Kind Requests

When discussing what to blog about in Berlin, my current flatmate suggested that I write about something very unique to Berlin: the large variety, rather than large number, of people asking you for money. 
Today, someone asked my friends and I to buy cookies from them so they could get tickets back home - wherever that is, as they did not have accents that we could identify.  Eastern European, perhaps?  With packs on their backs and hand-carrying a basket of cellophane-wrapped cookies, we wondered how they got the money for cookies and a myriad of other roadblocks to their cause, including the possibilities of its truth. 

Very common to Berlin are hippies younger than me, dirty and pleasant, asking for money for beer or weed.  Often in a group, sometimes with a dog, they are usually a jubilant bunch, hoping to score a little change to be spent on a good time in Berlin.  As usual for me, I continue to have questions: where do you live and how do you pay for that?  Do you simply not have enough left over for beer, or is it just a sign that you made in hopes that it would inspire donations, no matter what the funds are really used for?  What is your history, what brought you here and made you decide to stay?  Perhaps just the availability of street donations. 

My personal favorite are of course the street musicians.  I have taken to giving them my smallest coins if I think they are playing well, and considering it good karma, have kept up the practice.  I inherited quite a bit of small change from friends and family leaving Europe, and I certainly think that decent musicians are a good avenue for that small investment.  However, I do not like them on trains - the space is too small, and makes it impossible to gossip with one's friends.  Those I ignore - I don't want to encourage them!  However, they are all a part of what makes Berlin, especially in this warm time of year, an incredible place to live.  Someone's always doing something, and there's always something to talk about.