With all its festering problems, dysfunctions, diseases and crime, the Downtown Eastside offers the fresh air of truth, even if it’s the stripped, frayed truth of desperation. It holds up a mirror in which we all, as individual human beings and collectively as a society, may recognize ourselves. The fear, pain and longing we see are our own fear, pain and longing. Ours, too, are the beauty and compassion we witness here, the courage and the sheer determination to surmount suffering.
