When we visited the great state of Hawaii, we were shocked to find so many homeless people there (this was in the late 1990s). We thought to ourselves that those homeless people were smarter than the many homeless that we were familiar with in New York because they were living in a warm climate and it was paradise. We told ourselves that should we ever become homeless, we would definitely save up enough money to get an airplane ticket, fly to Hawaii, and live as a homeless man in paradise on the beach.
Fast forward many years, and we found this scene along the Bowery. The remnants of a homeless person’s cardboard bed. If you’re stuck in New York and can’t get to Hawaii, the next best thing just might be sleeping outside of the Hawaii Restaurant Equipment store along the Bowery, with four men watching over you.