Their Stories

These are the stories that keep weighing on heart like concrete—I need to leave them somewhere so that I can breathe. Some will make you laugh out loud, some will make you angry, and perhaps some will leave you asking why.

There was a dead dog on the side of the road by my house. My host mom was all worried about it smelling and exploding and then attracting birds and lord knows what else. For two days the dog was just frozen in its death as she kept asking her husband to remove it, he said he didn’t want to touch it and I don’t blame him. So the third day she confronted him and told him that if he didn’t do something about that dog he wouldn’t get dinner, now it’s important to know that she also cooked his favorite dinner that night. Of course he had to do something so he called my uncle who is our neighbor and they split a beer. Next thing I know they set the dog on fire!!! My host mom was horrified but my host father ate his dinner savoring every bite.

I met a 13 year old who is five months pregnant and almost killed herself trying to self abort (abortions are illegal and highly common in Ecuador). The baby’s daddy is her 22 year old stepbrother—he raped her. Her eyes rimmed with tears keep haunting me. As she rubbed her tummy I kept asking myself, why—why did this happen? What life will this baby lead knowing that it was never wanted? How will this baby beloved within the family its presence destroyed? What future does this girl lead being outcasted as a teen mother when it wasn’t even her choice? From every angle it seems so unfair. 

Bellka is 17 years old and absolutely lovely. Her most striking features are her eyelashes—they are glamorous. She is the only daughter of my host-mom and in her senior year of high school. For awhile she has been harassed by a classmate, he has a crush on her but she likes him the way you would like a wart on your nose. So one day she had told him exactly how she felt and he got a little aggressive. She called her dad. Now my host father is incredibly funny and sells butter for a leaving but Bellka is his world and he is her sun. Within moments of Bellka coming home my host father had his brother, his two nephews, and a couple of his friends waiting. Bellka then had to give a detailed account of what was said and what the kid looked like and where he lived. With that my host father and his army left to confront this kid. Bellka is the only niece and so protected she rarely goes alone anywhere and I often babysit her. I’m sure this kid most have pooped his pants when my host father and all the other men showed up on his doorstep. Nothing was ever mentioned about what happened that night except that everything was taken care of. Than today this kid shows up at our house with his father and a present to formally ask the entire family for forgiveness for the harm he caused Bekla and her family. Bekla and I stood behind the front door dying of laughter he looked so scared. 

The house above my host moms has twin girls, they must be around 3. There being abused and we can hear them crying everyday over the yelling of their mother. They are hit for anything and everything because their mom is it for anything and everything by their father. There is a cycle in Ecuador—men use machismo to abuse their wives who than abuses her children in desperation who then grow up to be abusive husband and abused wives. The girls are so hungry for both food and love. We try and sneak them food and love whenever their mom isn’t looking. There is no such thing as social services here—I can’t call the police or something. All I can do is pretend to not hear their heartbreak and see their bruises. How hopeless it truly feels, I can’t save them.

The stories keep coming in and falling into my lap the way leaves in fall let gravity pull them down to the earth. The pain of this place oozes out, its so painful seeing and watching and only being able to move around like a ghost. I love and detest this place for breaking my heart. I had no idea this was going to be so hard. In the beginning all I had wanted was to work in an orphanage and then God puts me here in such heart break and I don’t know why. People here are so broken from babies to old women, their just shattered. I don’t even know how to love them, all I do is listen and hold their stories like tear drops.