Today I was reading a book at the train station, and some guy came up to me and asked if I had two or three euros for him. I said no, and he walked away. I watched as he asked a few more people with little success. five minutes later, he came back to me, and with a smile on his face he said in a German accent:

"You know, I do this 10 hrs a day, and I make an average of about 200 euros. I have a house in Miami, and $200,000 in the bank. The people love to help out the street people. But it's not just me...there are five of us. We are a team."

Then he told me, that you just have to keep it real. And he sang what he said was a Jennifer Lopez lyric, about keeping it real. An interesting encounter - but what a low life.