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Roatán

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This post was written in 2015 after I just finished my volunteership at Charmont Bilingual Academy. I spent intensive 1-on-1 time with the children and learned about their shocking and devastating background stories and family situations. It was hard to write down some of their personal narratives (100% anonymously), but it's crucial to make people aware of the urgent necessity of their help.

The world warned me that travelling in Honduras would be unsafe and confronting.

Poverty, violence, murders, abuse... The media as well as random people (that never actually visited Honduras) were not spreading too much positivity about the country. Usually I process this kind of 'information' with a healthy dose of skepticism, but this time however I learned this quite adequately matches the reality of a significant part of the population. However, this means that there's also a chance to really make a difference in the lives of people that need it the most. A unique opportunity to be the change you would like to see in this world.

That the majority of the Hondureños are an incredible bunch of people I already experienced during my trip through the mainland. Every time I felt insecure or even anxious, someone overwhelmingly friendly and helpful would show the opposite of what I was afraid of. That doesn't mean their lives are free of care and sorrow. In fact, the sometimes severe conditions they learned to live in might be the very reason every drop of love and positivism is squeezed out of them. It's genuinely touching. I strongly felt the urge to give back to this community.

Via WorkAway I got in touch with Valerie, a Canadian lady who dedicated her life, resources and efforts to start up a foundation:

Familias Saludables beats the spreading of AIDS on Roatán and the Bay Isands by providing free tests, medication, treatments, anti-conception, education and support.

Later on, when basically all children started to survive, she decided to set up an entirely free school for these minors growing up in seriously worrying conditions. All of them are either HIV-positive or are growing up in a family tormented by AIDS. Many are victimized by domestic violence and sexual abuse, some are closely connected to narcotrafficking (f.e. running drugs for their parents). Some parents have an addiction, some moms work as prostitutes. All students live in extreme poverty, the slums are their home and there you have to fight to survive.

Therefore the school provides free nutrition, as most of them don't get food at their homes as it's simply not there. On field-trips I saw them scraping food off the street, scrubbing off the dirt and eat it. What are you going to say then as a teacher, "don't do it, it isn't hygienic"? No, that’s what they learned to do to survive, so you let them. It's a bilingual school, teaching all subjects half of the time in Spanish, half of the time in English. On an island where tourism is growing and bilingual employees and entrepreneurs have the strongest position, this school has the potential to provide a promising future for these initially deprived children. The brightest ones even get sponsorships and education options at universities abroad!

My respect for Valerie was immense, but grew beyond indefinite when I learned she also adopted 13 (!) kids and changed their lives a 100%. Also her daughter Jane continued the good work and is now working on a better life for her two adopted children. Next to adopting, both had countless of infants living in their houses for a few months up to many years in order to guarantee their safety, nutrition and existence in general. Faith in humanity restored. Yes, I would definitely give all my motivation and dedication to help teaching these children for the duration of a month.

After a sickening ferry ride to the island, I finally got to put a face to the name. Valerie picked me up and gave me some more background info about the schools' funds and projects over a veggie pizza meal.

In between the conversation she pointed at the cruise ship docked at the harbour and explained that although it provides a big boom to local tourism, hardly anything comes back to the community and instead a new problem had arrived: Sex-tourism with little children is a growing concern, as paedophiles don't get convicted here (the worse that can happen is that they're sent back to their cruise).

Welcome to Roatán, the tropical paradise of child prostitution.

Money that DOES come back to the island is mainly related to drugs trade, as Roatán is located on a major drugs route... Most fancy hotels and clubs in West End are financed with drugs money and provide at the same time a great way of money-laundering. Uffff, I found it difficult to process these contradictions in my brain, this flipside of paradise.

Once we got the food down she immediately drove me to the school to show me around... or so I thought. In fact, I would spend my first hour in front of the classroom! I was going to help Miss Lucy (from Australia) teaching these cuties English, spelling, math, science and art. Eleven pairs of big brown eyes looked up at me. Then a big salvo echoed through the classroom: "Welcome Miss Stephanie!" Meeting these kids was tremendous. I never believed in love at first sight, but that moment I realized it truly is out there. I felt instant love and affection for these children that I had never saw or heard of before. I had no idea yet what stories went behind those eyes, but I knew I would find out soon enough.

The weeks that followed I spent helping Miss Lucy in grade 1-4. I mainly spent time with kids that needed some special 1-on-1 attention, something that soon became a sought-after status symbol, especially by the girls (“Me want Miss Stephanie, me waaaant!”). Some of them made a big progress when they finally got the full attention and possibility to learn at their own pace and ask questions. Others had major concentration problems and were visibly struggling to get by. It's not a big surprise once you find out what's going on in their fragile, young lives. To give you an idea...

[Although only showing the tip of the iceberg, the following case descriptions are very confronting and personal. I wrote them down to give you an honest representation of these children’s realities, what hopefully makes you realize how much your help is needed. I don’t mention any names to assure anonymity and won’t post any recognizable photos of the children in this specific story for the same reason].

I intensely worked with two quiet and in the beginning a bit hostile sisters. While trying to break through their shells by showing them affection and positive encouragement, I learned that they are systematically raped by their dad. The youngest came to school with blood running down her legs and had to be stitched up in her vagina. I went to their house later on and had to distract my mind in order not to burst out into tears right in front of them. The house was nothing more than a tiny shed with four mattresses scattered around on the floor: no furniture, no running water, no electricity. That’s the place where they studied for their exams (and passed gloriously). To slowly see these children open up once they realized we're here to care for them instead of abuse them, and being the reason of their smiles and laughter every now and then... THAT's what life is all about.

Another girl I spent lots of time with is often locked up in the house by her manipulative father (who claims she's his possession) when he goes on his dates with 15- and 16-year old girls. If she goes to the bathroom more than twice a day she gets beaten up. This girl is also a victim of sexual abuse, supposedly by this same charming parent, and therefore tends to avoid men. She lost her mom and maybe for this reason behaved extremely possessive when it came to me: No other kid could hug me, I was hers. She would kick them away or get extremely angry or emotional. She is bullied in school as she looks different (half of the descendants on the island come from the Spanish, the others have African roots). Her behavioural issues are a concern I found hard to deal with, but I developed a profound affection for this young girl.

My colleague worked very closely with a teenage boy who was born with AIDS as the cheating dad never told his mom that he was HIV-positive (an angry spouse had more value than the death of his family). When the man almost died himself Miss Valerie refused to continue his medication, unless he came clear with his family. After months they reluctantly all got tested, and yup, the entire family was indeed infected. Thanks dad. He even convinced his son to get off the medication, as "God had cured them both". After the dad died two months later, this seemed to be not the case. However, this had limited the boy’s chance of recovery. As he also has tuberculosis, there are not many medication options left. He is on the most severe pills possible, but if they don't work that'll be it.

The oldest sister of a family with several kids in our school caught a robber in her house and got sliced up with a machete, as was her infant kid. The children orphaned by this tragic event needed to live with their young (HIV-positive) grandma, together with the other five kids.

Some other siblings in the school have a very young mother covered in burn marks and machete cuts. They saw that happening most of the time when their father (a dealer) and grandmother were abusing her in front of them. When he came to the school once he got out of jail, she stabbed him down with a kitchen knife. When she is out of money, she sometimes prostitutes herself. These kids are the tough ones running the school, the young boy being the alpha-male dominating the class. ‘The hardest ones to love are the ones that need it most’, a song once taught me, so I gave them just that. For me the room brightened up when I heard their hoarse laughs, and my day was made when I saw them kicking ass on their exams.

On a field trip I had to take a heroin-needle off a kid... He just found it at the porch of the house next to school. Every child immediately recognized what it was.

A very sweet boy in our class that always looks out for others once brought a gun to the school. The reason is heart-warming and horrifying at the same time: He saw his dad beating up his mom and heard him threatening to kill her. So he stole his father's gun to protect his mom and sisters if his father would show up at school.

Most children survive nowadays (thanks to Miss Valerie), but still some die because medical care is not readily available and hospitals are not well equipped. This resulted in the recent death of little Jorge, a name still often referred to by his mourning and confused classmates who just lost another friend.

One student with AIDS didn't get his medication, as his also HIV-positive mom was withholding them. Why? Because she wanted him to die before she did, as no one wants to look after a child with this disease. It has a huge stigma here.

I am not a social worker nor an experienced teacher so I had really no idea how to professionally handle these kids. I just figured I will give them as much affection as possible and encourage good behaviour or smart learning to motivate repetition. This seemed to work, especially with the girls. The children quickly grew very attached and constantly attacked me with hugs and kisses. Holding my hand or even touching me resulted in real battles: In the ghetto even love is something to fight for. I think it's good in a way, as many don't have an appropriate role model. Also, because they do want to work with me so badly they tried as hard as they could to do a good job, what benefits their results. However, they did see me more as a friend, what made it sometimes hard to obtain order and discipline (yes, my respect for those teachers that can grew significantly). Aaaaand, I was going to leave, so that's another one disappearing out of their lives. But seeing even the most troubled, distant, traumatized kids slowly melting down and shyly grabbing my hand or putting their arms around me when no one's watching... that does something. I hope I could bring a bit of positivity in their lives, even if it's just a bright little moment.

Another activity of Charmont is the “community tour”, on which Valery took me as I made a big effort to raise money for this amazing project. This money we spent partly on handing out food and clothes to the families that need it the most. After we shopped four carts of life necessities, we first went down to her clinic where she offers AIDS testing for free. She showed me the supplies of powder mother milk, medication and free condoms, all financed by donations and her own resources. Then we were off to the slums.

Now I did travel through Latin America for 15 months straight and saw many slums from up close, but I was not prepared for this. I was not mentally ready to see the children I honestly started to care about live with nine people in one rattling shack without furniture, running water or anything that's minimum to a humane existence. That this is possible in this world goes beyond my understanding. It was heart-breaking, but at the same time beautiful to see how these people received us warm-heartedly into their homes, full of tenderness and pride. When we passed the palace mansion of the mayor (corruption olé olé) and drove into the guarded community to see the holiday villas of celebrities Richard Gere, J.Lo, Lucy Liu and Julio Iglesias Jr. my brain just shut off. If this is the reality of devastating contradictions we live in, we need to build a whole new system to correct these flaws.

The school year ended quicker than my brain could grasp, before I knew it I was already witnessing the kindergarten graduations and frolicking with the hysterical happy kids at the last day of ‘school’ on the beach. Yes, even though they live on an island, they don't have the money to go there (some don’t even know how to swim). To give them the chance to be a ‘normal kid’ for one day is magnificent.

I will try to stay up-to-date about their lives and development, even though I know in some cases it will be heart-breaking. Yes, some will be pregnant before they turn 14, some will become dealers or pimps, some will also abuse their own kids and some will die. But some will escape their destructive environment and get a scholarship abroad, some will grow as a person, and some will create new habits and reconstruct their own realities.

Life is out there, and even though right now it seems like a struggle for survival, the future is determined by many more things than just 'destiny'.

More about Charmont Bilingual Academy:

Charmont Bilingual Academy in Roatan was founded by Valerie Nelson, a Canadian social worker who initially set up an HIV-clinic to beat the poignant death rate on the island caused by HIV, providing free testing and medication. Seeing how her initiative saved the lives of many adults and their children, she soon realized a new step had to be taken to improve this new surviving generation’s quality of life and future perspectives, using education as a rescue route out of the slums. The Charmont Bilingual Academy, set up together with the Charmont Family, was an instant success. A sponsor- and donation-based system can facilitate cost-free education to children living in a climate shaped by poverty, violence, drugs and prostitution… offering them a way up and out, right towards a better future. A recent addition to Charmont is the in-school breakfast program (in addition to the already existing in-school lunch provision), launched as soon as the teachers realized the young students had little energy to concentrate in class because they hadn’t eaten… simply because the availability of food isn’t as normal and evident as to most of us. Let’s join forces to energize the children of Charmont in their quest of knowledge and a bright future!

I ended up doing a 900km fundraiser walk for this cause, raising EUR 1000.

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