Hoping

Recently, I've been able to catch glimpses of hope in the middle of poverty, and they've stuck with me, and I'm grateful. Poverty is misery, but it's not all misery. Homelessness is a malicious form of despair, but it's not all despair.

Last Saturday, I went over to the villa at noon to meet up with Sarah Chang and about 30-odd kids for a children's choir competition. Sarah had recruited me as the pianist, since the usual pianist was having problems with his family and couldn't come. By the time I arrived (late, naturally), most of them were already in position, dressed in white shirts with bright red flowers around their wrists. When I walked through the door, those in the group who were my students enthousiastically shouted 'SEÑO!' and left their places to tackle me with hugs & welcome me in; after wrestling them off, I hurried over to the piano to start practicing, since we were scheduled to leave in about 15 minutes and I'd never played through the songs with them before. The song selection was in two parts--I Love You Lord (obviously in English, which none of the kids really speak, despite our best efforts at teaching), and Sa Rang He Yo (the same song in Korean, which none of the kids speak at all), accompanied by the most precious dance routine you've ever seen. After 10 minutes of practice, we piled into four Remises (similar to taxis, but more like junky cars driven by random people wherever you want them to go, for a small fee) to a Korean church in the area. Speaking as someone who loves experiencing other cultures, this was one of the most intercultural experiences I've ever been a part of. I was loving every minute. As they listened to the church worship band, sat through the pastor's unintelligible mini-sermon (in Korean with certain verses in Spanish), and watched group after group of Korean children sing & dance to trilingual Christian songs, our rag-tag bunch of Peruvian, Paraguayan, Bolivian and Argentine kids were so excited to share their song. And they did such a good job. Up on that stage--compared to Iglesia Esperanza in the villa, that church was a resort--they weren't just 'villeros'. Dominant stereotypes say that as poor immigrant kids, at the bottom of the socioeconomic totem pole, they are destined to drugaddiction and unwanted pregnancies and nothing more. But that Saturday afternoon, they were performers, they radiated beauty and talent, they could be applauded and appreciated. Celebrating music with hundreds of Coreanos and four Gringas. It was a beautiful thing.

This Wednesday, on the plaza outside of Retiro, I was sitting under a mulberry tree on a dirty blanket with a family we've gotten really close to. They have two young girls, and the older of the two has one of the most incredible imaginations I've ever seen. But that day, while the girl was entertaining herself painting with berries, I was talking with her father about what life is like sleeping outside. He's been experiencing it for 25 years now, and had plenty of stories to share about the knife fights and 'quilombos' that go down after 1:30 in the morning, which places to avoid and why, the police who work with narcotraficantes under the radar selling drugs on nearby street corners. He and his family have lived more suffering than I know. They are staying out on the plaza, with their mattresses and garbage bags always by their side, because the villa where they used to live has become too violent and tense for them to stay there, and a decent apartment in Buenos Aires is too expensive when jobs are this scarce. But even in the middle of all that, he is still able to see the good. He told me that of course he would like to live in a hotel someday, feel the protection and security of four walls and a door at night. But he also told me that even here it can be beautiful. Sitting under trees like this, you can here the birds sing in the morning, he said. There's a nest right there, and he pointed it out. Even here, life is growing. Even on the streets, there's beauty.

And these glimpes are too small, too few and too far between, I know that full well. So many more things need to change. But as I'm spending time here, trying to offer myself as a listening ear and a helping hand, I'm coming to the understanding that those beautiful things are invaluable reminders not to give up hoping. Because even in the slums and on the streets, kids are dancing and birds are thriving and people can learn to live a different way. Which is why we absolutely cannot give up loving, not for a minute.

There's so much more I can say, but this post is already epic.

Pray for Cristian--they should be operating on his throat this month if everything goes well, which is huge and really exciting and I hope everything goes well. After the operation, theyll be moving out of the church, getting work, moving ahead from where they're at. So please be praying for everything to go well, if you can.

Pray for this new program we just started at the church, Apoyo Escolar. In the area surrounding the church, there are a lot of really poor families who are living in abandoned buildings and other precarious situations, and the church is offering space and snacks and homework help to neighborhood kids every Monday and Thursday afternoon, from 5-7. I've helped out twice already, and the kids are great. It's a definite need in the community. Pray for enough volunteers to give one-on-one or two-on-one attention to the kids, especially once us NorthAmericans leave.

Keep praying for God to do things here, take us by surprise even, change situations of drug addiction and poverty and misery into light and joy and hope.

Thank you for reading, praying, supporting me always. :)
And feel free to write back.