Those involved in the drug-trade (traficantes) are a powerful presence in the slum. They are the law. They are the ones who keep the order, the ones who no one wants to mess with. Two examples from this past weekend illustrate the variety of their functions, how they enforce their power, and the relationships they have with others (including us).
The first example is quite brutal. At 9pm on Friday night, just down the street from the Lighthouse, a man was beaten to death with sticks by the traficantes. Apparently the beating was so brutal that his head was severed. One has to ask several questions as to why the traficantes took this approach, 1) to beat him so brutally when they could have just shot him or stabbed him, and 2) to do it in the middle of the street in open public view at a time where there are tons of people out and around.
From what I have heard about this man, he owed the traficantes quite a bit of money, and had fled from the favela years ago in order to get away, and came back for some reason perhaps thinking enough time had passed that they wouldn't remember. It seems, based on the time, place, and method used by the traficantes, that they wanted to send a message to others in the favela, to strike fear into them and reinforce their power and the idea that no one should mess with them.
So the traficantes do bad things, though this is an extreme example. Someone who has been living here for years commented it is the most barbaric thing they have seen or heard of happening here. Yet, in an ironic sort of way, the traficantes actually help preserve peace in the slum, as long as there is one gang in power.
What? Traficantes preserve the peace? They want to avoid anything that would invite the police into the community. So, they have a law - no stealing from anyone else in the community. If someone steals from you, who do you call? The traficantes. And there is a high likelihood of the stolen object being returned to you. Calling the police wouldn't do much of anything, so people readily turn to the traficantes, who readily provide their services knowing that it enforces their power and keeps the police out.
Weekend before last, one of our staff members had his laptop stolen out of the office by a kid who came into grab his kite and carried out the laptop along with it. Some of our staff saw the kid running off with the laptop but didn't recognize him and assumed he wasn't from the community, because usually no one in the community is stupid enough to steal from someone else within the community. The person who had the laptop stolen went out into the community with our leaders and reported the stolen laptop.
A week went by, and everyone assumed the laptop was gone for good, that someone on the outside had taken it. Then this Sunday one of the traficantes showed up at our gate, saying that they had the laptop and asked for someone to go with him to get it. One of our leaders went up with him to the boca (drug-dealing alley), where he asked someone else to go get the laptop from his house. Our leader naively began to follow this person, before the traficante motioned for him to stay back (he obviously didn't want to invite him into his house). The boy he sent returned with the laptop and the traficante had fulfilled his community police duty.
Of course the person who had the laptop stolen was happy to receive it back, not only because of the financial value, but also because of the documents saved on it. But naturally we were concerned with what happened to the 12-year-old boy who stole the laptop. We were relieved to discover that the traficantes had mercy on him, telling him that nothing would happen to him if he turned the laptop over to them. He evidently turned it over readily and the traficantes kept their word.
The slum is really a different world with its own rules and laws and the traficantes are those with the most power. It is interesting that although they do bad things (acts of violence on top of drug-dealing), they really respect those who are trying to do good for the community and especially religious workers such as missionaries. I feel like those at the Lighthouse have favor with them even though our teachings condemn many of their actions. But perhaps witnessing to the traficantes can be a key to social tranformation here in the slum. At least we know we don't have to fear them because we have no reason to.
Showing posts with label slums. Show all posts
Showing posts with label slums. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Lessons from the Amarelinho
The amarelinho is the little yellow bus that runs through the slum. Although the bus line has a number (103), everyone simply refers to it as the amarelinho, or "little yellow". Riding on the amarelinho is an adventure in itself, like a R$0.55 rollercoaster ride that actually gets you where you're going. Though, depending on the time of day and how off-schedule the buses are running, you will likely be standing for this ride, but don't worry, if that is the case, you will likely be packed in enough that you won't fly around much!
There are now a couple of newer amarelinho buses with a slightly new design. God has been speaking to me a lot through analogies lately, using simple, tangible examples to represent a bigger lesson. This happened the first time I got on one of these new amarelinho buses. They may look more chic, but someone seriously errored in the new design. Perhaps they thought that using slightly larger seats would make the bus ride more comfortable, but they obviously didn't consider that by making the aisle smaller, it is nearly impossible to squeeze past others standing, and given that the bus only has one door in the front to both enter and exit, that is a challenge. The seats are also staggered so there is not a straight aisle, making it challenging to get through. As I boarded this bus during the morning rush of people heading to work, I couldn't help but thinking that whoever thought of this new design had obviously never riden on the amarelinho before! A five year old kid from the slum could have come up with a more practical design!
The bigger lesson: this is what happens when people from the outside try to fix problems they know nothing about. Well-intentioned people often try to do things to help those more in need, but they can't do it apart from the input of those very people, because they are the ones who best know their own situation and they can come up with the best answers to how to address it.
I was reminded of this lesson this morning as I was reading through my old journal entries since arriving in Brazil for the first time. (I'm currently on my 5th journal since arriving - I jot down struggles, questions, lessons learned, things God speaks to me, etc. then I can look back to make sure I don't forget it and to see how much I have learned and grown.) A month or so after arriving in Brazil the first time, I wrote: "Looking for answers to questions regarding the roots of poverty - the best place to be is with the poor so I can learn their stories and begin to gain an understanding of their situation before trying to improve it." There is a kind of learning that comes from knowing people that you can't get from books. Some problems can be better understood when they are witnessed and experienced firsthand. And often the best answers and solutions come from those most familiar with the problems.
There are now a couple of newer amarelinho buses with a slightly new design. God has been speaking to me a lot through analogies lately, using simple, tangible examples to represent a bigger lesson. This happened the first time I got on one of these new amarelinho buses. They may look more chic, but someone seriously errored in the new design. Perhaps they thought that using slightly larger seats would make the bus ride more comfortable, but they obviously didn't consider that by making the aisle smaller, it is nearly impossible to squeeze past others standing, and given that the bus only has one door in the front to both enter and exit, that is a challenge. The seats are also staggered so there is not a straight aisle, making it challenging to get through. As I boarded this bus during the morning rush of people heading to work, I couldn't help but thinking that whoever thought of this new design had obviously never riden on the amarelinho before! A five year old kid from the slum could have come up with a more practical design!
The bigger lesson: this is what happens when people from the outside try to fix problems they know nothing about. Well-intentioned people often try to do things to help those more in need, but they can't do it apart from the input of those very people, because they are the ones who best know their own situation and they can come up with the best answers to how to address it.
I was reminded of this lesson this morning as I was reading through my old journal entries since arriving in Brazil for the first time. (I'm currently on my 5th journal since arriving - I jot down struggles, questions, lessons learned, things God speaks to me, etc. then I can look back to make sure I don't forget it and to see how much I have learned and grown.) A month or so after arriving in Brazil the first time, I wrote: "Looking for answers to questions regarding the roots of poverty - the best place to be is with the poor so I can learn their stories and begin to gain an understanding of their situation before trying to improve it." There is a kind of learning that comes from knowing people that you can't get from books. Some problems can be better understood when they are witnessed and experienced firsthand. And often the best answers and solutions come from those most familiar with the problems.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Slumdog Millionaire vs. the favelas of Brazil
Last week I went to see the movie Slumdog Millionaire with others who work here at the Lighthouse Community Center. As we work with community development here in the slum, we were all interested to see how this movie portrayed the slums of India. It came out later here than it did in the US...so I will have to jog your memory if you saw it a couple of months ago!
The first thing that caught my attention was the title in Portuguese. Now, it is fairly normal for movie titles to change significantly when translated. But the question is always why. In Portuguese, the movie is called "Quem quer ser milionario?" or "Who wants to be a millionaire?" A literal translation of the title would have been "Favelado milionario." Why change the title in this case? I think it is an issue of marketing here, that those who can pay to go to the movies wouldn't have their interest drawn if the world "favelado" (a derrogatory term for someone from the slum/favela, much like "slum dog") was part of the title.
Rich and middle class Brazilians are able to see a movie like this that shows what life is like in slums in OTHER parts of the world, but the fact is that they would rather turn a blind eye to similar conditions that exist here in Brazil. Including the term "favelado" in the title would make that connection to the similar conditions here, and most Brazilians don't want to watch a movie that is about a favelado, because of the prejudices that exist against favelados here.
There are some key differences between the slums depicted in the film and those here in Brazil, or at least the one that I live in, known as Cafezal, which is part of a community of slums that makes up what is called the Conglomerado da Serra, like the conglomerate slums of the mountain ridge. The government has invested in the slum here in the past twenty years, to provide basic sanitary living conditions, such as sewage systems, running water, electricity, paved roads, and so forth. In times of heavy rain certain smells can result that make me question the sewage system's efficacy, but it is nothing like what was portrayed for bathroom systems in the film! Thank God! Just as in all Brazil, we cannot flush toilet paper down the toilet, but that is about as rough as it gets.
Yet many of the problems portrayed in the film exist here as well. While the government has succeeded in improving basic living conditions, it has not been able to address the social problems of the slum. Drug lords hold a tremendous amount of power, controling certain territories. Kids often get sucked into the drug trade due to lack of other ways to climb the social ladder. Many kids find creative ways to supplement the family income, such as perform tricks at busy street intersections to get money. Those who are vulnerable are easily taken advantage of, just as in the film.
Perhaps the biggest similarity goes back to the term favelado or slumdog and the accompanying prejudices. The gameshow host said shockingly rude things to Jamal when he was competing, belittling him on national television, because of his background growing up in the slum and his current job serving tea. The idea passed is that a slumdog is stupid, ignorant, incapable of the functions of higher society, and basically destined to remain at the bottom in the slumdog kind of life. Jamal is treated in a dehumanizing way simply because of where he is from. It is even assumed that he cheated because he knew the answers and there is no way someone from the slum could do better on the show than an upperclass, highly educated person.
Similar prejudice exists against "favelados" here. Kids who grow up in the favela are told that they are no good, stupid, slum trash. Some of our group leaders witnessed this last year as they took the kids in their group on a fieldtrip to the zoo, where some schools had also taken kids on a fieldtrip. One of the school teachers made a derrogatory comment about the kids in the group referring to them as "favelados" and the kids were very upset by it. They are not too bothered by the term favela, or to say they live in a slum, but the word favelado carries a much stronger meaning with it.
The problem comes when kids internalize the labels others place on them. When they are told they are just favelados and are destined to repeat the same kind of life in the slum that those before them lived, most start to believe it. When they believe it, it can turn into self-fulfilling prophecy. I don't know if their is anything sadder than seeing kids start believing these sorts of things about themselves - a big part of the work we do here is restoring a healthy self-image that society has done so much to destroy, to help kids see themselves through God's eyes rather than society's.
It is so sad that society treats people in this dehumanizing way, that it can treat a group of people as if they are less than human, as if they are trash. I am convinced that this outrages God, who created man in His own image, to see that image being so defiled. As Christians I believe it is our responsibility to fight against these oppressive societal structures that make human beings out to be trash, to restore humanity to those it has been taken away from.
The first thing that caught my attention was the title in Portuguese. Now, it is fairly normal for movie titles to change significantly when translated. But the question is always why. In Portuguese, the movie is called "Quem quer ser milionario?" or "Who wants to be a millionaire?" A literal translation of the title would have been "Favelado milionario." Why change the title in this case? I think it is an issue of marketing here, that those who can pay to go to the movies wouldn't have their interest drawn if the world "favelado" (a derrogatory term for someone from the slum/favela, much like "slum dog") was part of the title.
Rich and middle class Brazilians are able to see a movie like this that shows what life is like in slums in OTHER parts of the world, but the fact is that they would rather turn a blind eye to similar conditions that exist here in Brazil. Including the term "favelado" in the title would make that connection to the similar conditions here, and most Brazilians don't want to watch a movie that is about a favelado, because of the prejudices that exist against favelados here.
There are some key differences between the slums depicted in the film and those here in Brazil, or at least the one that I live in, known as Cafezal, which is part of a community of slums that makes up what is called the Conglomerado da Serra, like the conglomerate slums of the mountain ridge. The government has invested in the slum here in the past twenty years, to provide basic sanitary living conditions, such as sewage systems, running water, electricity, paved roads, and so forth. In times of heavy rain certain smells can result that make me question the sewage system's efficacy, but it is nothing like what was portrayed for bathroom systems in the film! Thank God! Just as in all Brazil, we cannot flush toilet paper down the toilet, but that is about as rough as it gets.
Yet many of the problems portrayed in the film exist here as well. While the government has succeeded in improving basic living conditions, it has not been able to address the social problems of the slum. Drug lords hold a tremendous amount of power, controling certain territories. Kids often get sucked into the drug trade due to lack of other ways to climb the social ladder. Many kids find creative ways to supplement the family income, such as perform tricks at busy street intersections to get money. Those who are vulnerable are easily taken advantage of, just as in the film.
Perhaps the biggest similarity goes back to the term favelado or slumdog and the accompanying prejudices. The gameshow host said shockingly rude things to Jamal when he was competing, belittling him on national television, because of his background growing up in the slum and his current job serving tea. The idea passed is that a slumdog is stupid, ignorant, incapable of the functions of higher society, and basically destined to remain at the bottom in the slumdog kind of life. Jamal is treated in a dehumanizing way simply because of where he is from. It is even assumed that he cheated because he knew the answers and there is no way someone from the slum could do better on the show than an upperclass, highly educated person.
Similar prejudice exists against "favelados" here. Kids who grow up in the favela are told that they are no good, stupid, slum trash. Some of our group leaders witnessed this last year as they took the kids in their group on a fieldtrip to the zoo, where some schools had also taken kids on a fieldtrip. One of the school teachers made a derrogatory comment about the kids in the group referring to them as "favelados" and the kids were very upset by it. They are not too bothered by the term favela, or to say they live in a slum, but the word favelado carries a much stronger meaning with it.
The problem comes when kids internalize the labels others place on them. When they are told they are just favelados and are destined to repeat the same kind of life in the slum that those before them lived, most start to believe it. When they believe it, it can turn into self-fulfilling prophecy. I don't know if their is anything sadder than seeing kids start believing these sorts of things about themselves - a big part of the work we do here is restoring a healthy self-image that society has done so much to destroy, to help kids see themselves through God's eyes rather than society's.
It is so sad that society treats people in this dehumanizing way, that it can treat a group of people as if they are less than human, as if they are trash. I am convinced that this outrages God, who created man in His own image, to see that image being so defiled. As Christians I believe it is our responsibility to fight against these oppressive societal structures that make human beings out to be trash, to restore humanity to those it has been taken away from.
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