Living in the dump.......

Jan 17, 2012  Chureca

Heading out to the Chureca today... that's the dump.  Talking with Katie from the NGO Manna, I learned about the communities they work with... including the community that lives in the dump.  WHAT?!?!?!?!?!  I am shocked, confused, intrigued, then again... not surprised.

I don't really know what to expect exatly.  Are there houses actually on top of trash, do they have houses, or move around depending on where the newest garbage is being added.  Will it smell, will I be grossed out, repulsed, sad. Probably.

I hope to learn more, maybe this will be a place I can give some of my cameras to in hopes to get some photo stories...

"Bad words want to come out of my mouth" I say after a visit with one family.... surrounded by garbage, watching truck after truck, or should I saw dumpster pass by.  One of the little girls comes running out with a peice of paper (what was just given to her) that she had written 'Sara' on with her new bright and shiny crayon that was also given to her.  She wrote the name of one of the volunteers and was giving her the peice of paper.

One family had a women making tortillas.  Kids running around with knives, people with no shoes, a bag full of medical tubing, yep, some still had blood in it.  This guys 'job' is to collect it, then clean it, and resell it.  it sells by the pound.  One volunteer said she has seen needles in the area, the women of the house didn't have shoes on.

This family... as all of the ones living in the dump, didn't look like they had anything that wasn't recovered from the ever growing piles of other peoples crap.  This little girl was just given something for her very own, and she was thinking of someone else and giving it away.  I tell her she has a big heart, but I don't think she knows what I mean.  The next thing I know another little girl is running out holding a 2-foot tall barbie when the next thing I know it breaks into song singing "I'm a Barbie girl"  and we (the 6 volunteers from Manna and the three girls that had come out for one last visit) all broke into a dance party, right there, in the trash.