The Day I gave Money to the NOI

Walking through downtown Toronto is always an interesting experience. One time I saw Batman. I was in grade nine and a man carrying some groceries and wearing a plastic batman mask attached to a short black cape was crossing the street. What could I say? I just waved and called out, "Hey Batman!" Batman waved back, of course, and continued on his errand. Not many people can say that Batman has waved to them, but I can.

Recently a woman accosted me in Toronto and started muttering about the invasion of the pink monkeys. I am not lying. Pink monkeys. She must have been faking psychosis so that people would give her money. I mean, pink monkeys is so cliche. That's the first thing they'll start talking about when their playing crazy on one of those improv shows. Maybe not, but I was under the impression that most schizophrenics hallucinate about spiders, aliens, and the CIA. Pink monkeys aren't frightening. They're just something Timothy Leary or Lewis Carroll might write a children's book about.

I am one of those people who gives money to panhandlers. People always tell me that I am just feeding their drug or alcohol habit, but apparently only thirty per cent of the money goes to drugs and alcohol while the rest goes to survival. If I give two dollars that means I've spent a good $1.40 on a worthy cause. Not many charities can guarantee that seventy per cent of your donation will go to the actual cause . . . although I suppose not many panhandlers are going to guarantee that to you either.

Last summer a smartly-dressed man in a nice suit stopped Laurianne and started talking about books. I love books and so I started to listen. Laurianne started to politely leave but I continued the conversation . . .

"So you're starting a library?"

"Well, we're raising money to add these books to *insert library here*. We want black youth to have good African history books so that they can appreciate their history."

"That's a worthy cause . . ."

"Here's a list of books that we would like to add to our collection."

I glanced over the books quickly. I had never heard of any of them but, then again, I had only read a few books of African history.

"-- John."

"Just a second, Laurianne."

"Well," I dug in my pocket, "here's two dollars for the books."

"Thank you sir," he handed me a newspaper and a couple of flyers.

"No problem, thank you." I smiled. Here was an investment I could be proud of. Educating young people on their history. I didn't have any drug habits or drunken binges on my conscience.

I began rifling through the newspaper on the subway. "Hey, Laurianne?"

"What?"

"What is Louis Farrakhan doing in this newspaper?"

"You do realize that you just gave money to the Nation of Islam?"

"Uh." I thought of the wonderful bag of chips that I could've bought, "they don't take money from white devils do they?"

"Apparently they do."

"Oh," I paused, "Do you remember any of those book's titles?"

"No," she said, "I was busy walking away."

"Right." *sigh*