Leaving home

Maria was born and raised in a township low on economical resources. She grew up in a family with several problems and it was her grandmother who took responsibility for her and raised her. The risk of leaving home is bigger in the poorer townships and especially in families with internal problems, and at the age of seven Maria started leaving home. At first she only went for some short trips but later she left for longer and longer periods of time. - I started taking the bus alone when I was seven. At that time I couldn’t read so I didn’t know where the bus was going. I often went with a friend. She was nine and knew where to go.

Although life has been difficult for Alix Maria, she still knows how to smile. 

Turns of hunger

When Maria was 14 she got pregnant and today Maria is a mother of a two years old boy. He lives in the township with Marias mother. Maria sometimes visits him, but because of problems at home she doesn’t like to stay for long. Maria herself lives with an elderly woman she calls ”grandmother” in the centre of Santa Marta. -My abuelita (grandmother) is very nice to me. I sleep in her house, she gives me food, and I help her sell cigarettes and sweets in the street. I trust her. A mayor part of Maria’s life she has spent on the street. When I ask her what she does during the day she says: -I walk all over town. I am like a hen, one minute you see me here the next there. I know the streets and I make turns of hunger.

Life on the streets in Colombia is hard and it normally includes drugs. All the street children who come to the activities with PANICA and the foundation have been in contact with drugs, and most of them are drug addicts. - When I was 11 I started consuming drugs, Maria says. But now I don’t do that anymore. I have realised that I have to do things for my own sake.

-In here we are clean

Every Wednesday PANICA in cooperation with Coracones Felizes, has activities with the street children in the foundation. Here they shower, brush their teeth, eat breakfast and lunch, play and have workshops about different topics like self-esteem, AIDS, how to respect each other etc. There have been changes in Maria’s life after she started to come to the foundation and PANICA. -I like coming here. It’s a nice environment and the people here are treating us nicely. Being here is like a workshop.  We learn a lot here, for example how to shower and clean ourselves, brush our teeth and use soap. In here we are clean. Not exactly perfumed, but clean, she says while giving me one of her many beautiful smiles. 
 

- We learn a lot here, for example how to shower and clean ourselves, brush our teeth and use soap, Alix Maria says.