La Chureca

La Chureca, on the banks of Lake Managua, is the city dump, where hundreds of loose family groups live and dig through garbage looking for food to eat and items to sell or use. Since most useful throwaway items, such as bottles or repairable furniture, are already collected by garbage truck operators during curbside pickup and sold to entrepreneurs at the dump entrance, what is finally dumped into mounds of garbage is of little resale value. Likewise, any food is probably rotten and dangerous to eat. Nevertheless, cows, buzzards, and dogs compete against humans for survival.

Cardboard, plastic, and scraps of wood pieced together create precarious shelters wherein live the dump diggers. Leaning onto each other for support, a haphazard grouping leaves little room for privacy. Dirt floors of packed garbage are muddy when it rains. People wear tattered, dirty clothes found in the dump, and often are barefoot or wear mismatched shoes.

Life in the dump is brutal, especially for children. Twice a week, some portions of the dump are burned; the acrid smoke obscuring the sky is visible for miles. Small methane gas fires spontaneously erupt from decomposing garbage; trails of smoke drift on the wind. In October 2006 three children were found dead amid the piles of For these who live in huts of garbage, eat garbage, and wear garbage in La Chureca, Los Quinchos is a beacon of hope. garbage. They had eaten what they thought was chocolate; it was rat poison. Children are routinely mistreated by families, other dump diggers, and dump employees. Outright physical abuse and sexual exploitation is common. Children are hungry for positive attention and rush up to visitors with wide grins and open arms for hugs.

Los Quinchos built a walled compound with small building and covered porch where dedicated staff and volunteers provide an oasis amid this inferno. They arrive by 10am to prepare for the day. Water for washing and cooking is hauled in buckets by hand uphill from a water pipe pirated from a nearby neighborhood and then poured into a barrel. Wooden tables and stools are brought from inside the building, La Chureca boys stored overnight to prevent theft, by eager children. As one staff member cooks rice and beans on a fire pit, another teaches math and reading to children who don’t attend school. Volunteers teach math, reading and crafts. Older Quinchos, former street kids assist. This is the only schooling for many children; families prefer the children dig in the dump instead. A few fortunate children attend a nearby school. As they return to the dump, they join the others for possibly their only meal of the day.

Food is served equally to all. One day I visited, the usual rice and beans, cabbage and juice was enhanced by some chicken. Because they have learned how to survive in such appalling conditions, these children can be brutal toward each other as they fight over the rare piece of chicken. Due to malnutrition, most children are older than their physical size. A slight teenager of perhaps 16 is actually a young mother of 24. Her small nursing baby, with distended belly from parasites and malnutrition and looks six or eight months old, is actually 13 months. The Los Quinchos project feeds her as well as her children.

The saddest news was learning that a flat-chested, scrawny preteen, wearing a filthy tattered pink chiffon and taffeta party dress, barefoot, matted hair, smudged face was already prostituting herself to garbage truck drivers for $2Cordobas, about 11 cents.

For these who live in huts of garbage, eat garbage, and wear garbage in La Chureca, Los Quinchos is a beacon of hope.

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La Chureca

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