When I first started traveling to poor countries as a young journalist I was most shocked by the slums.
Tarp cities and shantytowns in Asia, Africa and Latin America ”” often butted up against wealthy neighborhoods and sleek high-rises ”” stood out to me as symbols of the distance between the United States and the “developing world.”
But that distance has shrunk in Seattle.
Yes, we’ve had a large homeless population here for as long as I can remember. But the now-ubiquitous knots of tents on traffic medians, the appearance of homeless encampments in neighborhoods and the growth of “The Jungle” alongside I-5 have shown me our city is not immune to extreme poverty ”” or outrageous disparity of wealth.
And nothing brought that point home quite like visiting “The Jungle” alongside an Anglican Bishop from South Sudan..
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[Seattle Globalist] The Jungle shows Seattle’s not immune to global poverty
When I first started traveling to poor countries as a young journalist I was most shocked by the slums.
Tarp cities and shantytowns in Asia, Africa and Latin America ”” often butted up against wealthy neighborhoods and sleek high-rises ”” stood out to me as symbols of the distance between the United States and the “developing world.”
But that distance has shrunk in Seattle.
Yes, we’ve had a large homeless population here for as long as I can remember. But the now-ubiquitous knots of tents on traffic medians, the appearance of homeless encampments in neighborhoods and the growth of “The Jungle” alongside I-5 have shown me our city is not immune to extreme poverty ”” or outrageous disparity of wealth.
And nothing brought that point home quite like visiting “The Jungle” alongside an Anglican Bishop from South Sudan..
Read it all