The faces of the homeless once more bear the signs of exhaustion
These “lonely men” have been sleeping for three days in the folds of the city to try to protect themselves from the cold. Morning marauding.
On Friday, many homeless people had to leave the emergency establishments set up during the winter.
LAURENT GUIRAUD
We saw them leaving their accommodation one by one last Friday under the snow, thanking before leaving, hand on heart, the team of social workers and the receptionists of the hotel. They looked rested when they went up the Chemin des Olliquettes (sic), to Petit-Lancy, an improbable address that had become theirs.
In the Pâquis district. At this place, we had inaugurated the first night stopover in Geneva.
LAURENT GUIRAUD
Every man for himself in the exercise of survival of which they know every corner. There was no regrouping, a newly created camp this weekend on Geneva territory, following the closure of a good third of the hotel rooms made available for the most deprived.
The time that other places open once more, so here they are back on the street. Single men who have found the plans they know: building alleys, cellars, these folds in the city, sheltered from the wind, protected from view, where they had sometimes taken the trouble to hide the boxes that serve them box spring.
The flowering trees in this park on the Right Bank withstood the frost. Next door, a homeless man buried in his sleeping bag.
LAURENT GUIRAUD
Run away from drafts
The station sector has also found these solitary figures that the security guards never let sleep for more than an hour in the same place. Without a transport ticket, the waiting room, still just as ridiculous in its derisory size and its furniture, is a counter for those who are turned away.
The rounds of the chasuble wearers stop there regularly and clean up. “They push us outside or into the big hall, which is filled with drafts,” says Antoine, a 38-year-old welder looking for work.
“The agents at the station chase us all night and show no humanity.”
“My CV, I sent it, I’m waiting for answers. Until last Friday, I might go to job interviews with a clean face and an untired face. The galley resumed, we dive back very quickly…” Antoine is angry, he is angry with these agents “disguised as fries”, who ruined his night at the station and “show no humanity”.
When everything closes, Cornavin once once more becomes this giant shelter unconditionally hostile to human presence which has neither roof, nor ticket, nor anything to legitimize itself. Shared anger.
The camping tents have returned to the edge of the river. Until the next dismantling.
LAURENT GUIRAUD
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