What does a hostel offer? A roof? Is that all a homeless person needs? For me what I needed, because I came from a place that of violence and abuse, was to fe

What does a hostel offer? A roof? Is that all a homeless person needs? For me what I needed, because I came from a place that of violence and abuse, was to feel safety of person and possession. In many ways, that sense of security trumped everything. And if you take a teenager that has gone through that and chosen the street over a roof at home... then changing the roof and being surrounded by strangers, some of whom suffer from mental illness and can be violent themselves... a hostel doesn't deliver on safety. I only stayed in a few, they were how I imagine US summer camps to be. Rooms containing a number of bunk beds, anything from 4 to 8 people in a room. The ones I experienced separated on gender as you would expect, but didn't separate on age, or other needs. When I landed on the street I was frightened, crushingly shy, a victim all the way through. A hostel was a brutal experience, horrifying to me in those early weeks on the street in ways that sleeping under bushes, on industrial estates and on building sites just wasn't. I had a different set of problems outside, namely the weather, shelter and warmth. But what I had with some planning was a sense of security, a sense that my possessions and myself were safe. That the very worst that could happen would just be to be moved on. Those were things I felt were in my control. I felt safer on the street. I should note that I didn't spend every night of 2.5 years sleeping rough. I was young, and learned fairly quickly to seek out Universities, find the student union bar, arrive late afternoon and read a book, and then wait for people to arrive so that I could chat to people. From there the opportunities opened up, and there was a good chance that if I overcome shyness, didn't scare them with the state of me, and everything was cool, that for one night there was going to be a bed, a shower, and some toast. I became quite good at this, but never stayed in a city more than a couple of nights before hitching elsewhere so that I never overstayed a welcome and doing this meant I could have a few nights a week on a sofa of someone my age who had a kind heart.