Saturation in the Slums

The white van pulls up to the market and kids scatter. It’s past 10pm, the city’s curfew for kids, and they know the van is there to pick up all the children in the market, mostly selling rice or some crazy coconut concoction, unaccompanied by adults. This is called saturation. We (plus a few cops for protection) go all over the city (dark alleys that house cheap and dirty karaoke bars, stale smoky strip clubs, etc.) and find all the kids and bring them back to the Holding Boys Center (HBC) for the night.

The next morning the kids are bathed since many of them haven’t seen a bath in months, their long scraggily hair is cut and lice picked out, and their parents are contacted to pick them up, if they want to. Almost all the kids I am with every day were picked up the same way. Eleonor was living in the jeepney terminal begging for food and Jeny and Joseph were found in the market scavenging any meat from any bones they could find.

The first night of saturation may have been one of the most difficult experiences of this trip. The trembles of fear and tears in the ten children’s eyes were not only for getting caught, but the bruises on some of their bony bodies tells me the consequences when they did reunite with their parents might be worse. Also, to see the slums of Ormoc is something I’ll never forget. There were people sleeping in every nook and cranny with the rats and cockroaches streaming out of the sewers with the smell of urine everywhere. I am sure walking through the slums of any city would be comparable, but something I have never done nor think I ever will. One city is enough.

Even harder was going back to the HBC for my first time while the kids were sleeping. It was then that I saw Jay (the little guy who offered to share what little candy he had with me) curled up on a cardboard box on the floor in the same outfit he was wearing the last two days. The next day is when I ordered mattresses, but it still breaks my heart thinking about it.

Even though there are enough kids on the streets to do saturation every night, thankfully we only go two times a week because I am not sure I could handle much more.