JOHOR BARU: Their presence was noted from earlier this week when they began gathering at the covered bus stop in front of the old Johor Baru railway station.
On closer scrutiny, it was not hard to see the desperation in their eyes despite their adherence to the Covid-19 Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) guidelines.
All it took to unleash each individual's respective tale of woe was asking them what they were doing at the bus stop so early in the morning.
Tears glistened in their eyes as they spoke of the desperation that had brought them to where they were seated.
A 72-year-old former container loader in Singapore said he lost his job in March last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
"My family left me because I was jobless," the septuagenarian said, adding he was homeless and used the toilet in a nearby mall to freshen up everyday.
"Some good people give me food," he mumbled, apparently too distraught to speak in more expansive terms.
Like him, another man here also became jobless during the Movement Control Order (MCO) in March last year.
The 69-year-old was formerly a guard and has no family. After losing his job, he lived on the fare he obtained in soup kitchens that sprung up during the pandemic last year.
But this time, with the re-imposition of the MCO, soup kitchens have yet to reappear.
"I live on this walkway," he pointed to the pavement under his feet.
"On days when it rains, I starve because nobody comes by to hand out something to me," he said with eyes that reflected the stark realities of his plight.
Another former guard here, a 56-year-old man said he was not able to find a new job after losing the one he had during the MCO.
"I get help from passers-by but sometimes I have to starve because there is no one to give me even a little something," he said, informing that he lived alone.
For an 83-year-old woman, who had a job in housekeeping, she said she was retrenched due to her age and sickness.
Adding to her woes is her diabetes which has now confined her to a wheelchair.
She is helped by her younger brother who wheels her around.
She is single and has no family.
"If not for my brother, I doubt I would be alive today," she said.
Unlike her, a 39-year-old here said he has no relatives to help him.
"I have to depend on the kindness of strangers," he said matter-of-factly.
"If I don't ask people for help, I would have to starve," he said.
It seems certain that with the return of the MCO, many of those at the bottom of the economic ladder is going to be like the indigent at this old railway station.