Anthony Jucha spent the Queen’s Birthday long weekend sleeping rough in Adelaide’s west parklands.
I did not know whether I would go through with the idea. I was at work ringing around for advice, speaking with someone from Westcare, one of Adelaide’s day centres.
“You really should meet someone who lives on the streets first,” he said. “Get an introduction – for your own safety, and out of respect. Clara would look after you. I’ll put her on…”
I could hear Clara coming. She took my idea and put it into action.
“You’re a lawyer?”
“That’s right.”
“Where’s your office?”
“Halifax Street.”
“What number? I’m coming over.”
“No, don’t do that!” I was not prepared for this. “I’ll come to you.”
“Okay, meet you at West Terrace.”
Which is how it was, having intended to enter the scene incognito, I found myself en route in a suit, in the rain, with no umbrella. By the time I met Clara, my suit had been reduced to a stinky wet sack. We sheltered under the trees to discuss my idea. Why did I want to sleep in the parklands?
“I’m not sure,” I said. “I’ve read about the dry zone and about the Adelaide City Council taking people’s gear and moving them along. I want to learn more about it; maybe write about it.
“Alright,” said Clara with laughter. “Come camp with me.”
I took the next day, Friday, off to prepare. I bought a cheap tent and borrowed a tarpaulin from my father. And seeing as I had the day off, I arranged to have lunch with an old friend. The lunch went to liquid and ended up in a bar. By the time I was due to meet Clara, I was ticking along quite nicely. Much as I suspect could be said for so many of my contemporaries on any Friday night.
Back at West Terrace, Clara introduced me around. I met Aaron, who assumed the role of my personal bodyguard; always by my side. I met families, kids, dozens of people. I was made to feel welcome. No one seemed too concerned by my presence. Someone later told me that he knew I was not a cop because I did not go around asking a lot of questions.

He was right. I was not looking for trouble. I did not even see it coming when, late in the night, someone hit the deck. His face was a mess.
“Call an ambulance!”
I pulled out my phone. And in my mind, I remembered a time when I had called an ambulance for a friend who had bashed his head on the stairs. When it arrived, they told me to send him to hospital in a taxi. If he did not have insurance, it would be much cheaper. I felt sure this guy did not have insurance. So, I called a taxi.
“Did you call an ambulance?”
“No, a taxi.”
“A taxi?! What? Give me that phone!”
I fell back. I felt I had been exposed as not valuing this man. I felt an outsider, confused and ashamed. I started to feel a little afraid.
The ambulance came. They bundled the man up and took him away.
“Good luck,” someone called out. “Good luck… what’s your name? Good luck.”
Clara declared the night over. About half a dozen of us followed her through the cemetery and on to her camp. Aaron and some of the others went to work building a shelter and before I knew it my tarp was up in a tree.
It was late. I was tired and could not face my new tent, so I joined the group huddling together under the tarp. It sheltered four or five of us on that rainy night. I woke up wet below the waist; my legs were sticking out from the tarp. Shivering cold, the first one awake, I left the camp to buy a lighter for a fire. And maybe some food. I felt ill. Worse and worse as I walked. I felt a cad. Leaving! Not even twelve hours in! I aborted my mission and went back to the camp. To eat oranges. The ones my parents gave me to keep away colds.
In time, the others awoke and took me to a day centre for breakfast and hot showers. We walked there virtually under police escort.
Waiting my turn by the toaster, I learned that life on the streets is a game of cat and mouse, except with no mouse holes and some serious cats. Accumulating fines is a way of life. One couple told me they received a parking fine every night they slept in their car. The car did not start and the fines would never be paid. A HECS debt from the school of hard knocks.

I spent most of the morning sitting in the courtyard with a guy who introduced himself as the “local needle exchange”. We were cop watching. Cops filed in without end, in uniforms, in suits and in plain clothes ridiculous. Occasionally they took someone away. In a paddy wagon of course. No point messing up the back of the Commodore. Come lunch time, we had lost quite a few.
There were rissoles for lunch, for me anyway because I had two bucks for lunch. A hungry guy asked me if he could have one. I said he could have them all; I am a vegetarian.
This caused an eruption between him and another hungry guy who also would have liked one.
“No!” the first said defending.
“They were offered to me.”
The defeated stormed off and, much to my surprise, the victor shared his spoils with a more polite other. I just ate my mash.
After lunch, another character, a little too smiley, sat down for a chat.
“So, you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth?”
“No, I earned my silver spoon.”
“Have you ever met a hired assassin?”
“I don’t believe I have,” I said shaking his hand.
“What’s an assassination go for these days?”
“Doesn’t matter, it’s fun.”
“So you’re more of a pro bono assassin then?”
“Do you in for nothing.”
I excused myself to get a coffee. Or maybe a tea. Coffee, I noted, was not provided. One less addiction to foster perhaps. Though, there were sachets of instant around to be found.
I drank my coffee with a woman whom I guessed to be in her sixties. She told me about her husband who had lived with her on the streets. He died from cancer that very week. She seemed to be taking it well. A volunteer, passing by, offered her some warm socks.
She accepted, only to roll them out in disgust.
“Odd socks?” she said. “I’m not wearing odd socks. They’ll think I’m some sort of freak!”
It was getting dark and with rain approaching Clara and Aaron took me back the camp. There, we met a man in a Datsun 120Y doing his rounds distributing food and blankets. He gave us soup and stories told in a Liverpudlian accent. Another passing good soul helped me to put up my tent. I slept much better on Saturday, my second, night.
Clara, Aaron and I woke up alone in the camp on Sunday morning. We set off to find breakfast and, along the way, we found a friend of Clara’s who had spent the night in a car. He recruited our help for a push start. We failed. It left me coughing and retching, nearly throwing up. The weekend was taking its toll. We gave up on the car and walked into town.
“So you’re looking at homelessness then?” said the man.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“Well, homelessness is the just secondary issue.”
“What’s the primary issue?”
“Indigenous rights.”
It took me by surprise. And still it took me by surprise when we arrived at the day centre to see a man being cuffed and arrested. It is a bit hard to tell when someone has their face pinned to the ground, but I reckon you could knock this man down as soon as look at him. Or just sit him down on a step, while you wait for the paddy wagon.
Inside the day centre, I watched a bare footed man wandering around the courtyard. He had smuggled in some methylated spirits. His face was a grimace; he could barely stand up. He shook his head at those smoking rollies around him.
“At least smoke something decent,” he said passing around cigarettes, before staggering away.
Over what was supposed to be a calming coffee, a woman told me about her brother’s death in custody. She showed me photographs of him dead in his cell. He lay beneath a vent strung up with shoelaces. He hung himself said the coroner. Bullshit said his family.
I met a quiet woman of seventeen. She had run away from home when she was twelve. Her parents fell into drugs and lost everything, so she left. Then, I met an older, even quieter, woman who had been taken away from her parents at a similar age. It was too late for her. She went on to give birth to her father’s child.
It was too much for me. I needed solace. Clara and Aaron took me back to the camp. I sat away from the others for a while, contemplating my conversations of the day.
“What’s your mission here?” one volunteer had asked me.
“I don’t know. I’m really not sure.”
“I think you’re looking for clarity.”
“Maybe.”
“Well you won’t find it!” he said. “You’re opening up a Pandora’s box here mate. Domestic violence, mental illness, gambling, drugs, prostitution, rape, incest, just sheer isolation. And some of these guys are their own worst enemies.” He looked around the day centre. “This isn’t a mission of success. It’s a mission of mercy.”
Someone lit a fire and it brought comfort to the camp. It also brought new company in a mother and daughter and a few jokey blokes. With the story telling and laughing underway, we decided to chip in for a cask.
But our runners returned empty handed; the closest pub was already closed. I hesitated, but reasoned it would be alright. It was after all my last night. I stood in the middle of Anzac Highway, hailed a cab, and took it to a bottle shop I knew to be open and straight back again. The leap between worlds was utterly surreal. I returned triumphant with a cask of Morris Dry Red, standard fare in my circles. Someone sampled it.
“You drink this with food, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess I do,” I said humbled, pondering port, warm and filling.
There was a lot of talk that night. I was starting to feel comfortable in my company and pushed the conversation with Aaron a bit.
“What’s the reason for getting up in the morning? Food, shelter, booze, what?” I asked. “What drives you?”
“Just being happy.”
“Fair enough.” Same here.
I stayed up as late as I could. And then a bit more.
“Go to bed Anthony. You’re nodding off mate.”
Morning came. My third night had passed. Everyone in the camp woke up at about the same time. We all knew I would be leaving soon. I excused myself to go to the toilet and returned prepared for some emotional farewells. But the camp was empty. They were all gone. I was alone. I dialled my father.
“Dad, I’m going to have a hard time taking this tarp off these people.”
We left it.
I went back to my home.