WHEN I FIRST moved to the Bay Area in 2022, I was adamant about living in the city. I have always been a city girl — I grew up in Mumbai, spent my teens in Delhi, and lived in downtown Chicago before moving to the Bay. So, a big, bustling city was the natural choice for me.
My husband, a long-time resident of the Bay, was hesitant about the move. He had spent his 20s in Santa Clara, pretty much not moving anywhere for almost half a decade. He liked his time in the suburbs, playing tennis with his friends over the weekends and eating at his favorite Indian restaurants. I was, however, determined to make the city move work. How bad could it be?
I was quite mistaken and deeply under informed of what was coming my way. Before I moved to SF city, I romanticized its hills, its history, and dynamism. I had only visited the Golden Gate Bridge, Presidio, Embarcadero, and its surrounding areas.
A scene out of the Walking Dead
On my first day as a city resident, I decided to drive down to a local Pakistani restaurant. The low rating of the restaurant didn’t ring a bell. “How bad can the food be, it’s just kabab,” I thought to myself. When my car took a turn into the Tenderloin, I understood why the rating of the restaurant was so low. Suddenly, the clean streets made way for the reality of SF city — its homelessness and drug crisis. I saw two people taking drugs in front of my eyes and needles lying on the street. There were homeless tents spread across the street. This was a scene straight out of The Walking Dead.
I thought to myself this apocalypse wouldn’t affect me and decided to avoid the Tenderloin altogether. Like most people in the city, I started ignoring the problem. I ignored the homeless lady who set up a tent right outside my condo, I ignored the homeless person rolling a joint as I passed him by to collect my delivery. I eventually accepted this as the reality of the city and stopped caring. Till one day, I couldn’t help but care.
A punch in the face
Last month, I was walking my dog at the intersection of Market and Page, when a homeless man suddenly punched me in the face in broad daylight. For a second, the world blacked out for me, and I held on to my dog’s leash for dear life. When the blood rushed back to my face (and eyes), I picked up my glasses from the street to take a closer look at the person who punched me. He was looking at me and murmuring, “You shouldn’t have punched that girl.”
I picked up the plastic bag that he had punched me with and saw it was filled with granola bars. My guess was that it was his only food for the day, that he had now lost.
I suddenly felt ashamed and I wondered why he decided to punch me. “He could have chosen anyone else. Why me?” I thought to myself. When the shock wore off, anger rushed in and I started cursing. The man threw the plastic bag he punched me with at my face and crossed the street. He started threatening me with violence if I called the police. My dog panicked so much that he was trying to escape his leash. I picked up the plastic bag that he had punched me with and saw it was filled with granola bars. My guess was that it was his only food for the day, that he had now lost.
A police complaint
Suddenly, I felt a tinge of pity and started crying. I filed a police complaint and some shopkeepers came to console me. They told me such incidents were common and there was little the city could do, as it was understaffed.
My husband rushed me to urgent care, where the nurses conducted a vision test. I couldn’t see anything with my left eye and everything was blurry. I was recommended an MRI, but I decided to come home as I was already too traumatized by the events of the day. My husband insisted that I go to an eye doctor and schedule an appointment. For two days, I stayed at home, scared to go out.
When I finally mustered the courage to go out, I felt scared every time a man passed me. The vision in my left eye continued to be blurry. The eye doctor eventually declared me completely fit and said I was lucky that I was wearing glasses when I was punched, as the glasses protected my eyes from an impact. Despite all the assurances, I kept wondering why the man chose to punch me. Why I was assaulted in broad daylight? Did something I wear anger him? Did he attack me because I was walking a dog and was unarmed?
The bane of homelessness
A few days later, KALW, a local radio station, held a session on homelessness. I decided to go to understand why SF city had failed to act on the homelessness situation and question officials to seek closure on my trauma. City administrators at the event told me that they were struggling to rehome homeless people, as homeless shelters were already full and there was no place to accommodate new people. According to government estimates, over 7,700 people are experiencing homelessness in San Francisco. The homelessness situation has gotten so out of hand that Whole Foods has closed a flagship store in SF and several companies have moved their offices out of the city.
Recent research by the San Francisco Press Club reported that most people think SF is in a doom loop and a cycle of self-perpetuating economic decline. In the survey, when respondents were asked, “Do you believe San Francisco is in a doom loop,” 64 percent of respondents said yes, with 59 percent of people from the Bay Area agreeing.
SF’s rising cost of living has pushed people to the streets and an ongoing mental health crisis has further exacerbated an opioid crisis. The man who punched me had no clue that he did it — a force bigger than him was controlling him — one that has destroyed his life to the extent that even though he knows he shouldn’t have punched me, he couldn’t control himself.
A vicious cycle
Over the past few weeks, the government has “cleaned up” the streets of San Francisco by moving homeless people away from the public eye ahead of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference. But this action doesn’t address the core problem of homelessness and it is expected that the tents that were removed will eventually return.
Several homeless people are stuck in a vicious cycle. First, they lose their homes, then fall prey to an ongoing drug and mental health crisis. Many who are addicted to drugs never realize the importance of rehoming, and find themselves back on the streets because they are a victim of a deep addiction that the city’s infrastructure isn’t equipped to resolve. As a resident of the city and a victim of assault, I have no answer on how to deal with this crisis. All I know is that the person who punched me needs help and I hope he gets the help he needs.
A few weeks after the incident, I was standing at the intersection of Otis Street, when a homeless person with a stick in hand walked up to me and threatened to kill me and “wipe my country off the map.” This time, I simply looked the other way and walked home, ignoring the problem and praying for his sanity. Because that’s the only way I can survive in this city now.
About the author
Ankita Mukhopadhyay is a media product manager and freelance journalist based in San Francisco. She recently graduated from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Ankita’s articles have been published in Deutsche Welle, SF Chronicle, The Jakarta Post and The Wire.
This story was made possible in part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library in partnership with the California Department of Social Services and the California Commission on Asian and Pacific Islander American Affairs as part of the Stop the Hate program.
This story originally appeared in India Currents.