End to end Street Pastoring evening last night. Town seemed a bit quite and bit subdued at first and then the first evening of the year where it wasn't a million degrees below freezing went over exciting.
I went out with a different team to the one I usually work with, due to a change in shifts. Out in town for the first hour or so a strange or at least a subdued atmosphere as I got to know my new sp colleagues and we did the rounds talking to the door staff.
First incident, a group of pnuematic young ladies standing around looking in to a drain... The traditional greeting of " you alright?" Illicited the answer that one of them appeared to have dropped their ID down a drain. I don't know why they would do that , but there you are. First Street Pastor stepped in and tried to open the drain. I had a go and neither of us could shift it. Game Over..
We couldn't help anymore so left them to it, we walked over to Mangos and we found a female student and her friends. The woman was having a panic attack and her friends were at a bit of a loss how to deal. Strangely enough we have just had First Aid training, so underpants over trousers we were able to help. She was pretty, how shall we say, collapsed in a state of being tired and emotional. It had turned a tadge cold and so we broke out the survival blankets and helped her to stop hypervenilating. When she had calmed down and sobered up a tadge, her frined popped her in to taxi and off they trotted. Strangely enough we bumped in to them again about 2 mins later with the woman hanging out of the cab honking up. Fortunately we were able to deploy the full cleaning kit and got her and the cab cleaned up.
Ok it wasn't all sick there was the woman who had collapsed by O Neils and whose friends wanted to get her to Harrow. Not an easy job....... We had to persuade her to get up and then we carried her as far as the IBIS, where one of her friends had a room and she bunked up there.
On a sadder note, at the very end of the night we came across a street person, who had collapsed next to a bin. Really tricky as he got colder and colder. We wrapped him in a space blanket and tried to persuade him to go home. Although it seemed as if he didn't have a home to go to. What to do.... we talked to him but he more or less completely passed out, so we asked the police to help. They called an ambulance and they eventually decided to take him to hospital. I hope.... Really really difficult situation, where should he go, there isn't a night shelter..I am sure we will come across the situation again and will have to find some kind comprimise again.
The night ended on this note and we were all a bit subdued. I had to rush off to bed as I had to up early to work, but that's another story
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