There but for the Grace of God...

I have been sitting on this post for a couple of days.  Mulling it over and trying to find the right words to do justice to what the experience was really like.  I keep looking through the pictures I took to see which ones would best represent what we saw.  Days after, I am still coming up with nothing.  The pictures are woefully inadequate. They will never be able to show the tiny details that make all the difference, for better and for worse.  The words I write, then erase, and then rewrite simply cannot convey the sadness, the hope, the anger, the joy that is Hogar La Granja and it's sister house, Casa Esperanza.  But I know I have to try, so here goes my best shot...

My girlfriend K and her family moved to Santiago just a couple of weeks before we got here.  In that time they had met a great missionary family that has been living here for over 20 years and who have been working with a "Hogar" (home) here in a very difficult section of town.  The home is for girls - up to the age of 18 that have had their basic rights violated (many have been abused).  Their families are not deemed fit for them to live with, so the country steps in and places them in one of the Hogars and the Christian and Missionary Alliance provides them with spiritual and emotional guidance.  My friend K has visited this Hogar on several occasions and found that there were some very simple things that could be done to make this place more of a home for these girls.  So, out went the email asking if we could give of our time to help make these ideas a reality.  On Wednesday, K, J and I hopped in the car (D had gone the day before with K) and took the 45 drive to the south of Greater Santiago.  I was told that it was a rough neighborhood, but didn't know how rough until after we had gotten home and I was recounting the trip for my Spanish teacher.  She actually gasped when I told her I was there.  I think she about fainted when she found out we drove.  Let's just say it isn't a nice place - but I have been in worse.  Heck, I have worked in worse.  But it still didn't prepare me.

You were the center of my life, the reason for my existence,
but mostly you were what made me suffer most...

For those of you who know me - you know I am never at a loss for words.  Ever.  But in this instance I was, and am, just stunned.  I had a hard time looking around me and hearing the stories about what brought these girls here.  The types of emotional and mental abuse that has been inflicted upon them is cruel in some of their cases and just downright horrific in others.  They come from circumstances that most of us cannot even fathom and this Hogar is actually a step in the right direction for them.  Some of the girls do have family that they can go visit on the weekends or families that can come to them.  Most of those families did not inflict outright abuse on their child, usually it was more of a case of abject poverty and neglect.  But most of the families that can visit, don't.  They can't find the time or make the effort and it is heartbreaking.  Some of these girls (there are about 70 of them) never get to leave the grounds except to go to school. And they will stay within the walls of the Hogar, until they turn 18 and are taken off  government and AyCM aid.  The girls will have a high school education (hopefully), will not have lived in the real world for a very long time, if ever, and will now be asked to go out and find work, a home, a way to support themselves.  I don't have to wonder why they are angry, and frustrated and depressed.  I can't imagine what it would have been like to be 16 and know that in just two short years, the only home I have ever really known, the only place that has shown me any kindness and love, would close it's doors to me forever.  It really isn't the kind of atmosphere in which hope flourishes.  It is not a place where little girls dream about their tomorrows, much less their futures.  It is - was - a place that your 18 birthday signaled an end, not a beginning.

But then two years ago that all changed.  A new type of Hogar was opened just down the street, Casa Esperanza.  Literally, the House of Hope.  The AyCM, along with some very generous benefactors, built a home for the girls that aged out of La Ganja.  They know that the only way to break the cycle of poverty and abuse is through education.  Education, love and patience. At Casa Esperanza, the girls have, not just a home and people surrounding them with love, they also have their college educations paid for.  Finally, some hope.  A reason for that same 16 year old to keep dreaming about what she can be when she grows up.  A way to keep these girls off of the streets and  keep them invested in their lives, in their educations.  Turning 18 can be a beginning for them again, and not an ending.  The girls at Casa Esperanza volunteer their time at the Hogar, making sure that the girls know that they too can have this future, if they just keep working at it.  That they don't have to continue the cycle of poverty, of neglect, of abuse.  There is a future for them and it is waiting just down the street.  Literally.

It was a day full of mixed emotions.  There is a sadness and an underlying anger that you feel when you visit La Granja (an anger that this has to happen, to anyone, anywhere), and there is such a feeling of hope and pride that you get when walking into Casa Esperanza.  It was a lot to digest and I don't think I am done sorting through my thoughts on it even now.   The one thing I do know is they both still need so much help.  And I hope that maybe I can give them some of mine.  I am not quite sure what that entails just yet, but I will keep mulling it over and keep you posted.

I will finish with some of the pictures I took...Though nothing I captured on film could compare to what it was like to be there.

A view of one of the 7 buildings that house the girls.

All possessions piled high...

No doorknobs on any doors. 

Their garden - all organic.  Surrounded on all sides by piles of junk.

I could have pulled this concrete wall down with  my hands.  It needs to be repaired as men have broken through at night and sexually abused the girls that live here.

Sweet baby Irma.   By far, the brightest spot of  my day!