Cercadillo

Yesterday at about two in the afternoon, I looked at my tear streaked face and questioned my decision to commit two years doing this. The night before, I planned a day trip to one of the poorest communities in my municipality. I have been there a handful of times before and always been drawn to their situation. Unlike many of the rural communities in the area, Cercadillo is avoided by all of the development projects that arrive with gifts like home construction, cement floors, water filters, and trees or crops. This is because over half of the population is Haitian and living illegally on this side of the border. The majority of these projects, including those from the US, cannot benefit families without Dominican citizenship cards. This leaves the 150 residents with dirt houses and floors, little potable water, and little opportunity for wealth generation. Since the first time I visited, their aqueduct has been broken meaning they have to collect water in their closest river.

Because I have visited and I am white, there is one Cercadillo woman who finds me every time she comes to town to ask for help. She always tells me that they still don’t have water and she is going to get the president of their water association to talk to me. Last week, she and this president found me on my morning run and answered some of my questions. No, they have not told the municipal government. No, no one is having meetings to figure it out. No, an engineer hasn’t visited. They aren’t sure but they think three bags of cement could fix the problem. I decided to go there and see the situation but I told them they should also talk to the mayor and Red Cross (who are working on the aqueduct in town). Three bags of cement is about $18 US dollars, not exactly a fortune.

I planned the trip with a driven college student who lives here half the week with his family and studies half the week in the capital. He had asked me if I had interest in a fruit tree project in Cercadillo and I thought we could take the morning talking to the people there about their future plans of the water problem. We set off in a mode of transportation not recommended by Peace Corps on the road that gets progressively worse as it nears Cercadillo.

Our morning was filled with introductions, a hike to the source of the aqueduct, and some uncomfortable talk about the fruit tree project. It was only uncomfortable for me because my friend mentioned an extension to their aqueduct and food compensation for their labor, two expensive ideas that wouldn’t be possible in the scope of Peace Corps projects. It turns out their aqueduct needs a tube replacement to effectively pump water to the tank. The tank also needs to be cleaned out as it has been sitting with a foot of water in the bottom for a time period no one seems to know. I don’t know how much it is going to cost but I know an engineer should visit to confirm that this as the easiest and most effective solution.

What brought me to my tear-fest when I got home was not the situation of their aqueduct. I watched a seven-year-old girl carry a five gallon bucket on her head up a steep hike and then over a fence that was hard for me to climb with nothing in my hands. Getting water at the river is hard but not as hard as the other factors of poverty that challenge the people of Cercadillo. It was the naked kids with protruding stomachs due to parasites, the people who look so hungry and thank us for visiting while apologizing relentlessly for not having even a little coffee to give us. It was all the kids who are not going to school because their school is undergoing what looks like a dreadfully slow process of reconstruction and the thought of not being able to pay people with food. It was the feeling that I am never going to be in their situation nor will I be able to change it.

When I got home, I drank the two bottles of water I had in my backpack that I could never have taken out in Cercadillo. I then broke down in tears and consequently started gagging a little (don’t drink two bottles of water really fast and then have a fit). It is moments like these that make me realize I just may be too much of a baby to be doing this. Then I realized, like almost everything, it is so not about me. There are billions of people who live in conditions like this and those far worse. There are others who live in a porcelain world that never allows the thought of poverty to enter. In my opinion, the global distribution of wealth is ugly to the point of being grotesque. I have some unjustified hope that if enough people care, it will improve. If there are a few Greg Mortenson and Paul Farmer types to do the dirty work and enough rich people and governments to donate their dimes, maybe the world could have water, healthcare and education. Maybe people won’t be driven to cut down their forest causing a nearly irreversible feedback loop of erosion and soil degradation and further poverty. I know this hope is out there, but it’s what I choose to believe.

I shouldn’t look at my ridiculous crying face and question my decision to be here. That’s just silly because I already made the decision. Now, I just have to keep it together a little and take it one day at a time. I’m sure that’s what they do in Cercadillo.