Me: You weren’t afraid of the older people you hung out with?
Sarah: No not really, although looking back I should have been. I was high or drunk, so all I wanted was more drugs. There is a lot of sickos who would try to have sex with young teenage girls. The “thrasher” was trails in heavy woods on the end of the railroad that is now condos and businesses. A lot of people were jumped, and beat-up. I knew some girls who were rapped in those woods. Junkies shoot-up in those woods. People camped out off the trails.
Me: Did you ever notice any child abuse?
Sarah: A lot of young teen moms would bring their babies on the corner. They would get high late at night with their kids. A lot of childhood neglect. A lot of older men with young, teenage girlfriends. A lot of runways didn’t get reported.
Me: I’ve notice a lot of diversity among people who hang out downtown.
Sarah: Yeah, a lot of natives, and blacks. Juggalos have a strong presence. Now days a lot of college students hang out down there.
Me: Did you ever deal drugs?
Sarah: I helped my mom’s boyfriend deal crack when I was 13 or 14. I never used it. I was like mule. He told me to put it in my underwear.
Me: Did you witness a lot of violence with your mom’s boyfriend?
Sarah: Yeah, one time one of these women came short, and I witness him beating the crap out of this girl. I also saw my little sister be almost ran over by a car for a crack debt.
Me: Did you ever run away from home?
Sarah: I was raised by grandmother. I would ran away a lot, and go downtown. I would find a place to crash before I would be found by her.
Me: Did you have any interactions with community services on railroad?
Sarah: The Salt on the Street program would give us food, groceries and food. But they never really talked with us. I never messed around with the Mission. I would visit the food bank a lot. Back then they weren’t a lot of social support places. Now there is the Rainbow Center and Amy’s place.
Me: Where did you use drugs at?
Sarah: Everywhere, in the parkaide, alleyways, on top of the Bagelry, Maritime Marinara, the Trasher…
Me: Now that you’re clean and sober, what does going Downtown make you feel?
Sarah: The neighborhood has changed a lot, more businesses are open latter hours. More people are living and spending time in the neighborhood. The empty lots, and abandon buildings are replaced with stores. The thrasher is now waterfront condos. I feel safe, I don’t hurry up to get to the brighter lights at night.
Me: Have you notice any changes of population?
Sarah: There is still the people I used to hang out with ten years ago still kicking it at Railroad. Some of them moved away, some have died, or in prison. I notice more high schoolers hanging out.
Me: How did “normal” people treat you?
Sarah: Most ignored us, it made us think that all rich people are stuck up. I don’t think that now of course.
I’m glad that I had the opportunity to interview someone. Individuals appeared hostile toward outsiders. This interview provided history of the neighborhood.