Tourist guide, counsellor . . . street cleaner
Few people are as familiar with the streets of Dunedin as Daryl.
From ridding the road of overly thirsty students’ vomit to securing a cigarette or two for the city’s rough sleepers, Daryl has for 16 years been ensuring the cityscape remains tidy.
He was first drawn to the job when he saw an advertisement at Work and Income and wanted to pay an outstanding debt.
‘‘Then after that ... for a while I was thinking ‘why?’ and trying to find a reason to keep me going, then I just developed a good rapport with people.
‘‘You see people come and go, you see businesses come and go, and I sort of became a bit of an identity, I guess.’’
The Dunedin man, who did not want his last name published, is a familiar sight to many as he roams the streets with his Glutton – a street cleaning device resembling some kind of vacuum cleaner-leaf blower hybrid.
He described the experience as becoming ‘‘a bit like a hairdresser’’.
‘‘They become a psychotherapist, they become this and that ... You become a tourist guide, a counsellor. It’s sort of like a 10-in-one, really.’’
He had helped people look for missing pets and found money and cigarettes during his 4am journeys, which he often gave to rough sleepers.
‘‘A few years ago, before they hiked the price of cigarettes up, people would just leave packs lying around.
‘‘I ended up just giving a couple to people at a time ... sometimes I’d find full packs.’’
He said most assumed ‘‘drunkards’’ would give him trouble on the weekends, but the job was ‘‘more draining’’ during the day when people were going about their normal lives.
‘‘On Sunday mornings you get the people who are just lobbing about and want to go home.’’
Dunedin City councillor David Benson-Pope, who chairs its planning and environment committee, said he had known of Daryl since before he got his ‘‘wonderful self-repelled electric beast’’.
‘‘Daryl, he’s always been a bit of a character. He’s always friendly to people and you always see him working away there, cleaning up other people’s mess.
‘‘He’s just one of the features of our city, I guess.’’
Benson-Pope said central Dunedin ‘‘would be a lot less pleasant’’ were it not for Daryl.
‘‘I think people appreciate him like that, not everyone wants to bloody sweep the streets but he does a really valuable and appreciated job.
‘‘I would doubt that there was anyone who wasn’t grateful to him for the thoroughness that he brings to the job.’’
"You see people come and go, you see businesses come and go, and I sort of became a bit of an identity, I guess."
Darryl, Dunedin street cleaner