Little Heroes

By Raimund J. Wild

"Little Heroes" tells the stories of six street kids in the barrio of Nigua in the Dominican Republic. Their stories were written in September 2002, after I had the privilege of living among them and their families over two months. Because of some personal setbacks, the final chapter was not completed until August 2007.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Guenter Heyes
• Release date: May 19, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311255945

Raimund J. Wild

R. J. is the founder of Project Nigua International. The same is a non-profit attempts to implement true self-sustainability projects for the underprivileged young people in the developing world. He it the author of the documentary book:"Little Heroes"

Book preview

Little Heroes

By Raimund J. Wild.

Editor: Tim Graf

Cover Photo: Javier Ernesto Montas Montero

ISBN # 978-0-9685674-1-8

Copyright ©2007, Project Nigua International

Copyright ©2015 Shmashwords edition

Also available in print via: http://tinyeden.org/shop.html

Dedicated to the Children of Nigua. And all those in similar circumstances

Foreword

This book is dedicated to true-life heroes. I’m not talking about big, strong men who live adventures, but rather simple, loving children who each day face many kinds of challenges to their survival in the developing nations of this planet. Here you will read of their dreams and aspirations, their dashed hopes and their resolve to never give up. These are their stories of abuse, survival, and smiles.

I have been privileged to meet some of these unsung but nevertheless real heroes. Their world is the Barrio of Nigua, a town west of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, and their names are unknown to anyone but the people they are involved with. I went there on business three years ago, and the town has captivated me ever since. I have been honoured to be invited into their homes, which are situated in midst of abject poverty. I have been permitted to witness the constant uncertainty of their lives and have been allowed into their small world of optimism and the dreams they keep dreaming in spite of their desperate situation. I was humbled by the trust and love they gave me, unconditionally, as only children can do.

Most of us know from exposure to historical documentaries and the stories our grandparents told us that our own countries weren’t much better way back when. Today, however, we are accustomed to the amenities of our civilized, information-driven societies and economies. For most of us, choosing to rough it on a camping, hunting, or fishing trip is as close as we’ll ever get to hardship. The world these children live in is completely alien to us. I hope that this book will help open the reader’s eyes to the challenges that children in the developing world face on a daily basis.

What makes this book unique is that it was inspired by a single boy who entered my life unexpectedly three years ago. If he had not suddenly appeared in my life, I would not have given a second thought to any of these kids; just as I’d never given a second thought to others like them in other times and places. I’ve been to many Third World and developing nations in my countless overseas assignments as a mechanical technician and engineer, and I used to believe that in the end, a slum was a slum no matter where it was. Poor was poor, no matter if in Rio, Bangkok, Mexico City, or Santo Domingo. I used to pity them. I would be relatively generous with tipping and the occasional handout, but I never did more than that. I would only complain about the inefficiencies in the distribution of development aid, the corruption, and the lack of proper education. I blamed big politics, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the USA and its business interests for all of this. Like many others, I focused on these giants and felt powerless. How could a few dollars possibly help? I thought I could only silently wish that the world would eventually wake up and realize the grave disparities between rich and poor. I saw no hope then, but three years ago, I was the one who was awakened - by a 10-year-old boy. He was just a boy shining shoes like millions of his kind do all over the world, and I happened to be one of his clients, a white Gringo having his rum at a roadside cantina like thousands of other men. This boy became my teacher.

In his Barrio he is called the beautiful child. This doesn’t necessarily refer to his physical appearance, but rather to the incredible acts of compassion he has demonstrated among his own kind. After my decades of frustration, this boy showed me what was really needed in the Barrios of the world. Over the last three years, I have spent 2-4 weeks at a time in Nigua and have just returned from a stay of over two months living among these children and their families. My eyes have been opened to an understanding of their plight that I could never have learned in the best universities.

I am awed and humbled because I have learned more from them than they learned from me.

The last two months in Nigua surely demonstrated to me that truth is indeed stranger than fiction. In this book I will tell the true stories of six boys. I couldn’t have made these stories up if I’d wanted to. Some of them border on the incredible; some are almost ESP cases, and some of the things I witnessed were hauntingly familiar. I wrote a fictional book called Tiny Eden a year before I ever visited Nigua, but some of the events I will write about here happened almost point-for-point right out of that book as though it was a script for the experiences I would have.

The characters in Tiny Eden have sometimes been criticized as being too perfect, too black and white in their behaviours and personalities, and too starkly portrayed as good or evil. However, within five days of arriving in Santo Domingo, I met the first character from my book. In his simplicity and noble comportment he is the absolute embodiment of the main character. His name is different, but he is Ardos, the native boy in Tiny Eden. Against all odds and in spite of the common beliefs in his society, he insists on compassion, forgiveness, and love. Everyone who has met him has come away from their meeting with the same expressions of awe: He is special! He is a prince!

I know that there are places in this world where the poverty is worse, where children endure shooting wars, where they lose their limbs or lives to land mines, and where slavery still exists. It isn’t the amount of abuse or hardship that’s important, though; it’s the courage to win that matters. In no other country, city, or neighbourhood have I encountered the level of courage and determination that I saw in Nigua.

The boys of Nigua speak in these pages on behalf of all children in the world who are suffering and hurting. Someone has to speak up, and who is better suited than those who are forced to live this daily struggle for survival? In this book I give them their voice and let them tell their stories.

On behalf of all those who suffer in similar or worse circumstances, I can only hope that the rest of us finally learn.

1. - The Little Prince

I am happily married and have two lovely children of my own, who have turned out quite well despite the daily stress, demands, and confusion of a western consumer society. My son is known to be a compassionate and caring peacemaker both in the schoolyard and on the streets. My daughter is a Type-I diabetic, but she handles her illness with a cheerful dignity not often found among some adults who have it, and even more rarely among her diabetic peers. I love my wife and children dearly, so how could this outsider have taken such a hold in my life? When I met him in November of 1999, I had no idea that he would change my life completely, but change it he did. I would not be in a position to write these stories were it not for him, because he introduced me to each of these little heroes one by one.

I returned from Nigua in July of 2002 after having been permitted, or rather required, to help him celebrate his 13th birthday two months before. His real name is Javier Ernesto, but outside of legal, administrative, or business dealings, Dominicanos are rarely called by the names on their birth certificates. They are known only by their nicknames, and his is Fabiano. In the local customs and folklore, this name loosely translates as beautiful soul or beautiful heart and is given to people whose com-passion and gentleness are obvious to everyone. His parents told me that he was given this name when he was only three years old. He was walking with them one evening when he heard a child across the street crying for some reason, and he let go of his parents and crossed the road to comfort the child. From that day on, he was known to everyone as Fabiano. When we’re out and about, I call him Fabiano or Fabs, but in private, I call him my little prince to let him know how much he means to me.

He was ten years old when we met. I was in Santo Domingo to scout out some business opportunities for a company in Montreal. I have a friend who owns some businesses in Santo Domingo, and I stayed with him for that first trip. Due to the educational standards in the Dominican Republic, anyone who owns a business had better be present day in and day out to make sure the workers do exactly as they are told, so my friend worked at least twelve hours every day. My activities, on the other hand, consisted of investigating business issues and opportunities, inquiring about laws, prices, equipment, and so forth, and my appointments hardly took up four or five hours on any given day. Since Montreal had long since begun its descent into the deep freeze when I left, I decided that instead of sitting around waiting for my friend to finish his work at the office, I would take advantage of being in a tropical environment.

I selected a strategically located roadside cantina where I could wind down from my day, sample the rum and beer, and soak up the sunshine along with the local culture while waiting for my friend to pick me up on his way home. In a land where pale skin owns businesses and dark skin works them, a Gringo sitting calmly in a cantina among the locals and not appearing to be too nervous about it will draw some attention. The first ones to notice me were the shoeshine boys; instead of being hustled by one or two, I got swarmed by about 20 of them all at once.

I’m not used to being served, and it makes me feel rather awkward when it happens. Even in a restaurant, I usually stack my empty dishes in a neat pile when I have finished my meal in order to make it easier on the wait staff. Because it makes me feel uncomfortable to be waited on, the idea that some kid was going to kneel in front of me to shine my shoes was naturally out of the question. I chased the boys away, but after the crowd was gone, I saw another young boy approaching.

He remained at a safe distance of perhaps ten meters but walked directly across my line of sight. He was carrying his shoeshine box just as the others were, but having seen me disperse the other boys - who were now hustling for clients at the other stores, bus stops, and cantinas - he just passed by and threw me a brief glance.

Less than a minute later he walked by again in opposite direction, but this time he was a bit closer, at perhaps nine meters distance, and his glance lasted a few seconds longer. Shortly after this he ventured past me again even closer, maybe only eight meters away, and our eyes met. At seven meters, his dark eyes looked squarely at me. His expression was very serious; he lacked the smile that adorned the other boys’ faces. He also appeared to be a bit of an outcast or perhaps a newcomer to the business. I had observed three boys actually getting physical in their competition to clean a client's shoes at another cantina nearby, and I didn’t think this boy seemed quite strong enough yet to hold his own among the others. On the six-meter pass, he stared at me again and then looked at my shoes, and I began to realise that he wasn’t going to give up. He was determined!

He passed back and forth until he finally walked by me at barely a meter length away. He still didn’t stop and offer his services even at that range but continued to walk slowly and deliberately. I fought with myself in my mind over whether giving him my business was encouraging child labour, but I finally comforted myself with the thought that these boys were likely doing this only for spending money. He passed me a few more times at a constant one-meter distance until at last, after about the fifth time, he finally stopped and looked me square in the eyes. He