Things are speeding up here in Honduras; hence my lack of blog writing; my creative activities more on loan to work predicaments such as trying to find a way to get the informations guy here to give me a list of the clients so I can keep doing the survey I was assigned to do, but in the end the solution is less creative and more like first grade, tell the big-boss to get him to do it; others are connecting biblical principals to being a loan officer for weekly meetings with loan officers, not that hard I have discovered, as the job seems comparable to many jobs and situations that occurred in biblical times, such as being a shepherd or the parable of the talents ---biblical style micro-finance at its best. Another would be how to write a run-on sentence such as those I am encountering in the “Alquimista” by Paulo Coelo, oh look, I just did it.
Due to all these somewhat strange creative experiences I have been able to discover in Nueva Suyapa, and being offered a continued position here, I have decided to stay another year. I will continue to work with the Microfinance program; excited to pursue some of the many ideas Yoni, the boss of the microfinance program and I birthed after our two week infiltration of micro-finance at the Boulder Institute of Micro-Finance in Costa Rica, thanks to some string pulling by my dad, who works for the Institute. At which I was able to learn cool new economic Spanish terms that I didn’t always understand in English, like Rentabilidad – (covering your costs…ok I know what that means) and Cartera – Microfinance Portfolio (the Spanish of which I knew months before the English); and equations that ran on like my sentence, these classes with such equations brought me back to college math and economics classes in which I was also lost. At first I just tried to listen and stop my mind running during, as I do in my meditation efforts in the morning, and in the end gave up and started physically running and actually getting lost. What I got out of that particular presentation though, was that Bolivia is amazing at microfinance and due to its stellar performance was able to withstand an economic crash in the country: so, be aware and be like Bolivia during our worldwide economic crash.
Other sat through classes better understood were how to amp up the meetings with clients and provide lessons and training in health, self esteem, women’s empowerment, business management and financial literacy; how to run a more productive program; how to reach the poorest of the poor while still making money and a lot about tariffs and interests, oh wait, I didn’t understand that either, and yes, the class was in English, translated into Spanish.
My father was able to come and teach other terms to expectant loan officers such as Viabilidad – or easy – viability – which in English means making money. But, lesson learned, as when I was with a fellow loan officer friend at the business of her sister in law, she commented, “See, this business is viable.” Commenting on the apparent cash – flow, something she also learned in the class that was easliy floating through this business. In addition to teaching necessary tidbits to facilitators such as how to run effective meetings and prevent “morosidad” which is a cool Spanish term for having debt; it was just good to have him here and introduce him to my friends and community. Which he felt so comfortable in, that he decided to throw a surprise party for me, going out with a bang --- a Dora pinata to be exact, which apparently looked like me. Since he and I and you and me and the entire world are apparently connected on facebook, you are free to view these schannanigans on facebook, free of charge, only giving your internet soul to the multi-millionare social genuises who created the gimmick.
In response to all of this learning some things we have decided to focus on here at MCM, aka Genesis, are: continuing to implement training and incentives for facilitators and clients on issues such as described above; looking into and possibly implementing insurance and savings programs—by linking up to bigger MFI’s (Microfinance Institutions) who offer such programs to smaller MFI’s; starting up a program specifically for the poorest of the poor of Nueva Suyapa, giving small loans of around $50 and providing more intensive training in empowerment and financial literacy; and finally --- finishing the dragged out survey that I am conducting on the clients of the program.
All that to say: I am enjoying myself here, finding a lot of good work to do, and plan on doing it for at least another year. I also plan on posting another creative writing attempt soon. Thank you for reading.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Splityear
“I did not go to Nicaragua intending to write a book, or write at all, but my encounter with the place affected me so deeply that in the end I had no choice. So: a moment, but I believe a crucial and revealing one, because it was neither a beginning nor an end, but a middle, a time that felt close to the fulcrum of history, a time when all things, all the possible futures, were still (just) in the balance.” Salman Rushdie, The Jaguar Smile, p. 5.
It is nearing the end of January, meaning I have just the same amount of time to go in my time here as the time that has passed. Like usual, it has gone by fast, and I reflect on what has come before.
Maybe this split of the year I find myself in is a little like being at the bottom of the hill on my common run a couple times a week: the way down, which is always in this case first, was less work, nonetheless much needed preparation for the way up, the more strenous part. But the way up, though once a grand feat, is now known, studied and experienced; pace intuitive, momentum steady, fear subsided. The amount of time is beginning to show more and more by my Honduran sister Diana, whose before mere bump is now a living being yawning, sleeping, stretching arms on their bed. Yes, 5 months, that is how long it has taken me to birth my own baby I’d like to call confidence and trust, in myself and in and from others and its still on its way. But I am constantly reminded, as being surrounded by the bible as a tool of reminders, that David wandered around for years in the pastures, attending to smelly sheep and killing bears and lions before slaying Goliath, and even that was just the beginning.
The outside living-ness of Nueva Suyapa such as children playing soccer in my path, donkeys going on their own and mothers bathing their children no longer makes me giddy like it did before. They now are everyday backdrops of the painting I’d like to call my life in Tegucigalpa.
Names, faces, children I’ve played with, promises I’ve made fly by like the buses going to their barns after a long day of hard work; too tired to really meet. That is something I’d like to change about myself and my situation, but with such a multitude passing through this community center each day, it is not always possible to invest, sometimes even to remember.
My expectations are beginning to lower, in a good way, it is making me happier and content, appreciative of the small things and small victories; me finally taking advantage of opportunities to joke around, understanding it all; a co-worker spending all day on a presentation for his bank meetings despite low turnout and finally giving my own presentations, and receiving positive results.
It is windier than usual here, making it cold this side of the mountain. I am finding myself robed much like those around me: everything looking nice but nothing really too practical for the situation at hand; hiding holes that expose goose bumping skin. No, it is not too cold here, but all things are relative, and when thin sweaters and blankets are all we’ve all got to keep us all warm, well, it feels cold. And how it feels really does matter, I’m beginning to realize.
Back in my house I’m led once again to decipher the difference between firecrackers, cars backfiring and actual gun shots. Though, hearing a real gun shot is much like the moment right when you’re going to throw up or faint, you just internally know it. I guess that is one of the many skills I am gaining while being here. I listen long to hear the after effects: children crying, fearful others or tormented participators running down the road; expectant individuals waiting to see what has really happened. I am convinced now; it is not so safe to walk around here at night. The fear that inhabitors possess, that multiplied x on the survey I am taking that says no these clients cannot live without fear of violence now also becomes a part of me. I now jump in fear when friends surprise me in the streets; an internal instinct of “watch out”. My eyes seem like they are only now beginning to open, my life now more a known part of the diffulculties every day Nueva Suyapans have had to live all of their lives. I always think about, how I will and can never fully know, for I have a way out, and access to more money; and it is in the end, only a year.
It is nearing the end of January, meaning I have just the same amount of time to go in my time here as the time that has passed. Like usual, it has gone by fast, and I reflect on what has come before.
Maybe this split of the year I find myself in is a little like being at the bottom of the hill on my common run a couple times a week: the way down, which is always in this case first, was less work, nonetheless much needed preparation for the way up, the more strenous part. But the way up, though once a grand feat, is now known, studied and experienced; pace intuitive, momentum steady, fear subsided. The amount of time is beginning to show more and more by my Honduran sister Diana, whose before mere bump is now a living being yawning, sleeping, stretching arms on their bed. Yes, 5 months, that is how long it has taken me to birth my own baby I’d like to call confidence and trust, in myself and in and from others and its still on its way. But I am constantly reminded, as being surrounded by the bible as a tool of reminders, that David wandered around for years in the pastures, attending to smelly sheep and killing bears and lions before slaying Goliath, and even that was just the beginning.
The outside living-ness of Nueva Suyapa such as children playing soccer in my path, donkeys going on their own and mothers bathing their children no longer makes me giddy like it did before. They now are everyday backdrops of the painting I’d like to call my life in Tegucigalpa.
Names, faces, children I’ve played with, promises I’ve made fly by like the buses going to their barns after a long day of hard work; too tired to really meet. That is something I’d like to change about myself and my situation, but with such a multitude passing through this community center each day, it is not always possible to invest, sometimes even to remember.
My expectations are beginning to lower, in a good way, it is making me happier and content, appreciative of the small things and small victories; me finally taking advantage of opportunities to joke around, understanding it all; a co-worker spending all day on a presentation for his bank meetings despite low turnout and finally giving my own presentations, and receiving positive results.
It is windier than usual here, making it cold this side of the mountain. I am finding myself robed much like those around me: everything looking nice but nothing really too practical for the situation at hand; hiding holes that expose goose bumping skin. No, it is not too cold here, but all things are relative, and when thin sweaters and blankets are all we’ve all got to keep us all warm, well, it feels cold. And how it feels really does matter, I’m beginning to realize.
Back in my house I’m led once again to decipher the difference between firecrackers, cars backfiring and actual gun shots. Though, hearing a real gun shot is much like the moment right when you’re going to throw up or faint, you just internally know it. I guess that is one of the many skills I am gaining while being here. I listen long to hear the after effects: children crying, fearful others or tormented participators running down the road; expectant individuals waiting to see what has really happened. I am convinced now; it is not so safe to walk around here at night. The fear that inhabitors possess, that multiplied x on the survey I am taking that says no these clients cannot live without fear of violence now also becomes a part of me. I now jump in fear when friends surprise me in the streets; an internal instinct of “watch out”. My eyes seem like they are only now beginning to open, my life now more a known part of the diffulculties every day Nueva Suyapans have had to live all of their lives. I always think about, how I will and can never fully know, for I have a way out, and access to more money; and it is in the end, only a year.
A kind of Rebirth
…“And then,
we’ll go wake our own dead
with the life they bequeathed us
and we’ll all sing together
with concerts of birds
repeat our message
through the length and breadth
of America.”
~ From Until We’re Free
By Giocanda Belli.~
The next time I was in the hospital, though not the same graveyard public hospital, Hospital Escuela, was for the birth of my Honduran sister’s first born child. Though this one was a private hospital, it still had the third world detoriation and dirtier feel that Hospital Escuela had; bringing back memories of the last dreaded visit. I guess, the same thread that can take life can give it; the same waiting room that brings greif can bring joy; and they often come hand in hand, just like my full circle experiences of a child’s death piggy backed by a new child’s life.
To realize that the same country, and the same amount though opposite emotive power can respond to and produce both life and death gives me hope that next to every story of sadness there is also a story of triumph, a story of overcoming obstacles, a story of one’s once dead spirit now living on in another. I guess that is what the resurrection story is about, and why, though He knew the eventual outcomes, Jesus wept deeply at the death of Lazarus, and to the point of death in Gethsemane. This shows me that Jesus’ example was that it is OK, natural and healthy to grieve losses in ones life, or grieve the loss, the profound sadness of a world full of things we cannot excuse, like the avoidable death of a ten year old child. And I truly believe that it is only in allowing ourselves to feel every one of our feelings, that sometimes unconsolable sadness and inquenchable anger for the backdrops of injustice that fill the skylines of our everyday lives that we can adversably feel true joy, and really rejoice.
That has been my experience here in Honduras; falling down to be picked up again by the beautiful people around me, but also to learn how I have the possibility, with help, to learn how to pick up myself; gaining slowly the self trust and confidence that sometimes takes. And now, after working to not stuff down but feel such grief, I am beginning to feel real joy at every day events like playing with children, going hiking and celebrating the successes of coworkers.
It’s Small steps taken gradually and at my own pace; and it’s not perfect; I thank God that he didn’t require that of us, but while in our suffering and struggle and what some call sin, well She had deep compassion on us, because we were like sheep without a shepherd. I pray for all of you, as you too, decipher this journey that is laid in front of you.
I saw the baby today, she’s a little chubby, blancita and beautiful, with big feet, just like the father they say. We waited up all night to see her, she was born at six in the morning, but we didn’t hear news of her birth till 9:00am. The family had an appointment to see her at 11:00am. It is weird to me that none of the family, even the spouse, can be with the pregnant woman while in labor. But, because there are over twenty women giving birth in the same open room, they have to allow privacy for every patient, meaning no strangers, who are family of one of the other 20, or nonmedical person present. I remember in a cross-cultural class in college having to study major events – like births or deaths in different cultures, now I see why, it says a lot about the values of a culture. For example, the husband slept all night while she was in labor while the parents and sisters waited up; he had work the next day and they didn’t give him permission to leave to be with his wife. That kind of behavior seems unheard of where my worldview comes from, but signifies a lot about the expectations about the role of the husband in a more machismo culture. However it is interesting to see, the power of such a small being, how she, by her mere presence, can transform these cultural norms; making even the more machista harder hearts soft, speaking in spanish baby language to the newborn. I look forward to seeing if she will change my own negative norms during the rest of my time here.
we’ll go wake our own dead
with the life they bequeathed us
and we’ll all sing together
with concerts of birds
repeat our message
through the length and breadth
of America.”
~ From Until We’re Free
By Giocanda Belli.~
The next time I was in the hospital, though not the same graveyard public hospital, Hospital Escuela, was for the birth of my Honduran sister’s first born child. Though this one was a private hospital, it still had the third world detoriation and dirtier feel that Hospital Escuela had; bringing back memories of the last dreaded visit. I guess, the same thread that can take life can give it; the same waiting room that brings greif can bring joy; and they often come hand in hand, just like my full circle experiences of a child’s death piggy backed by a new child’s life.
To realize that the same country, and the same amount though opposite emotive power can respond to and produce both life and death gives me hope that next to every story of sadness there is also a story of triumph, a story of overcoming obstacles, a story of one’s once dead spirit now living on in another. I guess that is what the resurrection story is about, and why, though He knew the eventual outcomes, Jesus wept deeply at the death of Lazarus, and to the point of death in Gethsemane. This shows me that Jesus’ example was that it is OK, natural and healthy to grieve losses in ones life, or grieve the loss, the profound sadness of a world full of things we cannot excuse, like the avoidable death of a ten year old child. And I truly believe that it is only in allowing ourselves to feel every one of our feelings, that sometimes unconsolable sadness and inquenchable anger for the backdrops of injustice that fill the skylines of our everyday lives that we can adversably feel true joy, and really rejoice.
That has been my experience here in Honduras; falling down to be picked up again by the beautiful people around me, but also to learn how I have the possibility, with help, to learn how to pick up myself; gaining slowly the self trust and confidence that sometimes takes. And now, after working to not stuff down but feel such grief, I am beginning to feel real joy at every day events like playing with children, going hiking and celebrating the successes of coworkers.
It’s Small steps taken gradually and at my own pace; and it’s not perfect; I thank God that he didn’t require that of us, but while in our suffering and struggle and what some call sin, well She had deep compassion on us, because we were like sheep without a shepherd. I pray for all of you, as you too, decipher this journey that is laid in front of you.
I saw the baby today, she’s a little chubby, blancita and beautiful, with big feet, just like the father they say. We waited up all night to see her, she was born at six in the morning, but we didn’t hear news of her birth till 9:00am. The family had an appointment to see her at 11:00am. It is weird to me that none of the family, even the spouse, can be with the pregnant woman while in labor. But, because there are over twenty women giving birth in the same open room, they have to allow privacy for every patient, meaning no strangers, who are family of one of the other 20, or nonmedical person present. I remember in a cross-cultural class in college having to study major events – like births or deaths in different cultures, now I see why, it says a lot about the values of a culture. For example, the husband slept all night while she was in labor while the parents and sisters waited up; he had work the next day and they didn’t give him permission to leave to be with his wife. That kind of behavior seems unheard of where my worldview comes from, but signifies a lot about the expectations about the role of the husband in a more machismo culture. However it is interesting to see, the power of such a small being, how she, by her mere presence, can transform these cultural norms; making even the more machista harder hearts soft, speaking in spanish baby language to the newborn. I look forward to seeing if she will change my own negative norms during the rest of my time here.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Melissa
“Cada alud de tristeza tiene su historia y su intestino”
“Every avalanche of sadness has its story and its intestine.” ~ Diana A. Espinal Meza (Honduran Poet) ~
“All too many ministers found themselves more cautious then courageous, and remained silent among the safe security of stained glass windows.” MLK – Letter from a Birmingham Jail.
“The oppressor is solidary with the oppressed only when he stops regarding the oppressed as an abstract category and treats them as persons who have been unjustly dealt with, deprived of their voice, cheated in the sale of their labor---when he stops making pious, sentimental and ritualistic gestures and risks an act of love.” ~ Paulo Freire; Pedagogy of the Oppressed p. 35 ~
“I asked you a question, I didn’t need you to reply;
is it getting heavy?
And then I realized, is it getting heavy?
Well I thought it was already as heavy as it can be.
Is it overwhelming; to use a crane to crush a fly?
A good time for superman to lift the sun into the sky
Is it overwhelming?
Well I thought it was already as heavy as can be.
Tell everybody waiting for superman,
they should try to hold on as best they can.
He hasn’t dropped them, forgot them or anything,
It’s just too heavy for superman to lift.”
Flaming Lips --- Waiting for Superman.
The last line of this song came into my mind as I walked to the hospital, bringing my never to be used by Melissa’s cd player to her last seen hospital room. I guess I didn’t realize how severe it was, or more accurately, didn’t want to believe how severe it was. I had been warned after all of the possible nearness of death in the moment when, holding her hand, out of my mouth poured “You see those angels, they’re singing for you, they’re singing.” I guess God has Her way of preparing us for the deaths of those we choose to love even when we are in denial about it.
It just didn’t seem to make sense, yes she had HIV and yes she was malnourished, and the terrible mix of the two was dangerous; but what she had at that moment seemed curable, and that is why I expect this situation to haunt and drive me for quite some time now.
The hauntedness coming from the idea of the third and fourth quotes, realizing the cautious route is the one I decided in this case, wondering if I risked more acts of love, if others risked more acts of love if it all would have turned out differently. But I will never know, and as David James Duncan says in the Brother’s K, it’s not my job to know. That, in the end will only keep me up at night and possibly keep me from more acts of love in the future. However, what my job is now, regardless of what I did or didn’t do in the past is to tell the story that she was not able to tell; and that is what I would like to do now.
Liz needed to go to the bathroom with her buddy, Diana, so she passed Melissa, who was sitting on her lap, over to me. We were watching a very strange and over the top middle aged musical, however Melissa was not noticing the strangeness or the over the top-ness. When I looked over at her, her eyes did not seem to be following the characters the way one’s eyes usually follow TV. Maybe that was a good thing, I have watched one too many children’s eyes stolen by these images flashing and dancing that maybe I’d rather any child be anywhere else in their mind. But not where I came to understand this child probably was in hers; I would rather her enjoying anything silly or fun even if it was a temporary, in this case, healthy escape.
Melissa was one who was taught very early on, as I was taught early on, not to trust virtually anyone, but especially adults. Her parents died when she was young and she lived with her grandmother who abused her, when the director of the orphanage rescued her from her horrible living situation. I do not know all of the abuse Melissa had to endure, but based on the dent larger than a fist on her head, and her flinches when children would play fight with eachother, I reckon it must have been severe.
As I held her already delicate body and scarred arms, overwhelming sadness overcame me. I imagined myself as a child, being held in my parent’s arms, realizing that whatever pain I experienced as a child was nothing compared to what this child had to go through. I held her tight as I cried over these things.
I remember the first time I met her; it was with a group of other children at the orphanage. She was more a normal skinnyness size then; dark black hair with twinges of brown that fit nicely with her bronze lightly rounded cheeks. Always interested yet always shy and in the backround. At this point though, she was involved in more childlike play things then she would be later. She was wearing a glitter lipstick that must have been gifted to one of the other girls at the orphanage; indicating her possession of a little dress up curiosity at the least.
That moment in the movie theatre when I held her, I noticed her experimenting with pushing my extended hand away and then asking for it back. She did that with many adults, and with my presence that night; going back into her room to be alone and then coming back out to be held again. I would wait and I noticed in the waiting would give her the chance to decide when she wanted touch as the touch she was used to was so often tainted or so far away from positive.
Back at the orphanage, after a long bout of being alone in her room, Melissa came out for her medicine, and to say hello. I will always remember her standing there, wanting attention but not able to ask for it in the way many other kids do so naturally. Maybe she felt she didn’t deserve it; maybe she thought her burden too large for anyone to take away from her; maybe she just wasn’t used to it, unsure she even wanted it. So she just stood there, gave me a “yes I am suffering” look and I walked over to her and asked how she was doing. She said she would like to sit down with me. I grabbed a chair, walked outside with her and sat her on my lap. We watched and talked about the stars and the other children playing duck-duck goose. Maybe she wished she could enjoy playing, maybe she was enjoying just wishing her wish that night.
It is hard to know if that came true.
After she was tired she had the courage to ask me to walk her to her room and stay with her as she went to sleep. I read her and the other children around her a story as she curled up as close as possible; smiling the only satisfied smile I had seen on her side of the tracks that day.
She slept in peace that night.
The next and last time I saw her, I held her hand that same way I did before and she curled up that same way she did before. She was frail and delicate this time, bones just holding together skin and failing organs, lifting up her near lifeless hand to ask for a drink or to try to move the IV counterfeit that was stuck in her arm. It was hard to hold that hand; experiencing first hand the effects of neglect and abuse.
She, I firmly believe, slept in peace; for good this time.
I say neglect and abuse and not HIV because I know that Melissa was receiving the treatment she needed to survive. However, not the intensive dose of acts of love that she needed. Because of that, she would walk around, weighted by her internal nightmare, would refuse to eat or play or commune at all with others, until her body began refusing food and treatment naturally, making her incerasingly sick, speeding up the effects of HIV and AIDS. I do not know specifics, but this is what I understood happened. In the end, her body shut down and she could not breathe.
“Osprets eat fish. Deers eat foliage, change their diets and they’ll die.” David James Duncan, The Brother’s K p. 282.
It was her much regimented diet of medicine that was changed which caused her to die. However it may have been a change of environment as well. Melissa had been rescued from her abusive household around seven months before to the children’s home where my friend Liz worked. It is hard to say, if bringing Melissa to the children’s home extended her life a few months later, simply allowed her to die knowing she was loved or was such a shock, though positive, still a shock compared to the hell she was used to, another kind of diet change. It is said that children used to abuse and neglect crave it because it is the only thing they have been shown as something like love in their life. Coming into an environment where she was shown a kinder variety of love may have been hard for her. In addition, with so many mouths and souls to feed it may have been a morsel compared to the intensified attentiveness and patience she needed to survive. There was one psycologist who just began at the orphanage for thirty five emotionally drained and needy children with HIV or HIV AIDS. I am not blaming any one, just trying to come to terms with the situation while noting the reality that exists in Honduras and so many other developing country orphanages around the world. Though I usually stray from eternity oriented religion, I couldn’t help but think of her death as one of God’s backwards ways of removing her from “a world’s worth of things I can’t excuse.”(Ani Difranco)
Nonetheless, whatever perfectly poignant insight we can get out of this inexcusable situation, it is still and will always be inexcusable. I have heard statistics of so many such deaths, and yes this was my first in person encounter with such a statistic. The fact that one ten year old dies of lack and malice personified tears me up inside, but the fact that the statistics tell me of thousands, millions of such deaths deflates all of those insides. And yes, this was one I loved, and yes that caused me to weep.
Maybe it takes one personal relationship to make the statistic mean something, maybe numbers just become numbers to so many. Maybe she died so that many more may live. I hope so, I hope there is some significant meaning. If nothing more, she will always be in me the rock that cries out regarding the grand injustice of the state of HIV AIDS and domestic abuse in this world and country. I guess I write this in the hope that her story will inspire you to do the same, and you will not get bogged down with the statistics, numbers and need. Realizing, that some will and do die, but if you fight courageously, if you fight with love, and favor that over fear motivated self protection, well, maybe many more really will live to be Honduras’ and Zimbabwe’s and Cambodia’s Martin Luther Kings.
“Every avalanche of sadness has its story and its intestine.” ~ Diana A. Espinal Meza (Honduran Poet) ~
“All too many ministers found themselves more cautious then courageous, and remained silent among the safe security of stained glass windows.” MLK – Letter from a Birmingham Jail.
“The oppressor is solidary with the oppressed only when he stops regarding the oppressed as an abstract category and treats them as persons who have been unjustly dealt with, deprived of their voice, cheated in the sale of their labor---when he stops making pious, sentimental and ritualistic gestures and risks an act of love.” ~ Paulo Freire; Pedagogy of the Oppressed p. 35 ~
“I asked you a question, I didn’t need you to reply;
is it getting heavy?
And then I realized, is it getting heavy?
Well I thought it was already as heavy as it can be.
Is it overwhelming; to use a crane to crush a fly?
A good time for superman to lift the sun into the sky
Is it overwhelming?
Well I thought it was already as heavy as can be.
Tell everybody waiting for superman,
they should try to hold on as best they can.
He hasn’t dropped them, forgot them or anything,
It’s just too heavy for superman to lift.”
Flaming Lips --- Waiting for Superman.
The last line of this song came into my mind as I walked to the hospital, bringing my never to be used by Melissa’s cd player to her last seen hospital room. I guess I didn’t realize how severe it was, or more accurately, didn’t want to believe how severe it was. I had been warned after all of the possible nearness of death in the moment when, holding her hand, out of my mouth poured “You see those angels, they’re singing for you, they’re singing.” I guess God has Her way of preparing us for the deaths of those we choose to love even when we are in denial about it.
It just didn’t seem to make sense, yes she had HIV and yes she was malnourished, and the terrible mix of the two was dangerous; but what she had at that moment seemed curable, and that is why I expect this situation to haunt and drive me for quite some time now.
The hauntedness coming from the idea of the third and fourth quotes, realizing the cautious route is the one I decided in this case, wondering if I risked more acts of love, if others risked more acts of love if it all would have turned out differently. But I will never know, and as David James Duncan says in the Brother’s K, it’s not my job to know. That, in the end will only keep me up at night and possibly keep me from more acts of love in the future. However, what my job is now, regardless of what I did or didn’t do in the past is to tell the story that she was not able to tell; and that is what I would like to do now.
Liz needed to go to the bathroom with her buddy, Diana, so she passed Melissa, who was sitting on her lap, over to me. We were watching a very strange and over the top middle aged musical, however Melissa was not noticing the strangeness or the over the top-ness. When I looked over at her, her eyes did not seem to be following the characters the way one’s eyes usually follow TV. Maybe that was a good thing, I have watched one too many children’s eyes stolen by these images flashing and dancing that maybe I’d rather any child be anywhere else in their mind. But not where I came to understand this child probably was in hers; I would rather her enjoying anything silly or fun even if it was a temporary, in this case, healthy escape.
Melissa was one who was taught very early on, as I was taught early on, not to trust virtually anyone, but especially adults. Her parents died when she was young and she lived with her grandmother who abused her, when the director of the orphanage rescued her from her horrible living situation. I do not know all of the abuse Melissa had to endure, but based on the dent larger than a fist on her head, and her flinches when children would play fight with eachother, I reckon it must have been severe.
As I held her already delicate body and scarred arms, overwhelming sadness overcame me. I imagined myself as a child, being held in my parent’s arms, realizing that whatever pain I experienced as a child was nothing compared to what this child had to go through. I held her tight as I cried over these things.
I remember the first time I met her; it was with a group of other children at the orphanage. She was more a normal skinnyness size then; dark black hair with twinges of brown that fit nicely with her bronze lightly rounded cheeks. Always interested yet always shy and in the backround. At this point though, she was involved in more childlike play things then she would be later. She was wearing a glitter lipstick that must have been gifted to one of the other girls at the orphanage; indicating her possession of a little dress up curiosity at the least.
That moment in the movie theatre when I held her, I noticed her experimenting with pushing my extended hand away and then asking for it back. She did that with many adults, and with my presence that night; going back into her room to be alone and then coming back out to be held again. I would wait and I noticed in the waiting would give her the chance to decide when she wanted touch as the touch she was used to was so often tainted or so far away from positive.
Back at the orphanage, after a long bout of being alone in her room, Melissa came out for her medicine, and to say hello. I will always remember her standing there, wanting attention but not able to ask for it in the way many other kids do so naturally. Maybe she felt she didn’t deserve it; maybe she thought her burden too large for anyone to take away from her; maybe she just wasn’t used to it, unsure she even wanted it. So she just stood there, gave me a “yes I am suffering” look and I walked over to her and asked how she was doing. She said she would like to sit down with me. I grabbed a chair, walked outside with her and sat her on my lap. We watched and talked about the stars and the other children playing duck-duck goose. Maybe she wished she could enjoy playing, maybe she was enjoying just wishing her wish that night.
It is hard to know if that came true.
After she was tired she had the courage to ask me to walk her to her room and stay with her as she went to sleep. I read her and the other children around her a story as she curled up as close as possible; smiling the only satisfied smile I had seen on her side of the tracks that day.
She slept in peace that night.
The next and last time I saw her, I held her hand that same way I did before and she curled up that same way she did before. She was frail and delicate this time, bones just holding together skin and failing organs, lifting up her near lifeless hand to ask for a drink or to try to move the IV counterfeit that was stuck in her arm. It was hard to hold that hand; experiencing first hand the effects of neglect and abuse.
She, I firmly believe, slept in peace; for good this time.
I say neglect and abuse and not HIV because I know that Melissa was receiving the treatment she needed to survive. However, not the intensive dose of acts of love that she needed. Because of that, she would walk around, weighted by her internal nightmare, would refuse to eat or play or commune at all with others, until her body began refusing food and treatment naturally, making her incerasingly sick, speeding up the effects of HIV and AIDS. I do not know specifics, but this is what I understood happened. In the end, her body shut down and she could not breathe.
“Osprets eat fish. Deers eat foliage, change their diets and they’ll die.” David James Duncan, The Brother’s K p. 282.
It was her much regimented diet of medicine that was changed which caused her to die. However it may have been a change of environment as well. Melissa had been rescued from her abusive household around seven months before to the children’s home where my friend Liz worked. It is hard to say, if bringing Melissa to the children’s home extended her life a few months later, simply allowed her to die knowing she was loved or was such a shock, though positive, still a shock compared to the hell she was used to, another kind of diet change. It is said that children used to abuse and neglect crave it because it is the only thing they have been shown as something like love in their life. Coming into an environment where she was shown a kinder variety of love may have been hard for her. In addition, with so many mouths and souls to feed it may have been a morsel compared to the intensified attentiveness and patience she needed to survive. There was one psycologist who just began at the orphanage for thirty five emotionally drained and needy children with HIV or HIV AIDS. I am not blaming any one, just trying to come to terms with the situation while noting the reality that exists in Honduras and so many other developing country orphanages around the world. Though I usually stray from eternity oriented religion, I couldn’t help but think of her death as one of God’s backwards ways of removing her from “a world’s worth of things I can’t excuse.”(Ani Difranco)
Nonetheless, whatever perfectly poignant insight we can get out of this inexcusable situation, it is still and will always be inexcusable. I have heard statistics of so many such deaths, and yes this was my first in person encounter with such a statistic. The fact that one ten year old dies of lack and malice personified tears me up inside, but the fact that the statistics tell me of thousands, millions of such deaths deflates all of those insides. And yes, this was one I loved, and yes that caused me to weep.
Maybe it takes one personal relationship to make the statistic mean something, maybe numbers just become numbers to so many. Maybe she died so that many more may live. I hope so, I hope there is some significant meaning. If nothing more, she will always be in me the rock that cries out regarding the grand injustice of the state of HIV AIDS and domestic abuse in this world and country. I guess I write this in the hope that her story will inspire you to do the same, and you will not get bogged down with the statistics, numbers and need. Realizing, that some will and do die, but if you fight courageously, if you fight with love, and favor that over fear motivated self protection, well, maybe many more really will live to be Honduras’ and Zimbabwe’s and Cambodia’s Martin Luther Kings.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Merry Christmas
I am in Utila, a Caribean island off Honduras and Christmas time has come and gone both eventfully and uneventfully. I wondered the span of my luck as, upon a self-guided running tour of the island I was gifted a show of a baking soda bubbling waves dashing against and over five meter high dried coral reef mixed in with various land vegetation. There were some waves that reminded me of a physics experiment I did in high school, where one person had a string and had to quick create a ripple that traveled along the string all the way to their partner. It was much better though, watching physics in actiopn without human manipulation, as the wave sensation was what we were trying to arrive at in the experiment after all.
As my muddy tour continued, I was greeted by whatever bright colored you can think of butterflies, and black with a tinge of purple birds in a canopy of viny and tropical trees. I was met by the salty air whose scent seemed to tell me that it was perfectly OK and actually preferable to slow down for awhile.
With all such vivid stimulation, backpacking foreigners and familiar styles of stores and restaraunts, I almost began to forget I was in Honduras, almost began to forget the slum neighborhood that me and my traveling companions had just come from. Until a friend from the neighborhood popped in my mind. Then I began to realize that though Nueva Suyapa contains its own flavor of beauty, it is surrounded by the crime, poverty and desperation they have begun to call home for so many years. Necessity doing its job in blinding them, as it would me if I had such things to consistently worry about, to the beauty of the view of the sun setting behind the far mountain and over the whole of Tegucigalpa from the soccer court in Onesimo or the sun rising behind the mountanita that friends and I run up. Sometimes we looki down instead of up I guess, when muddy bumpy roads and wind seeping through fagile walls surround us. I have also been blessed with the outside perspective of that neighborhood, as I am blessed now with a traveler´s insight and curiousity in Utila.
I did spend Christmas Eve and day in Nueva Suyapa, and I was very glad I did. I mixed my activities, spending some time with friends and come time with the family I was staying with. It was quite an international Christmas Eve, as the Danish volunteers here put on a Danish Christmas lunch which involved roasted duck and a wonderful sauce, gift giving games and some playing legos with children. I guess that wasn´t much unlike my usual Christmas celebrations where I often at some point find myself playing with children.
There was a lot of food involved, as everywhere I visited insisted I eat. The tradition in Honduras is to eat larger tamales stuffed with pork, rice and potatoes; delicious chicken sandwiches made in some well stewed sauce; torejas, a doughy doughnutty treat drenched in honey and of course...oil; squash also drenched in honey and chicken stuffed with, you guessed it, more meat. I must say it was a good thing, for my and hospitality´s sake that I had long given up the conscience driven desire to be a vegetarian. We´ll work on that when I get back.
In Honduras, everyone eats in shifts, guests first, ¨man of the house¨ second (my favorite tradition....) children next and cook last. Usually, all eating in the living room in front of an always on TV. I thought Christmas was different, big feast oriented like in the States. It wasn´t, I ate a chicken sandwich in the morning, then the danish duck, tamales in the evening and, a toreja at my friend´s house after church and, if you can imagine, the double meat meal, served alone with tortillas on Christmas morning.
I did attend church, the slacker way, after all the preaching was done. I was in time though to watch all of the ¨especiales¨, the highlight of which was the mid primary school children dressed in paper and cloth angel costumes with glitter spray painted paper wings. They sang a few songs, and there is a kid in the choir that loves to sing, and sing loud. He is not too of key, just aways a little low and booming. Because he sticks to it, they always seem to put the microphone near him, which I think, is unneeded, and it often ends up that only he is heard.
I was kind of disapointed with Christmas day at my house, as it was a ¨watch Chrsitmas cartoons all day¨day. At my house in Chicago, we sometimes had the tradition of watching Christmas movies, so that was OK, but the all day thing got to me. We did not exchange gifts as there was no pisto, and my family never really carried on that tadition. It was a unique and I think good for me experience to have a giftless centered Christmas. The focus in Nueva Suyapa seems more on people since things are hard to come by. However, on my trip to the mall Christmas day (can you believe it) to follow my personal tradition of last minute gift creating, I realized that materialism has seeped its way into, in a big way, Honduras´s Christmas, only it was those in the upper classes that indulged in it. There was a 100 ft. line of people of all classes to get the new Digicel cheap deal cell phone. Now it was starting to feel like home, memories of tickle me Elmo and Teddy Rubble flashing through my mind.
I was not giftless though, as my workplace did an ¨amigos secretos¨ that everyone went all out for, interestingly enough. I was surprised when, thinking my gift was good, I was outdone by people buying this very same cell phone for one another. It seemed that this work celebration was probably the biggest celebration that most of my co-workers would experience this Christmas, making the actual day anticlimatic. We sang Karoake and had a time to say what we thanked God for, which did remind me of my own family celebrations, and helped me get to know each of my coworkers better.
To finish off Christmas celebrating in style, I danced the night away with my Honduran family, quickly and awkwardly trying to learn Honduran dances like the punta, a typical dance from the Honduran Afro Carribean group the Garifuna.
I hope to pick up where I left of with my lack of dancing ability in the once was home of this very group, the Bay Islands.
Just so you know, I have a plethera of pictures available on my picasa website, that I just uploaded at: http://picasaweb.google.com/home.
As my muddy tour continued, I was greeted by whatever bright colored you can think of butterflies, and black with a tinge of purple birds in a canopy of viny and tropical trees. I was met by the salty air whose scent seemed to tell me that it was perfectly OK and actually preferable to slow down for awhile.
With all such vivid stimulation, backpacking foreigners and familiar styles of stores and restaraunts, I almost began to forget I was in Honduras, almost began to forget the slum neighborhood that me and my traveling companions had just come from. Until a friend from the neighborhood popped in my mind. Then I began to realize that though Nueva Suyapa contains its own flavor of beauty, it is surrounded by the crime, poverty and desperation they have begun to call home for so many years. Necessity doing its job in blinding them, as it would me if I had such things to consistently worry about, to the beauty of the view of the sun setting behind the far mountain and over the whole of Tegucigalpa from the soccer court in Onesimo or the sun rising behind the mountanita that friends and I run up. Sometimes we looki down instead of up I guess, when muddy bumpy roads and wind seeping through fagile walls surround us. I have also been blessed with the outside perspective of that neighborhood, as I am blessed now with a traveler´s insight and curiousity in Utila.
I did spend Christmas Eve and day in Nueva Suyapa, and I was very glad I did. I mixed my activities, spending some time with friends and come time with the family I was staying with. It was quite an international Christmas Eve, as the Danish volunteers here put on a Danish Christmas lunch which involved roasted duck and a wonderful sauce, gift giving games and some playing legos with children. I guess that wasn´t much unlike my usual Christmas celebrations where I often at some point find myself playing with children.
There was a lot of food involved, as everywhere I visited insisted I eat. The tradition in Honduras is to eat larger tamales stuffed with pork, rice and potatoes; delicious chicken sandwiches made in some well stewed sauce; torejas, a doughy doughnutty treat drenched in honey and of course...oil; squash also drenched in honey and chicken stuffed with, you guessed it, more meat. I must say it was a good thing, for my and hospitality´s sake that I had long given up the conscience driven desire to be a vegetarian. We´ll work on that when I get back.
In Honduras, everyone eats in shifts, guests first, ¨man of the house¨ second (my favorite tradition....) children next and cook last. Usually, all eating in the living room in front of an always on TV. I thought Christmas was different, big feast oriented like in the States. It wasn´t, I ate a chicken sandwich in the morning, then the danish duck, tamales in the evening and, a toreja at my friend´s house after church and, if you can imagine, the double meat meal, served alone with tortillas on Christmas morning.
I did attend church, the slacker way, after all the preaching was done. I was in time though to watch all of the ¨especiales¨, the highlight of which was the mid primary school children dressed in paper and cloth angel costumes with glitter spray painted paper wings. They sang a few songs, and there is a kid in the choir that loves to sing, and sing loud. He is not too of key, just aways a little low and booming. Because he sticks to it, they always seem to put the microphone near him, which I think, is unneeded, and it often ends up that only he is heard.
I was kind of disapointed with Christmas day at my house, as it was a ¨watch Chrsitmas cartoons all day¨day. At my house in Chicago, we sometimes had the tradition of watching Christmas movies, so that was OK, but the all day thing got to me. We did not exchange gifts as there was no pisto, and my family never really carried on that tadition. It was a unique and I think good for me experience to have a giftless centered Christmas. The focus in Nueva Suyapa seems more on people since things are hard to come by. However, on my trip to the mall Christmas day (can you believe it) to follow my personal tradition of last minute gift creating, I realized that materialism has seeped its way into, in a big way, Honduras´s Christmas, only it was those in the upper classes that indulged in it. There was a 100 ft. line of people of all classes to get the new Digicel cheap deal cell phone. Now it was starting to feel like home, memories of tickle me Elmo and Teddy Rubble flashing through my mind.
I was not giftless though, as my workplace did an ¨amigos secretos¨ that everyone went all out for, interestingly enough. I was surprised when, thinking my gift was good, I was outdone by people buying this very same cell phone for one another. It seemed that this work celebration was probably the biggest celebration that most of my co-workers would experience this Christmas, making the actual day anticlimatic. We sang Karoake and had a time to say what we thanked God for, which did remind me of my own family celebrations, and helped me get to know each of my coworkers better.
To finish off Christmas celebrating in style, I danced the night away with my Honduran family, quickly and awkwardly trying to learn Honduran dances like the punta, a typical dance from the Honduran Afro Carribean group the Garifuna.
I hope to pick up where I left of with my lack of dancing ability in the once was home of this very group, the Bay Islands.
Just so you know, I have a plethera of pictures available on my picasa website, that I just uploaded at: http://picasaweb.google.com/home.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
A la Ruta a Copan
It is 12:00pm on a Sunday afternoon, I am on the road to Copan, not unlike that first Sunday I arrived and traveled in Honduras. I think about the things I was thinking about then and how much they stuck. How the defeats and triumphs, messes and well-architectured creations followed me, as they often always do, to the new distant place I was choosing to reside.
On my trip back to where I started, it all seems to come full circle.
A child yells “Adios” to passersby, to gift a greater recognition of his and the bus’s presence. It is nearing Christmas time in Honduras and the ones on the empty billfold side seem little to notice or to mind. Presents and abundant food less missed when the lack of is not brought to light by T.V shows and advertisements all too commonly watched in my parts. Allowing immediate escapes to trump long term investments is a tendency too often turned to here. However, having similar natural instincts, to a degree, I understand.
A vendor or three jump on to sell icecream, chips and other frozen treats. Each a different product for a prospective different person. I make small talk with a child sitting on a stool next to me. He is admirably confident and knowledgable of the area and my guessed destination. The once heavily laborious execution of the language flies effortlessly off my tongue now.
I was on my way to dreaming about flying over the mountains we were speeding around when the anticipated but undesired necessity of giving up my seat came. A water logged single mother with a four month old baby, an also swimming four year old and six year old child mount the bus. She said they all walked two hours from her parent’s house up in the mountains. Baby still beautifully wrapped and intact, cooing and giggling at any attempt at interaction.
The driver attacks the curve and aces it every time. Bags flying and children crying are its battle wounds. One with a fuller billfold or a larger loan holds her bag of perfectly bowed presents.
The winding doesn’t bother me like it used to, but I notice our new busmates are having a bit of a tougher time. The four year old and six year old take turns throwing up as me and my friends take turns comforting them and searching for solutions to motion sickness.
Me and a friend get pushed to the back by the possiblility of more passengers. We are the ones sitting on stools now. During Christmas there seem to be higher volumes of travelers forcing higher regulations on the bus drivers, hence our need to appear somehow and somewhat seated, regardless how safe.
My mind doesn’t stick anymore like it did before, now maybe just a calm gentle swirl of past stuck items. I am more than grateful. Messages breeze past me in unattached clumps; aware now and once again that something greater than myself is at work amidst and around me. I am appreciative for such a conflicting yet conscience altaring bundle.
The gifts of one with fall on the ground. I am reminded I can help as well as watch.
On my trip back to where I started, it all seems to come full circle.
A child yells “Adios” to passersby, to gift a greater recognition of his and the bus’s presence. It is nearing Christmas time in Honduras and the ones on the empty billfold side seem little to notice or to mind. Presents and abundant food less missed when the lack of is not brought to light by T.V shows and advertisements all too commonly watched in my parts. Allowing immediate escapes to trump long term investments is a tendency too often turned to here. However, having similar natural instincts, to a degree, I understand.
A vendor or three jump on to sell icecream, chips and other frozen treats. Each a different product for a prospective different person. I make small talk with a child sitting on a stool next to me. He is admirably confident and knowledgable of the area and my guessed destination. The once heavily laborious execution of the language flies effortlessly off my tongue now.
I was on my way to dreaming about flying over the mountains we were speeding around when the anticipated but undesired necessity of giving up my seat came. A water logged single mother with a four month old baby, an also swimming four year old and six year old child mount the bus. She said they all walked two hours from her parent’s house up in the mountains. Baby still beautifully wrapped and intact, cooing and giggling at any attempt at interaction.
The driver attacks the curve and aces it every time. Bags flying and children crying are its battle wounds. One with a fuller billfold or a larger loan holds her bag of perfectly bowed presents.
The winding doesn’t bother me like it used to, but I notice our new busmates are having a bit of a tougher time. The four year old and six year old take turns throwing up as me and my friends take turns comforting them and searching for solutions to motion sickness.
Me and a friend get pushed to the back by the possiblility of more passengers. We are the ones sitting on stools now. During Christmas there seem to be higher volumes of travelers forcing higher regulations on the bus drivers, hence our need to appear somehow and somewhat seated, regardless how safe.
My mind doesn’t stick anymore like it did before, now maybe just a calm gentle swirl of past stuck items. I am more than grateful. Messages breeze past me in unattached clumps; aware now and once again that something greater than myself is at work amidst and around me. I am appreciative for such a conflicting yet conscience altaring bundle.
The gifts of one with fall on the ground. I am reminded I can help as well as watch.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Persistent Christian(s)
Luke 18:1 – 8 1 One day Jesus told his disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up. 2 “There was a judge in a certain city,” he said, “who neither feared God nor cared about people. 3 A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, ‘Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.’ 4 The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, ‘I don’t fear God or care about people, 5 but this woman is driving me crazy. I’m going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!’”
6 Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. 7 Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?” ~ From - Jesus~
“There is education in the family: first you shouldn’t speak because you are a girl, then later you shouldn’t speak because no one will marry you, then later you shouldn’t speak because you are a new bride. Finally, you might have the chance to speak but you don’t speak because you have forgotten how to.”
~ An activist from Pristina, Kosovo ~
“Mi hermano necesita dormir en puro piso,” (My brother needs to sleep on pure floor!!) he gutteraled to me followed by a request for a mattress for the third time in the matter of 5 minutes. Christian looked around ten, with short, mud-greased black hair that somehow met at the same color by the time it reached his Honduran darker side of brown skin. His clothes mirrored the floor he slept on last night; worn down by uncleaned overuse.
The thing I liked about this ten year old boy is that he realized this, and realized, looking at a clean face American snapping a $500 camera, that this contrast was not fair. However, unlike the clothes he had been given, he had not yet been worn down by a life of liars trying to convince him that he deserved this fate of floor sleeping with 30+ others huddled uncomfortably close. He knew my sometimes well matted hair indicated not only a mattress but a bed with more than enough blankets. He knew in some stubbornly courageous way that I did nothing better to deserve my comfortable beds and pillows and feasts than he did anything to deserve a one room shack with soggy foundations on the side of an eroding mountain. He was just a child after all, he was born into it after all, and he seemed to need to realize that to be able to speak up with the persistence and passion that he did. I guess he figured boys can shout because they were expected to shout while his mother and grandmother who tried to quiet him down had long been excluded from that possibility.
Maybe, in the end, what I liked most about this boy was that he probably did not think or figure or realize any of these things; that was me and my adult overanalyzing. Instead, it just sneezed out of him, and you’re kind of a jerk if you get mad at someone for sneezing: regardless of whether it makes a mess or not. While for me, years of over self restraint had provided me with the what I once thought was the stellar ability to sneeze inwardly; only to bring on more colds, more mess and needing more medical attention in the end.
I did not have extra blankets or mattresses on me, they don't really fit in my pockets, but I knew someone who did. So, remembering a lesson on empowerment from our Mujeres Valiantes (Valiant Women) program, I told him he was doing the right thing, speaking up on behalf of his brother, himself and his family, and that he should never stop, even if those children-should-be-seen-and-not-heard types consistently tried to shut him up and tell him no.
I saw Christian the other day with his grandma and mother, visiting a co-worker. I took more time to talk to the three of them and learnt that Christian loved to sing. “Figures,” I thought, as they explained him singing solos at church, gutteraling for Jesus, I guess. They said he wanted to learn to play the guitar to complete the set. I thought a guitar may be a hard thing to come by, but at the same time felt, this boy had a gift and hoped maybe he or I would meet someone with an old rusty or brand new unused guitar to speed along that process.
Natural disaster season is hard here in Honduras; a mix between afraid and desperate people who have really had their houses destroyed and everyday living in poverty people trying to get a piece of the pie. It is hard to know one from the other, and in the end, I wonder if it really matters, both, like Christian, have been given only the crumbs falling from the crusts; and those that made that pie often seem to wait until disaster strikes to offer a piece.
6 Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. 7 Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?” ~ From - Jesus~
“There is education in the family: first you shouldn’t speak because you are a girl, then later you shouldn’t speak because no one will marry you, then later you shouldn’t speak because you are a new bride. Finally, you might have the chance to speak but you don’t speak because you have forgotten how to.”
~ An activist from Pristina, Kosovo ~
“Mi hermano necesita dormir en puro piso,” (My brother needs to sleep on pure floor!!) he gutteraled to me followed by a request for a mattress for the third time in the matter of 5 minutes. Christian looked around ten, with short, mud-greased black hair that somehow met at the same color by the time it reached his Honduran darker side of brown skin. His clothes mirrored the floor he slept on last night; worn down by uncleaned overuse.
The thing I liked about this ten year old boy is that he realized this, and realized, looking at a clean face American snapping a $500 camera, that this contrast was not fair. However, unlike the clothes he had been given, he had not yet been worn down by a life of liars trying to convince him that he deserved this fate of floor sleeping with 30+ others huddled uncomfortably close. He knew my sometimes well matted hair indicated not only a mattress but a bed with more than enough blankets. He knew in some stubbornly courageous way that I did nothing better to deserve my comfortable beds and pillows and feasts than he did anything to deserve a one room shack with soggy foundations on the side of an eroding mountain. He was just a child after all, he was born into it after all, and he seemed to need to realize that to be able to speak up with the persistence and passion that he did. I guess he figured boys can shout because they were expected to shout while his mother and grandmother who tried to quiet him down had long been excluded from that possibility.
Maybe, in the end, what I liked most about this boy was that he probably did not think or figure or realize any of these things; that was me and my adult overanalyzing. Instead, it just sneezed out of him, and you’re kind of a jerk if you get mad at someone for sneezing: regardless of whether it makes a mess or not. While for me, years of over self restraint had provided me with the what I once thought was the stellar ability to sneeze inwardly; only to bring on more colds, more mess and needing more medical attention in the end.
I did not have extra blankets or mattresses on me, they don't really fit in my pockets, but I knew someone who did. So, remembering a lesson on empowerment from our Mujeres Valiantes (Valiant Women) program, I told him he was doing the right thing, speaking up on behalf of his brother, himself and his family, and that he should never stop, even if those children-should-be-seen-and-not-heard types consistently tried to shut him up and tell him no.
I saw Christian the other day with his grandma and mother, visiting a co-worker. I took more time to talk to the three of them and learnt that Christian loved to sing. “Figures,” I thought, as they explained him singing solos at church, gutteraling for Jesus, I guess. They said he wanted to learn to play the guitar to complete the set. I thought a guitar may be a hard thing to come by, but at the same time felt, this boy had a gift and hoped maybe he or I would meet someone with an old rusty or brand new unused guitar to speed along that process.
Natural disaster season is hard here in Honduras; a mix between afraid and desperate people who have really had their houses destroyed and everyday living in poverty people trying to get a piece of the pie. It is hard to know one from the other, and in the end, I wonder if it really matters, both, like Christian, have been given only the crumbs falling from the crusts; and those that made that pie often seem to wait until disaster strikes to offer a piece.
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