1. What is "Bodega?" 

Bodegas are corner convenience stores, popular in New York City. 

2. How did the teen show/tell the time? 

tapping Artie’s hand

3. What is the teen's name?

 Tereek

4. The Deaf-blind man's name? 

Artie

5. What was the teen's reason for staying out late? How do you think he felt when he shared his answer? 

Artie tells Tareek he’s out late because he was on a date, Tareek says “same.” He probably felt bad when he said it because he did not feel comfortable enough, or want to reveal his status as an unhoused person to Artie.

6. What did both of them laugh about? 

Artie had a bottle of water in his backpack, so they shared a laugh about how they wouldn’t have missed the bus if Artie had remembered he had water.

7. What did the teen do with his ears? What was the purpose of doing that? 

He covers his ears and closes his eyes to try to experience what it would be like to be Artie. 

8. What did the teen ask the bus driver to do? 

To tap artie to let him know when he arrives to 129 Street, 

9. What did he do with the money that he was given? What do you think went through his mind when he did that? 

He ended up giving the money to the (presumably) homeless man who was asking him for money before he helped Artie. What was going through his mind was probably a sense of compassion for the man.

10. Please prepare a small paragraph of your thoughts on the movie? 

Overall I thought it was fine. I feel bad to say this, because I’m sure the intentions of Doug Roland, who made it were in the right spot, however, stuff like this generally comes across a bit like poverty/disability porn. I want to know more about Doug’s story and relationship with poverty and homelessness, was it perhaps based on personal experience, or was he just using homelessness and disability as a cheap and easy tool to invoke emotion in the audience. I’m sure it’s not that cynical though.

What I learned from the slideshow is that, the various causes and demographics of homelessness, as well as the criminal justice system. On slide 4, it discusses the differences between transitional homelessness and chronic homelessness. This was important especially in connection to our self awareness video assignment. 

On slide 13, we are shown a graphic displaying “the path from arrest to pretrial detention”, to which we see that of 100 theoretical people, 4 are denied bail, and 34 can’t afford bail, both these groups are detained, whereas, 38 people can afford bail so don’t need to be detained, and the 24 are released on a non-financial basis. The bail system negatively affects the poor.

Slide 14 explained the process of parole, highlighting how those released from prison are extremely monitored, having to regularly report to parole officers, having restricted travel, as well as being restricted about where they live. Following rules regarding employment. Not buying weapons/guns, not breaking the law, and being willing to be searched to make sure they are following  protocol. I feel like this system is extremely restrictive, and may in fact lead toward a cycle of incarceration.

Side 16 is about punishment vs rehabilitation, I am personally more keen on rehabilitation. We need to move forward rather than just locking everyone up, since if locking people up really were the answer, we would definitely have the safest country in the world, but we don’t so it’s clearly not the answer.

Finally, Slide 18, a breakout discussion occurs. My thoughts on the school to prison pipeline, which affects marginalized communities more than others, is extremely sad. To change this pipeline I feel we need to advocate for policy change,I feel that the United States is particularly obsessed with sending things they don’t like or want to see elsewhere, but we need to focus more on education rather than punishment. Another step I feel we focus on is restorative justice.