Continued Thought on Poverty

Oh hello, I didn´t see you come in....mostly because I am not there right now haha, but it would be nice to be there.

So check it out, last week I mentioned something about middle class Ecuadorians, or rather, some of my neighbors who live in cane houses and on dirt roads, without running water, feel they are middle class. Now, while these thoughts exist and are true for some, to suggest it is the norm is a gross misrepresentation of the reality.

I have also spoken of different ways to define poverty, one being in relation to material wealth in the States and the other being a view that is opportunity-based. But recently I have been thinking too about organization or lack thereof. In the past ten days, I have been in a number of homes that were quite disorganized. This disorganization has had a surprising impact on me. While many of the people here are poor, both materially, financially and opportunity-wise, there reality can be misconstrued with how their home is. If their home is organized, it is clean, which tends to mean that they themselves practice good hygiene, which all leads to the suggestion that they have the time or can afford to take the time to care for themselves and their home. On the flip side, those who have less time, often have messy homes, which leads to poor hygiene at times. This lack of cleanliness, manifests itself elsewhere in the communities. The fact that the roads are dirt and there is a lot of dust, there is little grass here in Duran so parks are usually concrete, and the overall presence of flora is minimal. Maybe its the weather, or maybe it is insufficient funds to pave the roads and tend to grass, trees and plants, but I think one way or another it is all connected. So, organization and cleanliness have been new indicators for me as to the reality of the situation, not just here, but in most of the world.

But now that I am looking for ¨signs of poverty¨ after my previous blog, I see it more often (partly because I think I was used to seeing them that I stopped thinking twice about them). Such as women with unshaved armpits or legs, children who don´t get to bathe often, clothes that do not fit correctly, shoes with holes in them, repeating clothing choices, groups of three riding on a bicycle together for transportation, and water barrels. Things are not easy to come by. Coupled with the fact that many women here are single and the head of the household, attempting to stretch limited funds for food, school and entertainment for their kids, not to mention possible medical situations. Those who remain in relationship with their husbands tend to have a little more room, but it doesn´t mean everything in the home is always on good terms. It is a machista culture of course.

So things are hard for many people down here. Without running water, families have between 3 and 6 barrels they have filled with water every two to four days or so. Each barrel holds about 50 gallons of water I believe, (Ill double check these figures) and costs .60 cents to fill from a water truck that passes by. To give you an idea of what ridiculous comfort myself and the other volunteers live in, we have a 2,000 gallon cistern which supplies running water to our house. We fill it every 14-18 days, and call the water truck specifically. The water truck, which hold 40 barrels of water or 2,000 gallons, empties out in our cistern. Wild stuff...and unsettling.

And finally, a though about Che and Paulo Freire. Freire wrote ¨The Pedagogy of the Oppressed¨ and he says a lot of wonderful and interesting things. Without oversimplifying it too much, he speaks of the need to transform the world in a fashion that we each reach our ontological vocation of full humanization. That is to say, to become fully human and to have the full dignity each person deserves is what is needed. He speaks of oppression as dehumanizing to both the oppressor and the oppressed, and that the oppressed must liberate both themselves and the oppressors. But he also says, that in order to do this, to transform this world so that human dignity is respected, realized and prioritized, we must be lovers of life. We must love the world, we must love people, and we must love life. He comments too, how Che wrote ¨Let me say, at the risk of sounding ridiculous, that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love.¨

So that is what I am trying to do, celebrate life with those around me, and share in our love for life. Peace amigos!

PS - I joined a soccer team with my friend here. Our team wears the Argentina jersey, sweet eh. I played Saturday night and had a great time, scored a couple goals and we won the game. The best part was though, some of the kids calling me the name of Argentine players haha, good stuff. Peace!