Poverty in Europe

One thing I had wanted to blog about way back in regards to my trip to Europe was regarding homelessness and poverty. Starting from our unintentional 8 hour layover in Paris, I got a different feeling about the stigma of homelessness. I saw a guy sitting in the airport, who was clearly homeless, and he was just sort of sitting, then he took off his shoes and proceeded to rub mineral oil all over his feet. Security walked by countless times and never made any attempt to usher him out. Another guy who was either homeless or crazy or both was walking around the airport singing to people. Again, no big deal. If either of these things happened here in the United States, you can bet that each of those people would be sent on their way.

Then, during our time in Croatia, Greece, and Italy, we didn't see any apparent problems with homelessness. To that effect, neither did we see anyone who acted like the rich "too good" pricks you see all the time around here, nor did we see any people who seemed overly rich. Everyone seemed pretty equal for the most part. Hell, I see more homeless people walking the 2 blocks from the bus to my office than I saw in all of those countries while I was there

I know I've heard many times before that work ethic is different in Europe, and so I'm assuming the drive to become rich is not as widespread either. Perhaps I was just seeing tourist areas that are kept pretty homogeneous, who knows. I know I did notice for sure work ethic was different, especially in the service type jobs.

There seemed be less disparity between rich and poor, and less emphasis on it as well. I don't know, but I think it's healthier overall. Of course, I'm not driven by money so my opinion is bound to be different. It's a weird sort of paradox here, homelessness is frowned upon and pushed under the rug, and if you aren't driven by money and materialism you are different. I know I've made a bunch of gross generalizations, but hopefully you get my point.