When I was a sweet and protected young thing in 1960s Australia, beggars were the stuff of legend. As I walked sedately to my lectures, an old chap would stop me every now and then and ask me for a bob. That was my sole experience, and my father was disgusted. You know what that's all about, don't you? A bottle of metho to go with the boot polish.
I learned a hard and hasty lesson when I came to Greece to live, as beggars were everywhere. They still are, and in endless variety: the aged, especially widows, mothers with babies, amputees, the deaf and dumb, people who have been horribly burned or crippled, gypsies.
Yet to some people they are invisible: once I stood and stared as a well-padded monk and matching priest came billowing along the main street of Kalamata, totally ignoring a bent and black-clad old woman who had her hand outstretched. They ignored her, I realised, because they hadn't even seen her. I suppose that's what custom does.
But the scenes were all so raw to me that I used to walk up that same street, scattering small change in all directions, much to the disapproval of Alexander, my youngest son.
'They're all collecting rents from the blocks of flats they own in Athens.'
'You can't know that, and anyway, I have to give them the benefit of the doubt. You never know, I might be out there, cap in hand, myself one day.'
At which point he and his filotimo were outraged: how could I think that any Greek son would or could allow his mother to sink so low?
Some of my friends have worked the whole difficulty out: they refuse to give money to anybody. Me, I now divide beggars into categories, mainly because it is impossible to give to everyone. And there are aggressive beggars, and passive ones: another problem.
I give to amputees, but one day an 'amputee' got up and revealed himself to have two legs: his trick was like the one actor Edward Fox pulls in The Day of the Jackal. I don't always give to the apparently able-bodied. Mothers with babies pluck at my heart strings, although a cynical friend assures me many babies