In this newsletter I want to tell you a true story that Milton Osorio has experienced.
Milton had been with us since November 2007 together with his sisters Reyna, Mabel and Jennifer. We don’t know anything about his family and the siblings have never been visited by family members in recent years.
Towards the end of last year, Milton went through a difficult phase. He thought he was invincible and better than anyone else, he didn’t help with anything and his social behaviour was disastrous. He didn’t do anything at school, didn’t obey his teacher and in the children’s home he experienced daily quarrels with the educators. This led him to the decision to take charge of his own life and leave the children’s home „yo quiero ser...“
This is how the 15-year-old told his story:” I didn’t know where to go… I kept walking through the city for hours without having a place to go. It was very late already and I still didn’t have a place to sleep. I kept walking but didn’t get far and continuously returned to the same spot… I had no other choice but to sleep on the street. I hid away in a corner and was terrified, so I didn’t sleep much that night. I felt so small and alone and I had to think about my sisters and the other children of the children’s home… I was glad when the night was over and I was woken up by the first sunrays in the morning.
The next day, I walked around in the city without knowing where to go but with the hope to find my mother. Unfortunately, I never found her… Suddenly I saw an old friend, Guillermo. He offered that I could help him with his work, which was standing at the traffic lights and cleaning car windows. This provided him with enough money to live. As I felt entirely lost, I accepted his offer. While Guillermo cleaned the windows, I looked after his little backpack and the money in it; Guillermo had been robbed several times. In the mornings, we ate a piece of bread, at lunchtime, we drank soft drinks and in the evenings, we ate two Baleadas before hiding away in a corner to sleep. We bathed with the help of a water tap at a gas station and also washed our clothes there. This area is controlled by the M18; they accepted us and we were allowed to sleep there. They said that they had been like us once…
At one time, a killer offered us to go to work with him but we were scared and ran away. The guys on the street have a very special and peculiar character… They don’t care about anything and most of them sniff glue, the cheapest drug for all of them. I was offered glue several times and they promised that everything can be forgotten in a drugged state of mind! Once I witnessed that a few guys dragged a boy into a car and he’s been gone since then. I guess they’ve eliminated him long ago. Some of my friends were addicted to gambling, others paid for girls… In such situations I thought back to the children’s home and I remembered all the lectures that we were given back then. This gave me the strength to say no!
One day my pride vanished. I gathered all my strength and prayed to God to help me visit the children’s home and ask Edwing for a second chance. When I arrived at the gate, the children came running and all I could do was cry. I wanted to be strong and not show my emotions, but I couldn’t help it. I was very happy to be back home.
I realized late, but still on time, how lucky we are to be here in the children’s home „yo quiero ser...“. Life on the street is hard, dangerous and, above all, hopeless! In the children’s home we are given everything for free and we can go to school, which leads us towards a better future… My dear friends of the children’s home, I hope that you don’t have to go the same way to realize this, as it wasn’t a nice experience.”