Stories from the inside

Each one of us must have many stories to tell, imagine for a moment the number of existing stories inside a community where more than 700 children live today, thousands of children have been living there for the last 17 years and they live on a day by day basis counting on voluntary donations. As you must have guessed, there are a lot and the idea of this post is to tell you, briefly, some of them.

Arrivals and the beginning of a new life

Let me introduce you to Joel. He arrived to the community after just a few days of his birth thanks to a police officer that found him abandoned in the street. He was found completely naked, no clothes or even diapers to cover him. Today he is almost 3 years old and even though he doesn’t talk yet, when you play with him it seems the only thing he asks for is love. He likes human contact and it seems that simple thing is good enough to make him feel good. He has no idea why he’s here and when he grows up he’ll surely notice who his family is.

Kids like Joel now have a future thanks to the existence of this community, their support, housing and education. And all these is possible thanks to the unselfish economic support of some people. You could be one of them. You can be an important part of Joel’s future and other kids like him.

These 3 brothers arrived as small children, remembers Miguel, the founder and director of the community. Jordan, “Caparazón” and Renato came from Cusco with their mother seeking for better possibilities in Lima only to find they couldn’t be able to support themselves on their own. They arrived in early January and, as is traditional around that time of the year, breakfast consisted of Christmas cake, instead of bread, and milk. It was the first time they tried Christmas cakes. The following day they had bread and milk for breakfast. On the third day, Miguel noticed they were not eating their share of bread and milk and when he asked why they didn’t hesitate in answering they had already eaten twice that week and three times must, clearly, be a mistake. On their little heads they were expecting their next meal the following week.

Stories like this one happen daily in our country. We could be part of the change and help children like them, and so many others living either in the streets or inside the community, to feel that eating more than twice a week is not unusual. Let’s aid the community on their goal to help more children each time.

Concrete results

Not every story is a sad story inside the community. In fact, their walls and the look in the children’s faces are full of hope in the future and in the example set by others that already left the community and are now successful professionals, young students or parents. There are even more than a couple of marriages between men and women that used to be part of the community.

I may comment you about Ruben, that now at age 28 and after having lived almost his whole childhood and youth in the community, is a successful doctor that is studying his specialty in a foreign country with a scholarship. When he finished med school one of the first things he did was to open a clinic, financed by a spanish NGO. The clinic attends both, the children of the community and the community neighbors and now it’s ran by different doctors while Ruben is away.

We could also talk about Juan, who lived his whole life in the community and now, at age 14, he’s already studying Robotics at the university. He’ll soon travel to Germany to study nuclear engineering thanks to a government scholarship.

As them, there are many very good examples of the communities results based on the education and formation this kid’s and young people receive while they live in the community. We can assure this continues in the future by doing something today.

Contrasts and examples for everyone

Some of the more contrasting thing when you go to the community is the high degree of generosity and the willing to share among the kids, considering the latent needs they have.

I was lucky enough to witness one of this examples on one of my visits. It was lunchtime, everyone was at the canteen and two new kids had just arrived to the community. When they walked in, and after the classic “Good afternoon friends” that all the kids sing along, they started clapping as a sign of welcome to their new family members. Everyone there knew how much they have had to go through to get there, maybe some of them have had harder times than others but what is sure is that no one had an easy life and the clapping might be the way, their way, of saying things will be a little bit better from now on.


Another good example happens from time to time and started a year ago, after an earthquake that destroyed some southern towns. On Saturdays, kids are asked how many of them want to donate their share of bread to those affected by the earthquake. Without counting in detail I’d say than 99.9% of the kids raise their hands when prompted for this. The next day, breakfast is just a ceremony of bread collecting inside sacks that will reach the earthquake victims. That day, they wait for lunch with the satisfaction of having given back a little bit of what they’ve received. At their short age they do understand the beauty of sharing.

We could also do it, just as they do, from time to time.

Our goal: their future