I’ve always learned the act of charity from my parents. I grew up in a home where we give out to people even though we never had much. As a result of that, I chose to give alms to beggars once in a while. I still give out almost everyday but I have always set a general day for giving alms to a lot of beggars and not just one.
Luckily for me, my boyfriend loves to give too. I then told him about my intention of giving alms to beggars and he loved the idea. We were watching a movie that afternoon which made me remember that it’s about time I give something to beggars.
I said to him, “Babe, I am thinking of giving alms to beggars and I’m planning to do it tomorrow or next”.
“You should have told me earlier but that’s not a problem. I will support you with the little I have,” he responded.
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Right away, he transferred a sum of money to me and he even gave me an idea on how to go about it.
“I don’t want you to buy biscuits or cook for them this time. It’s better if you can get them little foodstuffs that should be able to feed them for maybe a week and we should make them just twenty beggars so it will be enough,” he said to me. I loved the idea and bought it right away.
I left his house that evening and called my sister. We attend the same University and her hostel is not far from mine. It’s just ten minutes walk. She got to my place even before I got there because she was closer to my hostel and my boyfriend’s was farther. I told her about my plan since we have always done it together. She also added the little amount she had and we went to the market.
On getting to the market, things changed and we could not afford to get something for the twenty beggars. Foodstuffs got very much expensive and I never wanted to break the bank just because I want to feed some set of people. My sis and I could only afford to feed ten beggars. We bough all we needed and went to the house.
We tried to wake early on the next day so we could pack all we were going to give them. Before leaving the house, my sister and I had a conversation.
“Bisola, I suggest you drop your phone at home because we never can tell how rough the place will be. You know we’re going to the ghetto area and you know what it is like over there,” my sister said.
“It doesn’t really matter. It’s not like we’re going to a crowded place. It’s just to hand those gifts to them and get back home,” I responded and she agreed with me even though she was smart to drop her phone at home.
Unfortunately, things didn’t go as planned.
On getting there, we met a lot of beggars but instead of gathering all of them together, we knew we didn’t have enough gifts for them so my sister and I divided those gifts into two and started giving them one by one until we got mobbed by the beggars. They began to beg us to give them something and truly, we had nothing on us. All of them just wanted to make sure that they get the package knowing fully well that it cannot be enough for all of them. My sister tried stopping them from surrounding us but it was difficult to control all of them.
All of a sudden, I felt empty but the place was too tight that I could not even try to raise my bag to check if my things are still intact.
I just dropped the load and forced myself out of the gathering and some of those beggars were still following me and begging me for money. I shouted at them and told them to stay away from me.
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I just had to check my bag and I realized that something sharp was used to cut my bag underneath and my phone was nowhere to be found. I sat on the floor and began to cry.
My sister left their midst and can to me to know why I was sitting on the floor and crying.
“What’s the problem?,” she asked and I could not even utter a word. I just had to show her my bag and she understood that my phone was gone. She threw all she had on the floor while the beggars were fighting for it on the floor.
It was so sad that I was trying to help some people but all they could think of was stealing my property.
Ever since then, I have preferred to give alms to single beggars and not when they are too much there but only happens once in a while.
