Hobo hygiene: re-writing the book for the other side of the pond

Keeping clean, well-kempt and well-fed while living itinerantly is not nearly as difficult or disgusting as you might think; you just have to lower your standards and be imaginative.

Back in the Homeland, things are made easier by the open-door policy of many common institutions. Take, as an example, American motel chains, which swing their doors wide open without much care for who is and who isn’t actually a paying customer.

I once spent six months living on the outskirts of Dallas on a street locally referred to as “motel row”, a suburban boulevard dotted with cheap digs primarily patronized by traveling salesmen working for less-than-generous corporations. At precisely 5:30 am, each of the seven motels within a 500-yard amble sets out breakfast cereal, bagels and orange juice—a “continental” breakfast far more plentiful than anything actually consumed on the Continent—and then unlocks the door to the unolympic-sized indoor pool. Most motels even have free kits at the desk nowadays, including toothpaste, a toothbrush and other goodies; don’t be shy.

With a proper enough shirt and a decent pair of shoes, a hobo holding his head high can strut right in, have a semi-proper meal and take a quick dip before starting his day. If you abstain from abusing this privilege and only visit each of the seven hotels one-seventh of the time, then this can go on week after week for an eternity.

Don’t forget the tea and cookies set out late in the afternoon, the coffee that stays hot all day and the TV and reading materials in the reception area. If your particular motel row is long enough, you could inadvertently gain a great deal of weight despite all of the walking and stay abreast of all of the latest news and televised entertainment, for 12 to 18 hours per day, for months on end. And the pool’s open all day.

The ostensible truism that “the customer is always right” includes a little margin of error that benefits those who aren’t actually right; the hobo who struts in at 4 pm for a cookie and may or may not be an actual customer is allowed a little leeway. And then he leaves peaceably enough, perhaps with a cookie for the road in each pocket.

But here in Europe, the rules aren’t quite the same. The customer isn’t always right, even in the pretend kind of way that he was back home. Also, those “motel rows” don’t really exist here, as far as I’ve seen, the way they do back in the New World.

This just means that you have to be a bit more creative, both for a place to grab a bite to eat and a place to take a quick dip in the water. So go local. Think like they do. Figure out where they’ve left the door a little too open, erring on the side of you instead of the paying customer.

For example: Paris has a great tradition of public pools. Granted, you might have to register and pay a fee, but then you get to come and go and, most importantly, stay, as you like. They require you to shower first and sometimes they even provide the soap, giving a hobo a great way to keep hygienic standards alive while on the go.

For free French food, replace reliance on motel fare for the free samples on display at the grandes surfaces (Carrefour, etc.) around the Paris area and you’ve got yourself a well-balanced diet of fois gras, horse-meat tartar and merguez, which you wash down with Knock-Off Cola. Vive la France.