Ice cream evangelicals

I have posted before on how expensive it is to eat on the street on São Paulo.  I often wonder, then, how people manage to do so.  One thing that I notice that a lot of homeless people do is eat a rice and bean combination out of either Styrofoam (like a reused takeout container) or out of reused 1 liter ice cream tubs.  In Brazil, most of the range ice cream one finds in the super market (particularly domestic brands) comes in plastic (not cardboard) 1 liter tubs.  I have often seen these tubs, usually a solid blue or white, used as impromptu tupperware by lots of people.  At home, we use one as a small, countertop trash bin.

When it comes to people on the street who ostensibly don't have steady access to housing or food, I often wonder how they manage to secure the food in ice-cream-tubs.  When I glance at the food, it looks organized enough for me to think it wasn't scavenged.  One thought would be that they get it from extra portions at restaurants, except that by law restaurants in São Paulo must dispose of food by throwing it in the dumpster.  Another thought would be social services, except that I have been at enough social services in Brazil to know that they serve pre-wrapped-and-assembled sandwhiches, with one fruit and one drink.  They do not vary from these packages, which they compulsively hand out to anyone who passes through their offices (even me, coming for an interview).  Most of the sexual health social services I know will arrive at an event with a giant box of snacks and a giant box of condoms and lubricants.  And the (mostly) female social service workers will complain about lifting heavy boxes until everyone agrees to divide the remaining snacks and condoms.

Yesterday, I saw a very different interaction that made me think about how these ice-cream tubs may circulate.  An attendant at a private parking lot near the downtown area was sitting in a rather rickity chair near the entrance, while another guy (I presumed homeless) sat cross-legged on the sidewalk just outside the parking lot entrance.  Their presentation was starkly contrasting.  the parking attendant had a sharp hair cut, neck tie, and a buttondown shortsleeve shirt.  The other guy had mangled hair and several layers of dirt on his face.  Between them was a 2-liter bottle of coca-cola that they took turns chugging.  The guy sitting on the floor was not wasting any time scooping spoonful after spoonful of rice and beans from a blue ice-cream container.  And as I turned back, I saw him handing the ice-cream tub back to the parking attendant, who casually placed it atop some other objects behind the entrance to the garage. 

Between bites and gulps, they were conversing, but I only caught one turn in the conversation.  The parking attendant said, "É Jesus que dá tudo nesse mundo," and the homeless guy replied, "é."  While I couldn't get further into the situation, it makes me wonder what else is circulating beyond ice-cream tubs.