One more sleep until this is all over! I’m excited, but also sad that its ending. We achieved our goal officially today though, so everyone here is exstatic and sooo thankful for all the donations we’ve gotten! Tonight was pretty fun, I was minding my own business trying to study for my test on Saturday and doing pretty well, when out of nowhere the boys pulled me out of my deep study and threw me into the snow. A brief snowball fight followed, but in the end I won and we all regretted getting soaked before bed!

 It’s sad to go back to real life, and the worst is knowing that its not over for the actual homeless people of the world. I am really glad I took part in this campaign, but I just wish we could do more.

I guess it was expected, but i never gave to much thought into how bad i would smell. A few of my friends came today to donate food. As usual, i went up to give them a thank you hug to find out them backing away; which of course never happens! I am not going to lie, i was extremely offended since at first, i didnt know why they were doing that. They then told me that i was eeking out a horrible smell. A mix of nature and sweat. I guess i never new i smelt that bad; that experience was a huge reality check. Since we are nearing the last few days, i think im going to start using the deoderant that was generously donated to us!

As we’ve seen all week, food donations for us and things to keep us warm in this weather have been pouring in. On a side note I am officially keeping count on how many roll up the rim large green tea’s I have won and lost on. So far im 2/a million, but theres still two days and thats time for a whole bunch of wins in a row (I’m following the strategy of the Maple leafs in their quest for the playoffs).

 Anyways! We’ve had our best day in donations so far, almost $1700 just today and most of it came directly from students and staff. And we all had a much better sleep, we tried to vote Scott off the cardboard to ease our issues with his loud snoring, and he refused but moving him to the outside of the sleeping arrangement worked and I actually got a solid 5 hours of sleep and woke up feeling totally refreshed!

 One big thing I realized today about being homeless is how much harder it makes even the little things. I have a test on Saturday, it’s in one of my favorite classes and I generally don’t mind studying for it. But being ”homeless” makes it so much harder to get the motivation to do anything. Even today we needed to clean our cardboard area and I had to take a nap first. I guess I can think applying this to real life when people say “homeless people need to get a job, and get themselves going, get an education, get off the streets and pull themselves out of their slump,” they really don’t know how impossible it is. Cleaning yourself up alone is a huge task without a shower, blowdryer and somewhere to put yourself together. I definitly don’t know the solution to homelessness, but support definitly helps. Having friends, family and people you don’t even know come to visit you is so key and real homeless people rely on the shelters and places we’re giving to for these things. Bottom line is, it is a lot harder than I thought it would be, and we aren’t even facing half of the challenges real homeless people face. I don’t know how they do it, and I hope this campaign inspires a lot more compassion in people who think homeless people should get a job.

Well I have finially gotten used to sleeping on a cold hard surface but I miss my bed! The days are getting shorter and shorter now which is great. We have had our best day of fundraising yet. We raised over $1700 in one day WOW! can you say AMAZING. We have had great support up until this day but today everyone just blew us away. We had a bake sale which was huge, I loved all the treats people kept giving us.

On a side note, I have finially gotten some orange juice! Thank you random student. You have continued to make my day. My mom came to visit today with her friend, it was nice to see family again … even though she has come to see me every day. Im starting to think she kind of misses me just a little bit lol. Don’t worry mom I miss you too. At any rate only 2 more days to go and less than $2000 to go… WE CAN DO IT!

Today was great. It was a good night sleeping, I somehow managed to sleep in until 10am despite everyone walking around. Its a warm day today, and that means tons of student traffic. We’ve managed to raise so much money today, I am so impressed with everyones contributions. Nicole and I ran around to classes to give announcements. I received an applause in one class that really touched me. It really showed me how much people care, that we really are making a difference.

 I love meeting all these new faces. So many new people coming out to introduce themselves just to say how proud they are of you. These individuals really make the difference for me, they bring a smile to my face.  I want to sleep during the days because im so tired, but i dont want to miss out on thanking everonye for their support

 So stupid mistake of the day. I have to dip into new clothing for socks, because in the middle of the night I have to go to the bathroom, but i decided not to put on my shoes, because i was lazy and half asleep (smart right?) sure enough, there was some….wetness… on the floor. Owell, wiped down my feet changed my socks and went back to bed. God I cant wait for that shower

After a night on no sleep (caused by a combination of -12 weather and Scott’s vaccuum-like snoaring) I was feeling pretty weak in the morning but that changed as soon as we woke up and the donations started flowing. The day flew by as the weather was a bit warmer than we were used to and we had more local media out to support us which we always really enjoy. We aired on the evening news and got an awesome repsonse from people who didn’t even know us from all over the city coming to drop off blankets, cloths, money and food for our charities. It was really inspiring and made the cold sleepless night worth it!

All day we have had amazing support from students, faculty, family, friends and the general public. Today I had several great conversations with students about our campaign what we are really trying to do and how great of a job we are doing thus far.

 I have noticed that all of the donations are coming from students that I don’t even know which is great! Iv had visits from my family which was nice, and we had a visit from some old close friends. Everyone is just being amazing.

 On a side note, I have found out that I snoar!… i know this sucks the group has threatened to kick me out of the spoon session if I dont stop….any advice? lol i think they want to kill me which isnt exactly cool. However I have agreeded to sleep on the outside of the group so that way I don’t bug anyone else. Our MSU prez is planning to spend the night, his initiation into the group is sleeping beside me…have fun Ryan!

Scotty

I was just getting up today from a nap, and the first thing i saw was a women and child starring at me. I said hello as did she. The women then asked me if she was allowed to donate anything as she had fruit to give us; fruit with high concentration of vitamin C. I thanked her for the donation. She then began telling me a part of her life that wasn’t all that glamorous as it really touched me. The women told me that she use to be homeless and having experienced homelessness she knew exactly what to bring us. She told me that when she was homeless, she would get sick often. One day a stranger approached her and told her that by taking vitamin C, it would help prevent her from sickness. She took the advice and ate the vitamin C the stranger gave her everytime the stranger passed by on that persons way to work. I found that to be very touching. To realize that there are many people in the world that care, and that want to help. I started this campaign with the goal of spreading awareness about the homelessness issue. I have gained so much more then just that goal. Not only do people donate to us to suport the cause they genuinely care about our health and safety. This women told me a part of her life as an explanation to why she is giving us fruit, and with that she gave light to the fact that people do care about eachother. So for all the other participants reading the blogs, take in as much vitamin C as you can!

 I wish you the best of luck,

Robin K.  

Last night was absolutely brtual. It was so cold outside that it almost made it impossible to sleep. I think it reached about   -17 degrees, and the worse part was, it keeps getting cooler throughout the night, just as you think it can’t get any worse, it does. On top of the gripping cold, scott snored so loud last night. Usually I dont complain about things like this, and it usually doesnt bug me, but it was just so loud that none of us could sleep. Im sorry scott, i love u buddy, but u drive me crazy. On top of the snorring he loves to spoon, so he would grab me, pull me in close and snore in my ear. Just not a good night

The day was much better, it was significantly warmer and i was able to take serveral short naps. A bunch of people stopped by to donate all kinds of stuff. One very nice lady was not impressed that we were eating so much tim hortons that she bought us all breakfast sandwiches, amazing. Then theres Shaun, Shaun is an All Star, he brought us coffee and tea first thing in the morning, with tim bits, and then came back later this evening to give us homemade chili and hot chocolate, it was great.

 I’ve heard a lot of positive support from this campaign that people are really receptive to the idea. One of the managers of the bookstores came and gave us McMaster Clothing because its supposed to get so cold tonight (i hope hes wrong). There are still some people who have some negative perceptions with the campaign and I respect their concerns. We continually stress that we are not trying to emulate homeless conditions, we are ismply trying to raise awareness. Once its all said and done, all the schools across Canada will probably have raised over 100,000$, which really makes a difference in the cause. It will be nice to look back and say, we made a difference.

 I really hoping for better conditions tonight, keeping my fingers crossed!

The first day went really well here at McMaster. We had a tonne of generous donations from students and friends and a lot of media coverage. We raised 780 in our first day and we expect the awareness to help with the rest! Hope everythings going well at other schools! Our only real trouble was sleeping, the cold really put into perspective how hard this is going to be and more importantly how unimagineably hard it must be to actually be homeless. Until tomorrow!