Homeless in Rio skyrockets, creating tensions, violence
RIO DE JANEIRO — One night about a year ago, Leandro Mota Generoso was sleeping on a street in downtown Rio de Janeiro when he felt something jagged strike his face.
Somebody — he didn’t see the person, but believes it was a resident in the neighbourhood — had slashed his nose with broken glass from a Vodka bottle. He awoke in a pool of blood.
“I can’t sleep at night anymore,” said Generoso, 23, who has been homeless since the grandfather who was raising him died five years ago. “To many people, we are rats, garbage or whatever thing.”
“That is the reality, and now there are many more homeless in the streets,” he added.