Selling or Begging?

I first noticed the boy as I was walking towards the taxi queue. He was a chubby one, between ten to twelve years old, dressed in an over-sized dirty tee shirt and short pants. In his hand was a bunch of stringed sampaguita flowers which he was trying to sell to a lady waiting in line. For a minute or two after that, my attention riveted to how long the queue was, and how long it would take for us to get a cab to go home. Exhausted from walking in the mall for about two hours, this pregnant mommy was all but ready for a nice, warm shower.

The next time I saw him, he was about two feet behind me. This time, he was sitting down on the curb, still holding on to his flowers. Then and there, he got my full attention. His tears were flowing down his cheeks and he was wiping them furiously with his free hand. I glanced at MY man who was in the queue with Roo--they were about five feet away from me and he mouthed something which I couldn't really decipher. When they finally reached the point where I was standing, MY man explained to me that he overheard the boy telling the woman that he'd get beaten if he doesn't sell off the flowers. Whether that was true, or just an act which is really hard to tell, we don't know until now. What I know is, parental instinct hit me, and I wondered why his parents would do that to him--started imagining my Roo in the same situation and my eyes watered. MY man reached into his pocket, got fifty pesos out, and handed it to the boy. Still sobbing, he accepted the money, then counted five strings, with about five scrawny-looking flowers in each string, and gave them to us. That was the last we saw of him as we finally reached the end of the line and took a taxi home.

There's a big chance that the boy was part of a scam, that the crying was all an act to sell the flowers and make money. Or to give the boy the benefit of the doubt, his lazy parents, or whoever was in charge of him, was just using him to get money from people. Not exactly begging, but it could still pass as another form of begging.

Oh that children be spared from this heartless practice!