Romario, age 11, Lives Alone

Q’ero Families Sacrifice for Children to Attend Heart Walk Schools  

by Melynda Thorpe Burt

Sept. 27, on location at Peru
Photos by Melynda Thorpe Burt and Rain Sundberg

He is 11 years old and happy, though lonely at times, cold, and often hungry.
 

He misses his father and brother most, and wishes they could live here with him.

But Romario understands that “this is necessary” and that he is blessed for the opportunity to study at the Heart Walk School and to receive an education.


After we work at the Heart Walk School today, Romario takes us to see where he lives. He leads us to a crude adobe brick shack the size of a single car garage, with windows, like many in the neighborhood, encased with colorful, broken glass and some covered by blue tarps. On the front side of the building, Romario’s father has smoothed the surface with stucco and installed four facade entrances to give the appearance of several tenants to help distract from thieves. 

Romario walks us to the door and welcomes us to “mi casa.” One at a time we enter. He first shows me his “possessions” which include a pile of colored glass panes, a small pouch and a masonry trowel. On the wall he has a bike wheel, no tire, just the metal wheel with spokes. He points to his broken bicycle on the other side of the room and says he is collecting parts to fix his bike someday.

In the middle of the room is a ladder handmade from tree branches leading to a loft about five feet above the floor. This, he tells me pointing up the ladder is where he sleeps. 

On the dirt floor are a few pans and a makeshift gas stove for cooking. He calls this his “kitchen” and says he cooks rice and noodles here. He says he does not like to cook, and he is not very good at it, but it is necessary because he is alone. 

There is also a wheelbarrow in Romario’s one-room adobe shanty. There are piles of old boards, and a string with hanging, drying clothes. He has three shirts and two pairs of pants that his older brother passed down to him, and a school uniform. Romario says he washes his clothes in the stream that runs alongside his home, and sometimes he misses school if his clothes are too dirty for lack of soap. 

He is ashamed to wear dirty clothes to school. So when Romario does not show up, School Director Bertha knows to deliver soap to Romario. 

Inside, Romario tells me he is the only boy at his school that lives alone. He does not like sleeping here at night. He says it is cold, and sometimes he feels lonely and afraid, “but it is necessary,” he repeats. His family lives in the Q’ero villages in the high mountains, and they are making great sacrifices for him to live here in Hueccouno to receive an education. Bertha tells us that he was chosen by his parents among his siblings because they feel he is the brightest of their children and they want him to succeed.


Romario says his father comes to visit once a month and they work in the fields with the wheelbarrow together. He smiles and says he likes when his father comes to stay and wishes he could live here with him. “It is not very good to live alone,” he says. But he does not complain. He seems proud to be able to attend school and he loves to learn history. When I ask what he likes to read, he says “mathematics.”

From the loft, Romario beckons me to climb to meet him. The loft’s floorboards are rough planks, thin and cracked, barely sturdy enough to hold his 11-year-old weight. I stay on the ladder and we begin to visit about what it is like to sleep up here. He shows me his carefully folded mattress and blankets – this is how he makes his bed – and how he has a few extra blankets hanging above him in the rafters for cold nights. Then he points to the bookshelf he has rigged just over the head of his cot. When it is dark, he lights a candle and reads. He says reading helps his brain grow tired, then he can fall fast asleep without thinking about being cold or lonely or afraid. But he does not pause with concern for himself. This is just how it is. And he says again, “It is necessary.”

Like the rest of his home, Romario seems proud of the way he has arranged his room. I see his excitement as he stands on his cot to reach his books. I ask him what he likes to read at bedtime and he pulls four from the shelf, then goes back for one more. He chooses from about 10, then sits on his cot and starts to show me his favorite bedtime stories. He turns to a favorite page and holds the book up to show me. It is a mathematics textbook. His favorite page has color and pictures and story problems. Vidal helps me understand that, yes, this is his favorite book to read at bedtime. He wants to be good at math and he says it helps his mind work hard so he can get tired and fall asleep fast.

I can tell Romario looks forward to school and I realize what a gift the Heart Walk School is to him and to all the children who attend. They are making true sacrifices to learn and they love to study. At the school, they can rely on two meals each day, and teachers who care about them and encourage their dreams of moving beyond the limitations of their history and circumstances.

Like Romario, all of the children I talk with have hopes of succeeding in their education; gaining professional employment and returning to financially help their families.

Climbing down from the loft, Romario thanks me for visiting his home and then says he is going to play with his friends. His daily routine includes going to school, doing homework, playing, washing his clothes and cooking an evening meal. He tells me this is what he does. Then he locks the door to his home and begins running down the road to throw rocks with his friends. As I watch him run away, he stops, turns back toward me, smiles at me, and then waves goodbye.

I think of his family living in the mountains that rise above us, and the sacrifices they are making for Romario to be here, at Hueccouno, studying at the school built by Heart Walk Foundation. Before HWF began helping the Q’ero people in 2003, the children had never held a pencil, nor read a book. Now, Romario and his schoolmates have very real dreams and goals of attending universities and helping improve the living conditions of their families who chose to remain here in their beloved Andes Mountain home.

MELYNDA THORPE BURT  has worked as a traveling writer covering subjects across the country. For her story "Unmasking the Unabomber," Burt was the recipient of the prestigious National Paragon Award for Best Feature Article.  More stories by Burt from the September 2012 service expedition to Peru can be read at:

blogs.thespectrum.com/heartoftheandes/

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