Imagine having a fifth birthday and no presents. One of the boys in San Antonio had his fifth birthday on Monday. To celebrate one of the workers played him the ringtone for happy birthday on her celular,when we were waiting for lunch in the canteen, mobile as you call them back in UK. No gifts.
I didn't know it was his birthday until I got there so didn't have even a sweet for him. His grannie phoned from Chile, but I'm not sure if he even spoke to her. That's the sum total of his fifth birthday celebration. But at least his gran phoned. Can't be easy for her either. Don't know about rest of family, except they are not able to look after him. When I think of how much is spent on kids birthdays in UK, and how much they demand and expect, even the poorest kids. Still he's well looked after here.
We only had two boys at San Juan yesterday. Don't know what happened to the rest of them. They live chaotic lives and it's hard to get them organised. So spent the afternoon playing with Rafael and Luis Miguel. We played some games and then got them to do some drawings. I suggested it would be nice to do one for their mums, which they did, and very good they were too. They drew birds which we copied from a jigsaw they had completed.
They made little envelopes for them and wrote te amo mama. They seemed happy. Rafael's mum is called daisy, spelt a wee bit diferent of course. He says cuy is his favourite food and they keep them at home to feed themselves. He invites me home to have some cuy with them. It's another invitation which I will probably turn down.
About Me
- Donald Maciver
- Edinburgh, Midlothian, United Kingdom
- Born in Aird Tong, Isle of Lewis, living in Edinburgh.
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- Some fotos
- Views from INABIF in La Victoria
- A turtle and a taxi Lima style
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- La victoria with Flor and Anabella
- La Victoria, Lima
- A fugitive
- mmol/L and mg/dl
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- I see the sea
- Heber not dressed up
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- Heber at Larcomar, Miraflores
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- Birthday
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November
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2 comments:
My pal Chomsky says
"The trouble is, that's the way that capitalism works. The nature of the system is that it's supposed to be driven by greed;
no one's supposed to be concerned for anybody else, nobody's supposed to
worry about the common good-those are not things that are supposed to
motivate you, that's the principle of the system. The theory is that private
vices lead to public benefits-that's what they teach you in economics
departments. It's all total bullshit, of course, but that's what they teach you.
And as long as the system works that way, yeah, it's going to self-destruct."
You know this already and it does not help the poor kids you work with - but you being there is a help and what you do there is a kick in the goolies to all the capitalist bastards.
God I hope so. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when she played the happy birthday ringtone. It was surreal to say the least. Still she was doing her best and the kid enjoyed it, so that's the main thing. Not only that she was working on her own all day with these 4 and 5 year olds, with only me to help; I should have stayed all day but quite frankly I was knackered. Had to keep my strength up for San Juan next day, plus my tum was playing up, and you just don't use the bogs here, except at home, unless it's just a stand up job, if you know what I mean. thanks for comment, keep them coming, will try to tell the kids all about Chomsky, though I might start with Tony Cliff.....
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