A Day in La Carpio

Hi there, sorry we haven't written in so long. After illness, moving house and entertaining visitors from the States, we're finally getting back in the writing saddle! Thought I'd write some detailed images/reflections of what it's like to work in La Carpio, where I teach math to teenage girls on Mondays and help run a girl's club on Saturday afternoons...

Driving across a land bridge to an outcropping of earth in the middle of a rock quarry/garbage dump, you notice piles of garbage on the sides of the road and charred spots in the grass. You realize what these are for when you see people jump on the garbage truck right in front of you (smells terrible!) and start pulling out bags to scavenge. Some of these people are kids. I once saw a kid of no more than 12 do a stunt that involved jumping on the moving truck, climbing up the back and walking across the top of the truck, all while the truck continued moving. They pull bags open on the side of the road and look for useful items or (among other things) metals that they can extract by burning. They can sell copper, aluminum, etc. for pennies per pound.

Gangbangers stand at each bus stop and stare at you with hard faces as you pass by. They don't threaten you, but rather stare through you. It's hard to tell what they're thinking and if they would want to harm you. There are 5 gangs in La Carpio, one for each bus stop. The bus stop you live closest to is by default your gang.

Everything seems broken in La Carpio. Ramshackle houses look like they are sliding downhill into the ravines on both sides of the encampment. Walls made out of corrugated tin sheets, bars everywhere (but this part is normal for Costa Rica), foam mats to sleep on inside houses. Mud walkways are the only way to get to many of the houses. If there IS a road, it's full of potholes. You don't see policemen or taxis. The small of garbage permeates everything and the lack of greenery to hold down the dirt makes it fly up and stick on your body. "Palsy dog" welcomes me as I enter the CFCI gate. Goats eat out of the trash dumpster outside. The bathrooms may be out of order, the water may be off, the internet for the computer lab may be down, your cell phone may not get reception, the ladder may be broken, your things may be stolen if you're not careful about locking them up, the whiteboard markers may be missing -- no telling what kinds of obstacles may fill your day today, but they certainly have a mysterious way of multiplying in La Carpio. Sometimes each day seems like a battle just to do the simplest things that we would take for granted in the plentiful U.S.

You work with kids that are so different from you in some ways that you may as well be from different planets. This is a place where kids are not like the ones you know: eight-year-olds who don't know their own birthdays, 10-year-olds who still can't spell their names, girls who have babies themselves, sisters who take care of their siblings and keep the house clean for their moms, brothers dead or in jail, young men with no motivation to do anything because they have no hope for a better life. Ages of students don't match up to grade levels due to multiple dropouts for jobs, babies, sibling care, illness, etc. Abuse of all kinds is normative. Girls are taught that they exist to take care of kids, clean, cook, and satisfy men. Boys are quickly ground down by the lack of opportunity, and fall prey to a mass learned helplessness, believing "it doesn't matter what I do, so I may as well _________."

Here are some of your students:

While other students doodle boyfriends' names in their notebooks, Nazareth doodles "Jeremy" with a heart around the name. Jeremy is her 3-month old son. Sometimes I get to hold him during class so that Nazareth can work. Tania and Surjen, other children of students, also hang out and occasionally demand the attention of their mothers or others. I won't forget the first time that Karen started breastfeeding her baby in the front row of my class without covering herself, though now I'm used to it!

Kassandra has to leave now at lunchtime to care for her 3 younger siblings in the afternoon. She misses study time and the valuable opportunity to have a hot lunch (which we provide every day for our students), when most of the kids in Carpio get only one meal per day. Her head is always down like she's waiting for me to yell at her.

Dayana has trouble concentrating because she is hungry in the mornings from not eating breakfast. I've taken to bringing birthday snacks and food prizes to have an excuse to give them something to eat during class.

Marjorie has recurrent headaches that make her miserable and send her home from class every now and then. I think she suffers from migraines, but doesn't have access to medication. She also frequently sleeps during breaks, leading me to believe she doesn't get much rest at home.

Ana Cecilia had to drop out of my class because she found a job in a hotel to help support her 4-year-old daughter Tania. She is 21 and was in my 7th grade math class.

Jareth stares off into space during break times and cites "problems at home" as the reason she looks so sad so often. I hope one day she'll confide in me what those problems are.

These are just a few of the girls I work with and a sampling of the problems they have. I love each of them, and I'm amazed at how they all do 2 things at the same time: (1) mess around, laugh, sing, dance, giggle, and have fun like the kids they should be, and so desperately want to be, and (2) be hard, grown up beyond their years, and pessimistic in their outlook.

I know that many of you have been wanting some specifics about what our life/work is like here, so I thought that describing the smells, sights and people would be an interesting way to share part of it with you. Am I complaining about how hard it is to work in La Carpio? Not at all. Just trying to describe the facts of the matter. I love what I'm doing, and I know that God has me there to be an agent in the process of bringing earthly hope and eternal hope to the girls and young women in this community. I also know that I am learning as much as my students are! Perseverance, patience, contentment, generosity, and thankfulness are just a few of the lessons that they teach me every day.

Humbly, Andrea