Thanks for taking an interest. If you don't mind, I can share a few reflections here. > One thing it left me with is that it changed the way I walk through the

Thanks for taking an interest. If you don't mind, I can share a few reflections here. > One thing it left me with is that it changed the way I walk through the city. On this subject... I recognize this same quality in the people of the working class district of Vietnam, where I now live. For them the gap between the public space and private is very narrow. This is common in Asian countries, where so much commerce is done on the streets. It is hard to define, but easy to recognize. Perhaps one reason why I feel so at home here. > I learned something fundamental... that one can get used to anything except being cold. Related to this topic was the importance of regular shelter. In that time, I slept in three places: a large doorway of an opera house, a bush in the middle of a large public park and under a bridge. Of these three, it is the bush of which I have the fondest memories, to the point where I even now I sometimes look at it on Google maps when I need reminding of who I am. Inside was open, clean and mostly dry. Living on the street reduces one's life to prime values, and the need for regular shelter is one of them. For me the regularity was as important as the shelter (hell... I had plenty of bushes to choose from!). It was the atomic beginnings of my sense of home. Odd to look back on now, when I am actively planning to design and build my own house. As for how I had found myself in that situation, it was around 20% unfortunate circumstances, and 80% low-level thinking on my part. At the time, my only response to situations that gave me harm was to avoid them. I had not yet figured out how to construct situations that benefit me. It was this failure of consciousness that led to to the streets, and the day I left the streets was the day intentionality came into my life. I was in McDonalds, ordering a Fillet-O-Fish. When I handed over my money to the guy serving me, he refused to accept it and gave me a look I can only describe as beatific... like saintly glow. It took a while for me to recognize that this was a look of pity. "Why on earth is he pitying me?" Behind me was a wall covered in mirror tiles. As I turned to go, I caught sight of myself in these tiles, and I saw myself for what I had become: a disheveled monster. That very evening I went home to my fathers house and started to take college more seriously.