Across the Wire

Reading across the wire was quite a shock. I've been exposed to such levels of poverty, though perhaps not to the extreme as in "Across the Wire". My home town of Taxco is well off because it's a touristy place, so there aren't many examples of extreme poverty. But once you get outside the city limits, the "suburbs" if you will, things change drastically. People living in what can generously be called shacks. Walls and roofs made of whatever they could find. They are really exposed to the elements. The roof barely keeps out the rain, and the wall barely stop the wind. Animals and insects could easily come in or out as they please. A bite from a scorpion, which is highly probably where I live, I should know, I've been stung by one, would mean death for some one living in these conditions. The anti-venom would be too expensive to buy. So they just wait it out and hope that the venom will merely cause immense pain and not death.
Though I have to say that they most of them seem really happy. I guess my dad had always been right when he says, La gente puede estar muriéndose de hambre pero siempre hay dinero para la pachanga y la cerveza.
When I went to Costa Rica I saw the same thing. I went for a medical mission trip, and I got to see some pretty messed up things.

I am the one on the right, with the terrible mustache

I guess these seem a lot better than what I imagine while I read the professor's book. But still, they were not the best living conditions. One of the natives told us that during the rainy season, of which Costa Rica has two, the streets get flooded or they become rivers of mud. They have to cross them to go to school. 

I think that my time in Costa Rica was the most memorable. I guess because my father was not there to show me the bright side. Also, I was there looking for the worst. We were taking care of people who had not seen a doctor for years. Some people were devastating to see. One little girl had a whole, like literally a whole, in her ankle because a cinder black had fallen on it. We asked the mother why she wasn't at the hospital since there was a lot of bleeding, she said that she was waiting for her husband to come home first to ask him what to do. We immediately told her there was no question, or else the little girl's ankle would get infected and they were not living in the best of conditions. Needless to say, we got her to the hospital. I was one of the people who found her; we were walking from house to house. I was flabbergasted. But what can you do. We did our job. Too bad her mother did not do hers.