(8/1999)
I have just returned from Brazil and it was one of those trips that leaves one exhausted, and yet full of an exhilarated energy. The girls are well. Renata (the little nine year old) used to be terrified of me and in general very shy and withdrawn. Now she is jumping all over the place, talking a mile a minute and full of energy and life. She was also reading to me happily–even putting voice inflection in her reading as she went. And to think that less than a year ago she was totally illiterate.

(1/2000)
So, first of all, the biggest news–for those of you who haven’t heard already through the grapevine–all the girls passed!! We–and most of all they–have succeeded through their first year, and second year for Juliana! This means that Renata will enter the third grade and Juliana and Barbara will go to the sixth. Rita was laughing with excitement when she called me from Brazil...

I would like to publicly remember that we have lost two girls during the length of the program, one of them earlier this year. In both cases, the girls themselves did not want to leave the program, rather it was their parents who undermined their ability to attend school and the tutoring. Last April, as Jamile prepared to leave with her mother to a distant, particularly violent neighborhood where her mother was moving herself and the children to be near her nineteen-year old drug-selling boyfriend, she stood tall, controlling the tears that stood at the edges of her eyes and said to me, I realize I am losing my future. There was nothing Rita or I could say or do. Then, as she left, Jamile turned, holding up her well-thumbed workbook. May I keep this? she asked.

(5/2000)
We now have eight girls in the program including two new young ones… Barbara (Chris), Renata and Juliana are all doing great. Barbara and Juliana are going through some general teenager problems, but are continuing to work hard at their studies. Ana, Renata’s mother, lost her job as a maid when the family she was working for moved to Sao Paulo. She, Renata and Renata’s brother were on the street for a bit, but she has now found another job and they are staying in the one-room shack of a friend and her son. Ana now works six days a week from seven in the morning to seven at night for about $40.00 a month. This means the children are alone much of the time and Renata often comes to school crying from hunger. We are still giving about $30.00 a month to Ana and periodically feeding Renata when she comes to school. This is one reason the grant we have just received is so important: we have become increasingly aware that we must work with the families of the girls, to help them improve their situation in order for the girls to have a chance to study and concentrate. Amazingly enough, despite all the difficulties, Renata is maintaining passing grades and almost never misses either the tutoring or school.

Barbara is going through a hard time right now. The family’s three room house is now shared by her father, her fathers girlfriend, two brothers, an aunt and a grandmother. She is having difficulties communicating with her father (not unusual for a teenager), and she has some health problems. Her mother (who lives away from the family ) will not take her to the doctor, probably because she would have to take a day off to wait in the enormous lines for the free medical clinics for the poor. Rita is taking care of this problem at this time. Barbara burst into tears when she was telling me about her fears and her worries; on top of everything else (and not surprisingly) her Portuguese marks are not high (she has always had a hard time with Portuguese, in math, however, she is very good) and she is terrified that because of this she will be kicked out of the program. I just held her for some time, letting her cry and trying not to cry myself, realizing that beyond the schooling, Bahia Street has become the central stable focus of Barbara’s life.

(12/2000)
Well, it is that time again–the holiday season. This means that it is also the end of the year for students in Brazil. The girls have taken their exams and one could hardly be prouder of the results. Barbara, Daza and Luedji passed everything first try. This is the first time so many of the girls have passed everything on their first taking of the exams and represents a wonderful achievement on their parts. They will now go to the equivalent of the eighth grade. Juliana, who has always been very studious, passed everything except math, a subject in which she has always had difficulty… I have only one disturbing report to make on the exam results. Renata failed everything. Everyone in Salvador involved with Bahia Street has come to love Renata; she came to the program completely illiterate, but once she started, she quickly learned to read, do math and developed a wonderful ability at art. She changed from a withdrawn, timid child to an out-going, funny, warm, young girl. She has been coming to her tutor the last few weeks, often crying, and asking for advice and comforting hugs–and not studying. Rita and the tutor, after long talks with her, have finally discovered what is the problem. It directly relates to her family and is very disturbing–so much so that I prefer, to protect Renata’s privacy, not to describe it here in a semi-public letter. Rita feels that because people in the favela where Renata lives know me better than her, that I am better equipped to try to resolve this problem. So, when I go to Brazil in January, I shall be staying in this favela with people I know, talking to people and asking advice on what is best to be done. I have already talked with some of her neighbors and they are currently looking out for her. Renata is looking to us for support right now and no one wants to fail her.

(2/2001)
Geldon, our math teacher who started last year, was teaching a summer preparatory math class for ten older girls. We have decided to hire two male teachers this year, not only because they have excellent qualifications, but because it seems important that the girls have male role models as well as female ones. The girls all seem to have crushes on Geldon and are competing with each other for the best homework to present to him–a situation that can only improve their math skills. Geldon is also very good at engaging them, and as Rita and I worked in the front administration room, we could hear them laughing and shouting out their responses to his questions. A sense of happiness pervaded the place. Everyone, from the girls to Rita to Iolanda, our part-time secretary, was full of the sun, laughter and excitement.

So, with the Bahia Street Center, we are enrolling TWENTY girls this year...

The situation for the one girl who failed last year is heart-numbing. We discovered that last year her mother essentially abandoned her, leaving her with various people and often with the mothers’ boyfriend. It would appear that sometime in the last six months the boyfriend started raping the girl. She did not tell anyone, but withdrew more and more into herself. Recently, she did tell Iolanda (who is a very warm person and in whom the girls often confide) that this boyfriend had beaten her. Iolanda confronted the mother and the mother then beat the girl for telling.

So, what we have done is to convince the mother to place the girl with a nearby caregiver whom we already know. We have talked with the caregiver and several of the neighbors, whom Rita and I also know, about the situation. They will now keep an eye out on the girls’ behalf. We have also told the mother that if we hear that the girl has been removed from the caregivers care, we will report her to the authorities as abusing her child. Such a threat is terrifying to most residents of these impoverished neighborhoods, so we hope it has some effect.

Because this girl didn’t pass her exams, she cannot return to the private school but we have placed her in a public school which has afternoon classes that follow our tutoring sessions. Thus, she will go to the tutoring each morning, then be taken by Bahia Street volunteers to her public school so we know she gets there.

This girl came on the day of registration for the coming year and Rita and I talked with her, cuddling her a bit as well, which she let us do. We told her that we were doing everything we could to protect her, to continue to give her a chance to study and to give her a space where people really cared for her. We asked her if she understood. She nodded, took each of our hands, then ran from the room crying.

(5/2001)
The girls are coming to school hungry. We have been feeding them snacks of fruit, but this is not enough. In order for them to study, they need to have at least one decent meal a day, something they are not getting at home.

Rita has set up a wonderful way in which we can feed the girls for minimal cost and help another local non-profit as well. A few doors down the street from the Bahia Street Center, a woman has started a project to feed children who sell on the streets… Rita has agreed to pay this woman one real a day (about 45 cents) per girl in the Bahia Street program if she will include them in her lunch program...

The other project that we need to start immediately is the Total Health Project. In the shantytowns where the girls of Bahia Street live, open sewers run through the middle of the streets. Rats and cockroaches roam freely both in and outside the poorly constructed shacks. Tuberculosis, AIDS, malnutrition, drugs, alcohol and gang and police violence are endemic–in Salvador’s impoverished neighborhoods last year, about 200 young people (mostly young men) per neighborhood were shot and killed. Women and girls must cope with brothers, fathers and friends being killed and live with the constant threat of physical and sexual violence against themselves. Among the girls currently enrolled in Bahia Street, one almost died from an illegal abortion administered when she was twelve years old. Two of the girls, who were ten and eleven at the time, were raped by their mother’s boyfriends. Recently one of the girls has complained to her Bahia Street teacher of sexual advances made by her older brother.

(7/2001)
The situation in Salvador has been very turbulent in the last weeks. According to Rita, the police had not been given pay raises in the last seven years and could no longer survive on their salaries. They tried to negotiate with the local government but got nowhere, so they decided to strike. The ensuing chaos led to pitched gun battles in the streets, massive lootings, 78 deaths and, no surprise, all schools being closed. The Bahia Street Center also closed. Most people avoided the streets and stayed at home.

The crisis has now been settled and the police have returned to work. The Bahia Street Center opened a few days ago and all the girls, Rita and staff are shaken, but fine.

(10/2001)
[Camila] is eleven, one of the brightest of our younger girls, studies very hard and has a joyful spark that makes the other girls want to have her as their friend. She and her three siblings live with her father and grandmother. When their mother died, her father took on the responsibility of all four children. Her grandmother has been a constant volunteer for Bahia Street, walking the children to and from school and continually concerned for their safety and well-being.

Last month, Camila’s father was assassinated. Two hired killers shot him as he came home one night. He was not involved in any gang activity or drugs and, as yet, Rita has been unable to determine why he was killed.

Camila stayed home for a week, but then she returned to the Bahia Street Center, accompanied by her grandmother who has been spending considerable time there since the death. She is helping around the Center and everyone there is trying to give her as much support as possible. The worry, beyond Camilas grief and helping her deal with the violence of her father’s death, is that the family now has no financial support. Rita is helping Camilas grandmother in trying to find some kind of work. In the meantime, Bahia Street has given the family a loan to help them survive.

2/2002
I just returned from Bahia and it was possibly the most joyous visit I have made there in years. Everything at the Bahia Street Center is going so well; it is incredible to see what is actually happening there… This year, we will enroll THIRTY girls in the program! (cough cough–this terrifies me a bit).

I arrived at the end of the school year to be greeted with remarkable results from the girls. All the younger girls passed their end of year exams with grades of 8 or more (out of 10). This is a huge achievement, since nearly all were basically illiterate when they came to Bahia Street. This result reflects impressive hard work on the part of the girls, increased rigor in the selection process, the excellence and dedication of the teachers and the dedication of Rita herself. I think we can all be proud–this represents a huge success for all of us.

Those who passed with the high marks included Camila, the girl whose father was assassinated a few months ago. Camila’s grandmother says that Camila spent the first week sitting at home crying, not talking, but then she went back to the Center and there she seemed happy. Everyone made a particular effort to give her warmth and support and she said to Rita that she didn’t know how she would have stopped crying if it weren’t for the teachers and her friends at the Center. Everyone is impressed with her courage and determination.

The little girl who suffered such violence and trauma in her family also passed, remarkably, but she still has psychological problems and is violent toward the other girls. Her mother does not look after her and she moves from shack to shack or the street, surviving as she can. She eats at the Center, takes showers there and continues to come. We are clearly the only security in her life. We have no legal right to offer her any more than we are doing already. She also has a younger brother whom we have not been able to locate and now the mother is pregnant again. I spoke with neighbors who are trying to help. How this girl passed with the grades she did is a mystery, but it reflects a determination deep inside her. We can only hold her close to our hearts, watch carefully and hope.

5/2002
Many of you will remember Renata, the girl who was abandoned by her mother, abused and failed her year at school. She developed severe psychological problems and began bullying the other girls and refused to study. She did keep coming to the Center, however, and we continued to keep her in the program (despite our regulation that all girls must pass to remain). We all felt heartsick–Renata came to Bahia Street a withdrawn, illiterate, eight-year-old and within six months she had transformed into an exuberant child who showed off her new-found reading skills to anyone who would listen. She entered directly into the second grade. But then, she often became sleepy with hunger (we suspect that the Bahia Street lunch was her only food), always dirty (she took showers at the Center), angry and depressed.

This last year, with our Total Health Project, we have been able to hire a visiting nurse, a part-time counselor for the girls and we have also hired Phil, our new Director of Curriculum. Phil is also our Arts teacher and he is trained in Arts Therapy. All of these people, with Rita, worked with Renata all year. And–she passed last year with high grades and she is now top of her class!! Thank you, thank you all of you. This is so wonderful. Everyone loves Renata–she has such a bright, yet fragile spark–and we really did not know if she would make it. She still has psychological problems, still has frequent bouts of anger, still has extended periods of isolation where she sits in a corner and sings to herself, but she is finding a refuge in her studies and she keeps coming to the Center everyday.

Camila, the girl whose father was assassinated, has also been going through hard times; she is hyperactive in class and continually wants attention. That she saw her father’s brutal killing haunts her. The staff are working closely with her and her grandmother comes in often as a volunteer to give support. Geldon, the math teacher and Phil are particularly giving her attention, as she seems to want male attention. Gradually, she is calming down and she is studying. She has discovered a fascination with science and loves to do experiments. Again, the extra staff from the Total Health Project are being a huge help here.

3/2005
Juliana was the first girl to enter the Bahia Street program. We had almost no money at the time and little infrastructure. Everyone said our aims were idealistic and unlikely to succeed. Juliana, however, wanted to try. She told everyone in her neighborhood, and us of Bahia Street, that she wanted to be a doctor. Her neighbors laughed at her.

That was eight years ago. This year Juliana took the Brazilian university exam and, on her fist try, she passed. A remarkable achievement. She has now been accepted to university. As if this were not enough on its own, the university chose her for one of the five scholarships it awarded this year.

When Rita told me this news, she was crying. Even as I write, I also feel tears pushing at the back of my eyes. No one is laughing at Juliana now.

grandes abraços,
Margaret

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