Rage against the machine

10/19/06

We went to Trindade to see Zelda today, and brought a few of the girls from the Center, in our attempt to show some sense of solidarity. I’m not a psychiatrist; I know only the basics of abnormal psychology and psychopharmacology. But seeing Zelda brought so many doubts and questions into my head about the use of medication for mental illnesses, questions that were already there before. Sometimes they can be very useful, even imperative for the safety of the individual and those around him/her, and sometimes it is effective in reducing a great deal of anguish and mental pain. Yet at the same time it so often changes the person, makes them lose a part of themselves, so that the person you now see isn’t who you would recognize before. Seeing Zelda was like seeing someone transferring back and forth between two different worlds, one we were in and one we couldn’t see or understand. She was very subdued, obviously on some type of sedative, and her cognitive abilities were severely decreased. I don’t know what meds they have her on, but I was starting to doubt their effectiveness, as instead of eliminating her need to cry, pace, and moan about wanting to die, the meds just made her do the same things with 10% of the energy, as though she was in the same amount of anguish but less able to express it, expressing it in a dreamlike state where her moves were sluggish and her mental capacity much slower. She appeared often confused, slipping back and forth between moderate clarity and profoundly sad confusion. She cried that she wasn’t crazy but yet they had put her in a place where she’s surrounded by crazy people. She begged for the girls to stay, grabbing her hands and telling them she didn’t want to be there. At that point I wasn’t sure it was a great idea for them to be there, seeing the fear in their eyes; they had never seen someone behave like this and probably weren’t quite sure how they were supposed to respond, so they sat quietly, not a word, but trying to be supportive. I think on some level it helped: though she didn’t have the capacity to express it, I think she was glad to know people loved her and hadn’t forgotten about her here in the institution. And so eventually we left, promising to come back with more girls to visit from the Center the next time. I feel as though I’m on my toes a bit to see how her situation progresses, if being in the institution will make it worse and she’ll sink farther into herself, or if somehow eventually the medication will bring her back to us. I miss the old Zelda.

* * *

On a fairly different note, I felt the need today to express my distaste for being a girl. There are often days or moments when I feel this way, just as frequently as I remember that I love being female. But today was one of those days when I wanted to hide the blonde hair and blue eyes, or find some way to evade the blatant catcalling, whistling, and elevator eyes that look you over from top to bottom. The catcalls I can ignore, the “psssciuuuu” sound I can walk right past without looking as I’ve learned to do—which is unfortunate, considering if someone I actually know tries to get my attention, I’d probably end up inadvertently ignoring them. What gets more annoying is the few times you find yourself trapped with the guy who’s asking all about you—your name, where do you live (which I never say, except for “here in Assomada”), can I come see you, do you have a phone number—and then throws out his desperate attempt for more with the “you are so beautiful” and “you have beautiful eyes” and all the other blah blah blahs. Today I went to my favorite coffee spot and was dismayed to see that in place of the nice girls who normally work there were two young men, immediately stoked to see the blonde foreigner, and looking me up and down, pulled out their best moves. The “you have beautiful eyes” comment came out twice, and then the second young man asked me to take him to America with me. “I’ll fit in your suitcase!” Haha, cute, we can all have a nice giggle about the bring-me-to-America gag, but sometimes I want to kick the boys in the shins. I think it wouldn’t be so bad if some of these guys didn’t just ooze testosterone and overwhelming self-confidence. Like they’re just the shit and it’s a game to see who’s suave enough to land the white girl. Most of the time I don’t care, I can remain good-natured about it and cut it off when it gets to the point of absurdity (which usually takes about 12.3 seconds)—after all, what’s the point of spending all your time frustrated or defensive? You can’t let it get to you. But in the same breath, I’m hoping that my continual presence here will show them that I am here to work, not play (in the tourist sense of the word), so that eventually they will leave me alone. One might hope that after a year or two of me walking the same route, going to the same places, they might get sick of the catcalls and whistles. One might hope.

10/21/06

We took half of the girls from the Center on a little hike today to a place nearby, just on the outskirts of Assomada. I chose a small hike as kind of a “test run” to see what the girls could handle, figuring they would tire easy, especially considering the lack of exercise they’re accustomed to getting. Any excuse for them to get outside is a good thing. I think it went pretty well, all things considered. The group that went today ended up being all of the younger girls, which makes it crazier but in my opinion more funJ (they’re easier to entertain). We packed a snack, a ton of water, made sure the girls were ready with some kind of footwear (the best we could get was flipflops for most of them, which didn’t matter because they ended up taking them off halfway there anyway—barefoot’s the way to go in Cape Verde), and headed on our way. And it was just as you’d expect an excursion like this to go with a group of 6-11 year old girls; the youngest ones tired quickest and required a little extra help and encouragement, the older ones bounded off ahead, racing to see who got there first. We took a ton of pictures, which hopefully I’ll be able to include in the post—altogether more than 60 pictures were taken, as you can’t take a picture of one girl without the others screaming “me next!!” or “now me and the goat!” or “now me eating my yogurt!” or whatever random shot they can conjure. On the way back down, a small group of girls ran ahead while we were distracted with the younger ones and got so far ahead we didn’t know where they were. We finished the hike and went to look for them, freaking out that they had run away (which wouldn’t have been too unlikely), but found them waiting at the end of the main trailhead. Phew. Other than that minor scare, it was a good time. We didn’t have stop for the girls to rest at all, only stopping frequently for girls to veer off to the side, drop their pants and squat to take care of their business. So much easier than taking kids on excursions in the States. I had flashbacks of working at camp and going anywhere with the kids, constantly hearing “I have to go potty!” every five minutes, which meant arranging someone to walk with them to wherever the nearest restroom was. No one has to hold their hand here, they know what to do. And no “accidents” this way. I really did feel like I was back in camp again as a counselor, the same concept of group management, constant headcounts, dealing with the occasional whiners, etc. It was really fun, almost forgot I was in a different country for a minute, except for the language thing. And so it was a pretty good day, hopefully they all had fun too. I think they were just thankful for an excuse to get out and run around outside of the Center for an afternoon. Hopefully we can make this a regular thing.

10/23/06

If it’s not one thing, it’s another. Things don’t really ever settle down in the Center, and instead situations and conflicts just continue to build until you can cut the tension with a knife. Right now the tension between the mães and the older girls who just returned from suspension is the primary focus of all of our attention, as it’s worsening to the point that something needs to be done. The mães don’t trust the girls and treat them very poorly, and so the girls act out in response—of course—and the mães then don’t allow them to leave the Center to be with friends, run errands, go to mass, or just walk around town, which is the one thing the girls want to do. It’s this escalating cycle that no one seems willing to stop: each side steps up the aggression in response to the other and neither wants to be the one to back down. And what infuriates me is that the mães are acting more childlike than the 13-year-olds—who shouldn’t have to be the ones to act as the “bigger person”. Who’s the adult here? It would be easy for someone to come in and say “Well these are ‘bad’ girls, hopeless cases, they need to be disciplined”, etc. but it’s just not true. These girls are good girls who truly want badly to succeed, to be given a chance. They recognize that this is their last opportunity for a decent life, but want to be treated with respect and so when they don’t receive it, they respond as they’ve learned to: with fighting words. They learned very early on that human interaction is marked by aggression, violence, and disrespect, and so they come to the Center (which exists for the sole purpose of protecting them) where they are met with the same exact thing. It’s killing me to watch this all happen, like a play being acted out, not knowing which act will come next. No one’s really listening to the girls, to what they want, and so they feel cheated, unimportant, reinforcing that they are “bad seeds”. Treated like shit in the Center, stigmatized in the community, no proper family to go to. And the problem is that the mães don’t just act like this with these older girls, they are aggressive and fierce with the younger girls as well. They attack them, scream at them, yank them by the ear, drag them across the room, etc. For little unimportant reasons! I understand that the manner of discipline here in Cape Verde within families may be different, it may be existent within the culture that if a child is out of line, it is acceptable to use a minimal amount of force to correct the behavior. I am almost willing to accept that, but not here in the Center. Not at all, it’s just not acceptable. These girls come from the worst situations you can find, from environments full of conflict, abuse, aggression, negligence, and absolute lack of structure or guidance. And so the Center was created to protect these girls, to provide a safe place out of the home so that they can have the opportunity to get an education and to live in safety. For no other purpose but this. And instead they are met with aggression, blame, misunderstanding, disrespect, and apathy. Simply put, the mães that work here are only present because they need money and need some kind of job, and this happened to be available. That’s it. They don’t really care to be here, they often don’t even seem to like kids at all, and yet here they are working in a center for girls who need even more attention and care than the average youth, someone who understands their situation and is sympathetic and prepared to handle it, none of which these mães are. How does this work??

I have been spending a decent amount of time with the girls this week and last week, and have been developing a good relationship with them (particularly the older girls), built on trust and communication. And really all I did was let them talk while I sat and listened. I didn’t have an answer for the situation, felt pretty helpless actually, but I let them express their frustrations and believed them. That’s a big thing for them: no one believes what they say half the time, or it is normally just turned back on them. And so while I take everything they say with a grain of salt (they are young, not quite emotionally mature yet, and they have been known to say a mean word or two in frustration with the mães—they’re teens), I also see that their side needs to be heard. The new president of the Fundação (which funds the Center) and I talked with the older girls on Saturday after our hike with the younger girls, and they spilled all the frustrations they had been having, the things that had been going on in the Center when we’re not there. Then today they did the same with Ercília. The “tecnicas” (those of us with formal education and titles: myself, Ercília, Andreia, and Ivete) met in Andreia’s office and discussed the awful situation of what has been going on with the mães, how they’ve been neglectful, how they often respond in a childlike manner, all the things I mentioned above. We were all in agreement, and were very passionate about the fact that this could not continue in the Center, and if their behavior didn’t improve, we’d have to make an effort to have them released from their positions (which isn’t as easy as it is in the States: you can’t just say “you’re fired” and they leave then and there). I felt satisfied at least that the girls had a team of advocates, people who were trying to look out for them. So we decided to have a meeting as soon as possible with all the mães and the older girls to get things cleared, see if we could come to some sort of resolution. Not with the best results, I have to say, though I’m not sure what they were expecting to take place. It was basically just a shouting match, more or less, with a few brief moments of calm finger-pointing. The part that was hardest for me to sit through was watching two grown women screaming at the tops of their lungs at these young girls, practically jumping out of their chairs at them. I understand they're frustrated, it's not easy to deal with, but there's no excuse for acting like a child throwing a tantrum. I would expect it from 8 13-15 year old girls, but not from grown women. I expected the other adults present to be equally dismayed and perhaps to have said something regarding their behavior or need to treat the girls with more respect. But instead the meeting was spent for the most part telling the girls they needed to behave better, show the mães respect, and then spend some time thinking about what they are doing to make the mães so upset, write it down, and come up with a way to ask for forgiveness. It's such bullshit. They're not going to genuinely feel sorry for anything if no one gives them the respect of standing up for them. The mães never had to ask for forgiveness for treating the girls like shit. I'm frustrated, and I'm not sure how to deal with it. It's starting to look like nothing will be done with the mães, no attempt to discipline them or send them packing. Instead it will be the "wait and see" game to see if they calm down and magically change their disposition and feelings towards children. Maybe I'm just too pessimistic, maybe things will calm down and get better and they'll benefit from the workshops we are planning, but I still don't think it's right to completely ignore some of the abuses that are taking place. So I have to just take a deep breath and start thinking about how I can retain the respect of the mães who may remain there for awhile longer while still maintaining my role of youth advocate. That said, I need to quit journaling for now, it's getting me frustrated.