Hunger.

Tidying up this and that I came across a newspaper from the end of March. We must have picked it up on the day we arrived I think. It was open at a page where there was headline about child poverty. 

AGE, an association of some kind that I have not yet identified, had made the regional government aware of a report by the charity organisation Cáritas that said the 20% of children in Galicia are living below the poverty line. One of the politicians involved in the debate referred also to a pediatricians’' report that problems of child health and malnutrition had gone up 54%. 

Mr. Nuñez Feijoo, president of Galicia, apparently thanked the organisation for bringing them these reports but said he preferred to use information from the Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas. Their figures put Galician poverty at 18%, below the national average of 21%. He went on the say that anything else was "apocalyptic description" and compared the presenters to the "Santa Inquisición". 

Hmm!! Is there really much difference between 18%, 20% and 21%? It still means that around one in five children are not getting enough to eat. If the average for the country is really 21%, then some places must be much higher. And this is in the 21st century in a country that is a member of the European Union. 

The same newspaper article told me that since 2012 the numbers of people using the Vigo Food Bank have gone up by 20,000 and now stand at 145.000. Similar increases are reported from La Coruña and Ferrol. There is clearly something wrong. 

And so I feel guilty about turning away the young man who knocked on our door the other day to tell us about an organisation called "Contra el Hambre". Oh, I know I couldn't have done anything, not having a bank account here and so on but even so. 

And I feel mean when I complain about the supermarket beggar who was telling me about it being her son's fifth birthday on Saturday when she harassed me outside Mercadona. At least, I think that's what she was on about. Her speech is heavily accented, possibly Andalusian, possible gypsy, possibly both, and it's often hard to tell what she is saying. She would certainly find it hard to get a job. 

And I know you can't give to all of them, but whenever I see a young girl begging on the street I find myself thinking that if that were my teenager I would hope that someone would help her. And that's that! 

(Post script: walking down into town yesterday evening, I was greeted by a young woman who introduced me to her son whose birthday had been the day before: our supermarket beggar! So presumably she lives somewhere across the road from us. Much more coherent when not speaking in her special begging whine. She scrubs up quite nicely. Somehow I feel slightly less mean about moaning about her now.)