Walk a mile in a homeless pair of shoes
TORONTO, ON—When Em Johnson was 14 she came to Toronto on a mission trip. She stopped to talk to one sick, homeless man, but a trip organizer hurried her along.
"He said there'd be more chances to talk to homeless people later," Johnson recalls. "When we were on the clocks, we were the greatest soup servers ever. But in between projects we were so self-absorbed we could see the exact same person we'd just served and ignore them. It didn't sit well with me. It didn't make sense."
The experience broke her heart, Johnson says. She knew there had to be a better way to help people understand the realities of street life.
Johnson and Alan Waugh are co-directors of UrbanEx. Johnson describes it as "an arts, culture and social justice experience." Based out of Kitchener, the organization aims to gives people a personal and interactive experience of the challenges others face.
Groups have come from all over the world to take part in week-long immersion excursions that include carefully planned exercises led by sex trade workers, artists, drug and alcohol addicts, homeless people—even people from the corporate world who have struggled with suicidal impulses.
Participants don't get the see the schedule ahead of time. "If you really want to know what it's like to roll with the punches then you can't know the schedule," Johnson explains. In the past participants have learned what it's like to live with a disability or work alongside a homeless person to raise money in an enterprising way.
"We give them an opportunity to experience and really feel what it's like to walk a mile in someone else's shoes," Waugh says.
Spenser Callaghan, a nurse, has experienced two UrbanEx excursions. In the imaginary scenario she was given, she had to avoid a certain type of person to assuage the jealousy of someone abusive in her life.
"It was crazy," Callaghan says. "If I was standing at a stoplight and [the wrong type of person] came and stood next to me I had to move. I was once in an elevator and someone entered, so I had to run out. I was completely paranoid.
"When you have no money and no food and you get hungry, you start to think stealing is a good idea. It's crazy how quickly you start to think these things when you don't have other options. All these things I'd never think of doing in my real life, all of a sudden, started to sound reasonable."
"You get a chance to find out what your real responses in those situations will be," Johnson says. "It may be surprising. You learn a lot about yourself."
But it's all safe, she adds. "You're in our care 24/7. It's not a scary thing. It's a beautiful thing."
UrbanEx is not a faith-based organization, although both Johnson and Waugh consider themselves followers of Christ. The organization does not have charitable status. Along with running excursions, Johnson and Waugh also speak to churches and school groups.
They hope to enable people to recognize "moments of truth" in their own lives, where they are able to impact the lives of others.
"When Jesus walked through the crowds he was able to see the woman crying in the shadows," Johnson says.
"Or the guy sitting in the tree," Waugh adds. "We look at fears and prejudices you don't even know you have. How do you love someone that you are afraid of, don't like or don't understand?"
"You can argue with statistics," Johnson says. "You can argue with studies. But you can't argue with experiences. You can't argue with meeting a person who makes you cry."
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