I was with my friend Marco one late Thursday afternoon just cruising about when hunger struck, causing me to detour at the McDonald’s drive-thru around the El Dorado Shopping Center. Now, specially nowadays with the emergence of fancy, well-lit and ridiculously safe shopping malls lately, in comparison the El Dorado Shopping Center seems pretty shady, and in many ways it is. They’re trying to keep up with the times, staying competitive by restructuring their facade little by little but the parking lot of the area looks to be the type where rape scenes take place every other week. More often that not I hear stories of people getting mugged on the way to their cars from the 24 hour supermarket in the mall. To put it in lamest terms, I try to avoid going around el Dorado as much as I can, but if I have to then I won’t shit a brick out of paralyzing fear.

El Dorado is notorious for, as I’ve talked about previously, its many street vendors. Their raidus of coverage is broader than the limitations the street have, as you can be pumping gas in the streetside gas station and be approached by someone selling pirated music CD’s and movies. This also goes for the McDonald’s on the other side of the street… the one my brilliant ass decided to pick that day because I wanted a quarter pounder with cheese. Or as they call it in France, a Royale with Cheese.

So, I’m at the menu with the speaker and give the McDonald’s voice my order. As I drive towards the first window to pay for my purchase, I notice there’s a kid in raggety clothes just hanging out right next to it, with a sad look on his face. I stop at the teller and the lady, completly ignoring said child as if it was a figment of my imagination, politely said that our order was $8.90. At all this, the kid goes up to my window and puts on the saddest, most bum-struck look his face can muster and asks me for some change. Now, this is brilliant marketing strategy in the making; every single one of us has done it at some point in their lives, when someone who’s homeless or in need will come up to you or knock on your car window and asks for some “help” be it for food or their crack addiction. I can safely assume that you, who is reading this, has brushed these people off at least once, perhaps because you don’t want to support their bad habits, or would rather have them gets jobs or simply weren’t carrying change at the time. Me? The reason why I usually don’t do it is because I don’t know who these people are, and I really am not in the mood to support a stranger’s ailments that prevent him/her from being a productive member of society. Also, if you do give someone a salvo in the El Dorado area, 13 others will come to you so you can give them a cut. Seriously, where does the charitable quality in a person draw the line?

This kid knows that by begging for money right on the teller’s booth, he is putting every McDonald’s client in a terribly compromising position that pulls on the patron’s moral strings. How are you going to say “no” to a kid who is watching you hand $9 dollars to a teller in exchange for fast food? He looked at me with the sorrow of a thousand widows as I handed the indiferent teller the money, and when she gave me the 10 cents worth of change the kid’s eyes brightened up as if she had handed me a piece of chocolate cake. I have the change to Marco, as it was his, and when the kid asked me for those ten cents of change I diligently adviced him to convince my friend whose said change belonged to. My charitable threshhold is well-defined, but I’m not going to speak on behalf of anyone else. And just like that, the kid sprinted to the other side of the car and knocked on Marco’s window, asking him for the ten cents I had handed to him 3 seconds prior. Of course, Marco gave him the ten cents in the end due to the morally compromising posisiton the kid put us on check mate with.

Where is the McDonald’s security cop during this exchange? In a different occasion I went to get some chicken mcnuggets (I love those) and this time the kids (plural, folks!) came up to my window right before talking to the mcgnome in the McDonald’s mcvoice box.

Designated Beggar Kid (pointing at my labret piercing): Does that hurt?

Rob: No, it doesn’t.

DBK: But did it hurt when you put it on?

Rob: This morning? Not at all.

DBK: No! I meant when you got pierced.

Rob: Oh! Well, yeah. A little. But it doesn’t hurt anymore.

DBK: …

Rob: …

DBK: Give me some change.

Rob: There you go…

DBK (with a look of sadness that would make a Spartan cry): Give me some change.

Rob: Fine, kid.

I looked around for change and managed to scour 10 cents (what? I don’t keep change in the car, man.) and told the pack leader that he better split that with his entourage somehow. As they promptly left me alone so I could order my damn nuggets, my mom (who was sitting next to me) was virtually horrified by what had just happened. She’s a tough cookie and I love her to death but she’ll never understand how i am willing to mingle with beggars, bums and hobos. A conversation on the subject started as we watched how another car got ambushed by the same kids plus some guy selling pirated movies; my mom, obviously a woman, has a different perspective than a man would have on this circumstance, given that a lot of the street vendors and beggars don’t really respect anybody’s privacy (they’re kind of forced to ignore it if they want to beg for quarters) and specially women, as they’re the so-called “weaker sex” and whatever ridiculous label some people still use these men will grab your boob if you so much as flinch. Men have it easier in this regard, but they will still get pissed at you if you politely refuse to give them anything.

In the end, the moral of this story is: Don’t go to El Dorado unless you have some spare change for the poor.

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