Occupy London - Portraits of the Protest

“- Are you part of the Protest ?
- No. A few weeks ago, I was near Saint Paul sleeping rought. I was tired, and when I’m tired, I just get my sleeping bag which is a mines 10, out and I go to sleep. And when I was sleeping... I woke up at 7 o’clock in the morning .. and a policeman came along and he was a very nice policeman, because he was Scotish, just like me, a scotish policeman, and he kindly asked me to move on. Do you understand ? I said fare enough, Guvnor, fare enough, I just move on. But then, two minutes later, just as I was packing up my bag, and we were talking, an other policeman came along, actually two policeman came along... but they were much younger. And they weren’t so nice. And they were quite arogant. And I thought : Fuck you mate ! I’ll just..I’ll just... So there is Saint Paul’s there. There’s me over there sleeping nothing to do with Occupy. I thought : Fuck you mate !So I moved over. And I went to Saint Paul’s, I met an ex army guy... from Scotland, cos I’m ex army... I didn’t know he was ex army.He said Mitch, don’t worry about it, go in the kicheen. So I’m there all of a sudden. One minute I was getting chucked away by the Police, the next minute, I was washing dishes in Saint Paul’s.
- So you’re saying that you’re occupying because of the Police ?!
- The Police pushed you to Saint Paul’s ?
- Yes ! ”

French, Sylvia moved to London 11 years ago.
She’s been squating since she arrived. Despite the fact that she has always
been in the margins of society, she hasn’t yet joint the Occupy movement.