Sunday, January 02, 2011 |
LOS POBRES |
"Pobre" means "poor" is Spanish. Although I might have mentioned
sometimes about some people living in less then desirable conditions, I
did not really focus on that so far. This is actually peculiar
considering the fact that I came here to work with the children of poor
families. The interesting thing is that when the children come to the
foundation here to have a meal and to play they are usually relatively
well dressed and clean. No one would ever suspect in what conditions
they really live...
Yesterday and today I went for walk in parts of town where our children
come from. Unfortunately I did not take my camera with me to document
what I have seen. Actually I didn't have my camera for a reason. I was
warned that if I showed up with a camera in some of these places, it
might be dangerous not only to my camera (it would be taken away) but
also to me.
When I came back today I took my camera and went once again to a place
where I had seen an elderly lady sitting in front of her house (a
shack, actually). I thought it would be a great picture. Maybe it
wouldn't be good enough for posting in The National Geographics but I hope that it
would make some impression on the readers of this
blog (assuming that anyone reads it -- if you do, please let me know and write a comment below).
However, the lady did not let
me take a picture of her. I usually don't steal closeup shots of people,
especially if they are living in poverty, without asking them for
permission first -- I think that especially poor people might not want
to be photographed because of their pride. I don't know why the lady
did not allow me to take the picture -- was it because of her pride, or
for any other reason? She was talking to me a lot and fast, and all I
could understand was the she did not want the picture to be taken. I
offered her 50 cents that I had in my pocket but she wouldn't budge. I
know that 50 cents is not a big bribe but some people here work the
whole week for only about $30, which makes about $6 a day...
This is the second time that I was refused by an older lady (!!)... :-) Actually, I mean that I was refused by an older lady to be photographed. I didn't really ask for anything else... :-) The
same happened to me on Dec. 30 (or was it 31?) when I walked around the better part of
town taking pictures. There was also an elderly lady standing in the
doorway looking interesting (at least to my eyes). She also refused to
be photographed and went away... An elderly man with a cat at his feet
also did not want to be photographed at first but I did manage to
convince him, just using my charm, rather then truing to bribe him. He
is one of the faces that I posted in my blog that day. Hint: look for the cat at his feet!
So, I did not take any pictures of the really poor neighborhoods. What I
can show, however, is a few pictures that were taken by Iza soon after
my arrival here. Iza and Jarek spent with us a few days here at the
foundation. They are two Polish mountain climbers who somehow found out about the
foundation and paid us a visit for a few days before their
return home. They arrived here a few hours before my arrival on Dec. 12, and
after spending 4 or 5 days with us, went back to Poland. While they
were here, a few of us went to visit a mother with two children. For
the security we went in the company of Rosa, an Ecuadorian lady who also
volunteers for the foundation. Iza had her camera with her and she took a
few photographs of the area that we were visiting. The area is called
La Poza ("the well" in Spanish). It is actually an area of buildings
built on swamps. Why these people live there? Because it is a
wasteland and it doesn't cost much to rent a space there. Every penny
(or 50 cents, for that matter) counts, if you make $30 a week, or if you
have no job at all and live with two children...
This is the lady and the child that we visited
These are all her possessions No bathroom, no running water (except when it rains, of course) Here are her neighbors with a much bigger house. There might be 10 to 15 people living in it. And another neighbor... Closeup of the boy we visited Another curious neighbor of his This boy came out to show off his bicycle...
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