La Chureca
by Hannah Robbins on January 15, 2010
Writing about poverty is not something I am comfortable doing. It feels impossible to figure out the right way to explain what I saw from the back seat of an air-conditioned, locked car and know that the way I express these experiences will be understood in the way that I intend them to be. That what I write and what you read is an opportunity for learning and not voyeurism. Parece que esto es el riesgo de compartir unos pensamientos en el internet para que todo el mundo pueda ver.
Monday afternoon after visiting two of the Fabretto sites in Managua, Mike (the NU grad who's been working with Febretto for 2.5 years) took us for a short ride into La Chureca- literally "the dump". As we came within a few blocks distance of the entrance our Nicaraguan driver, Roger, asked us to please lock our doors. What was to come was something I had read about before, but never allowed myself to envision.
The scenery as we entered La Chureca rapidly changed from the paved main road where people purchase cars from the Toyota dealership on the corner for $15,000 to a dirt road covered with decaying trash. A group of men, who I later learned were most likely the second or third tier pickers who would buy the plastic bags, bottles, aluminum and newspaper from those immediately below them in the social hierarchy of the dump, stood to the side of the road as we coasted in.
As the car cleared the high walls that separate La Chureca from the city, we saw a corridor of road completely swell with smoke as the trash beneath burned in violent orange flames. Turning the corner away from the fire we saw a few standing homes, the most protective one covered in corrugated metal. A girl of elementary school age stood on the edge of the road, bent over sifting through the endless pile of trash. She lifted her head for a moment to see us pass by, but quickly returned to the task at hand, not staring at "las gringas" or flashing a nervous smile as every other Nicaraguan has done upon seeing my pale white face.
From where our car stood on the top of a hill we could see black birds swarming above through more clouds of thick smoke. Further in the distance laid the lake that Maryulin, the director of the Fabretto site called
NicaHope, had told us about. The lake, she said, in which the people of La Chureca wash their clothes, wash their bodies, fill their pots and fill their bottles and the lake from which they get skin rashes and stomach diseases because of its contamination. Around the lake lie mountains of trash in which Maryulin told us the hospital used to dispose its hazardous waste--waste that included needles used on HIV positive patients. Needles which would pinch the skin of the children poking around for trash to sell.According to Martin, Donald and Roberto (three of the men who work for
AMOS and are Managuenses), there are around 20 houses in a small pueblito inside La Chureca. No one seems to know the real size of the place (wikipedia may disagree), but when I asked Donald how big the whole thing was he replied, "es bien inmenso". He says he's heard La Chureca has grown 30% in 10 years. What the Managuenses do know is that there are different family gangs, or pandilleras, that govern parts of the dump and to a certain degree act as informal "trash lords" over the people picking on their plots. The men told me the residents sift through the piles of trash with three pronged rakes, the metal edges of which are sharpened to a dangerous point. When a dispute over ownership of a prime piece of trash emerges, often times the debate is settled as these garbage-picking tools quickly become weapons.The prime pieces of material for which the pickers search is anything that may eventually be sold to a recycling company. First a picker will find the plastic, metal, or paper and sell it to another Chureca resident. That next person will then clean the material and sell it to a third person. That third person might then be the one to sell the material to a recycling company. According to Martin, these stages aren't so much a production chain, but more likely levels of exploitation. (If one wishes to not be "oppressed" he must then become an "oppressor", right Freire?)
When I asked Martin, Donald and Roberto if the government has tried to do anything about La Chureca they told me that it had planned to reroute Managua's garbage to a site farther away from the city to destroy the accessibility of such a market for recycled trash. However, when reporters went in to the dump to ask residents how they felt about the plan they made it clear they would not be happy. For fear of what the pickers and pandilleras might do, the government abandoned the plan entirely. When I asked if NGOs are attempting anything in spite of the government's dismissal, they told me there are a few organizations that donate food and clothing to the families including NicaHope which maintains a school, specialty classes and a jewelry making income generating project and Febretto which provides a school lunch program in conjunction with NicaHope at the Chureca school.
Being in La Chureca and learning about its horrific legacy through the people who seem to live in fear, awe and perhaps embarrassment of it has been a very difficult thing to process. Rachel and I have had hours of conversations about the immensity of what we've seen in the five days we've been here. The proximity of destitution to luxury is astounding and I am constantly uncomfortable knowing and feeling that everyone who can see the color of my skin sees my privilege.
If you are interested in donating, please do so to the NicaHope project of Fabreto Children's Foundation. Even a small donation of $10 or $15 goes a long way toward helping these organizations continue to provide opportunities for children living in La Chureca to gain access to an education, income generating projects, and nutritious lunches.
If you are interested in learning more about" churecas," read the Mexico City chapters of The Heart that Bleeds, by Alma Guiermopieto.
This post is #3 of an ongoing series for the GlobeMed Partner Search Fellows Program, through which GlobeMed's two PSFP Fellows, Rachel Berkowitz and Hannah Robbins, aim to build partnerships between GlobeMed and 15 new community-based health NGOs in Central and South America. These posts will help us follow their journey, as Rachel and Hannah help GlobeMed expand to new university chapters and community-based partners this coming year. To read the entire series of blog posts, click here.
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