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It’s Important to Be Polite to Vancouver Drug Addicts
BC Hydro Building at Dusk by Andrew Ferguson
So I’m downtown on Richards Street at around 7pm, slowly meandering home and taking photos. Mostly photos of the sky, testing out my sexy new polarizing filter.
I also recently read an article on overcoming the problem of converging verticals at Digital Photography School and wanted to try working with vertical lines. Therefore, photos of the sky and tall buildings. Sounds simple enough. When I take photos of buildings, I find it really makes a difference to get high up. We’re used to seeing tall buildings from ground level, so a photo from up higher is much more likely to catch the eye.
The best buildings to get high up are parkades. They’re the perfect structure for getting up high to take photos. They’re plentiful in major cities, sometimes as tall as ten stories, and you can almost always get on the very top of it and not have to shoot through glass.
I got the shot I wanted of the BC Hydro building, which you can see above. When I finally finished, I headed back down the same staircase I came up. I’m really proud of this photo and I was already excited even before I left the roof, because I knew I’d gotten the shot.
I stepped into the cramped concrete stairwell, still half smiling. Then I suddenly realized that two obvious junkies preparing to get high were blocking the way out. I had a brief panicked moment in the back of my head where I thought, “I’m about to get mugged by drug addicts.” I decided to go with the direct approach. I stepped up to the two of them and said “Excuse me guys, I understand you’re a bit busy here but can I please get by?”
No response for almost three full seconds. One of them finally goes “Oh… uh… sorry” and lets me pass. They sounded so confounded by my politeness; it was sad but a little funny. Trying not to laugh, I made my way down the stairs and back out to the street.
So keep in mind the moral of this story: If you run into junkies while you’re out taking photos, be polite.
Stephanie Said,
June 24, 2007 @ 7:01 pm
I think if you had asked anyone in any stairwell to politely move out of your way, they would have. I don’t think it’s fair to assume that just because they’re crackheads, that they don’t respond to polite requests. After all, they were blocking your way. There’s no arguing something like that, which is probably why they moved.
Brendan Said,
June 26, 2007 @ 1:21 am
I also think if you asked someone in a stairwell politely to move out of your way, they would. But I don’t think that Andrew was asuming that just because they are crackheads, they do not respond to polite requests. He merely noted that they seemed a little taken back by his simple, yet equal and fair request. Which is equal and fair to say the least…
For the person who begs for money without ambition… Is not a person who is searching for equality… The compassion you see or the guilt you feel towards such a person… is only fueled by their knowledge of habit and inevitablity… The soberness will all be over soon…
I, However, would like to note how Andrew was a little taken back by the drug addicts’ response. :)
Rowan Lipkovits Said,
June 27, 2007 @ 2:12 pm
I suddenly realized that two obvious junkies preparing to get high were blocking the way out.
For six months I co-hosted the all-accordion radio show at CO-OP Radio from 2-3 am once a week (still co-hosting — but now at 9:30-10:30 pm Friday nights 8) … CFRO being located at Hastings and Columbia (one block west of Main), traversing the gauntlet of junkies huddled in the front stoop was a necessary part of every station entrance and exit. It often took them a while to clue in to my “scusi”s, but once they understood the nature of the situation they were without exception polite and apologetic. (I don’t see why; it’s not like they were walking through MY living room.)
Andrew Ferguson Said,
June 27, 2007 @ 2:30 pm
You’re right, Rowan. It makes sense from an objective perspective.
It’s hard for me to get my semi-conservative suburban upbringing out of my system in strange ways like this. When you’re raised by a police officer, you grow up believing that all junkies are violent and unpredictable.
I’ve never really encountered that many until moving to Vancouver. Just drunks and sober-seeming homeless folk.
I’ve been through Main & Hastings at night and passed that same gauntlet, but this was my first time having a direct encounter with one.