Thursday's Work

Tara Here, So this is my third time on the Esperanza trip. This week, we have been working on laying the foundation for another room in a lady named Claudia's house. Claudia's adorable three-year old son, Ryan, has been been assisting us by passing us empty buckets. After several bucket lines and an insane amount of digging, we are almost finished! Earlier in the week, we visited the same girl's orphanage that we always do. Though this was my third visit, it was the first time that I noticed something about the girls that really touched my heart- the way that the older girls would just pick up the younger girls and take care of them as if they were their mother. And then it hit me- the older girls WERE the younger girls' mothers in a sense- since they had no family. It then hit me that once the girls hit their teenage years, they no longer had mothers. I thought about how in the United States, people (even adults) are much more hesitant to pick up a child who is not related to them, and our culture of paranoia of "stranger danger." These girls, on the other hand, are each other's family. Another new thing on this trip was our visit to Casa del Migrante. Though this was my third time going there (like the orphanage) it was the first time that I had heard one of the men who stayed there give a speech about why he was there. He explained that he had been involved in drugs and crime. This made me wonder what society can do to give people in places like tijuana other options (instead of drugs and crime). Overall, I am very glad that I have come for a third time. Tara Abhasakun