We walked through an elaborate graveyard to get there. At the front, there were the graves of the wealthy, elaborate concrete crosses heading up a cement box. Many of which were encased by prison bars to keep grave robbers out. Our contact said she wished she was kidding about the grave robbers. Except she sees them on a weekly basis, scavenging for anything of value, any piece of metal, any artifact that might prove profitable.
The graves got skimpier and less ornate, or rather, tackier in ornation, as we made it to the back of the cemetery. The dust kicked up a little, as did the stench. On the horizon my eyes met a massive landfill, littered with not just trash, but people swimming through it.
Welcome to Nicaragua. This is the Chinindega landfill.
People live here. A lot of people live here.
Well. They live right behind it.
They stay close so they can have good access to the trash. Or rather, the metal that the trash offers. Apparently, if one collects 100 pounds of metal in a bag, they can get money for it. Used to be that people could get 12 dollars for each bag. Since the global market crash in 2008, the price has dropped to somewhere around $2.50.
This area is known as the “Triangle of Death”. It is bordered by a landfill, a graveyard, a sewage plant, and surrounded by the murky El Limonal “river.”
Smack in the middle of such toxicity are the jalopied houses. Some made of old kiddie pool plastic and sticks, some with bricks. After Hurricane Mitch caused a massive mudslide in 1998, displacing thousands of people in the Chinidega area, the Nicaraguan government gave what was supposed to be temporary tent housing to people… right in this carcinogen epicenter.
This must have originally been a last resort. I mean, who moves into the heart of sewage and trash because they want to? They were displaced. Homeless. Desperate.
They had to set up shop somewhere, and this is where the government provided the quickest solution. So they moved in.
Except. It’s 2011 and they haven’t moved out. 13 years later.
This week we got to dig ditches on a water project with Amigos por Christo, an organization that has created a new housing community and business opportunities for these people to start a new life . We got hang out in this new community called Villa Catalina, about 10 miles from the dump, that has a school, a clinic, a playground, and houses with a big plots of land for gardening. Many have left the dump and embraced this hope and new life, but hundreds of other families choose to stay in the dump.
It’s what they know. What used to be just be tents and temporary shelters for people have turned into bricks and flower pots and height markings on door frames. Though given multiple opportunities to get out, some people prefer to live in the dump. It’s simple here. Or so they think. “If I don’t live next to the dump, how will I find metal…and if I can’t find metal, how can I feed my family?” They have no perspective that life can be any different, that there’s another way to survive.
It might be easy to think that we are different from these poor souls. There’s a desire to shake them and say, “Look! There’s a better way! You weren’t meant to live in a landfill and dig for trash for a living!”
But I’ve realized that, I too, have often set up house in the dump. In bad situations, in my sin, in my pain and sorrow. I’ve made what should have been a tent, a temporary visit, into a brick house. A mansion even. I’ve nested myself in lots of dangerous, toxic places thinking that I’d only be there for a season, but yet I stay for years.
(I’ve never read Beth Moore’s book “Get out of that Pit!”, but I assume it has the same concept).
This landfill scene showed me how easy it is to get used to things. To get locked in on a paradigm, on a view of life. No matter how distorted or disgusting it may be. We can even get used to living in a dump and learn to love it.
Except for the fact, that we’re human beings .We’re not made to live in trash, or snorkel through it, or have to dig through waste for hours a day just to put food on the table. We’re not made to breathe in toxic fumes. We shouldn’t have to walk through a graveyard just to go to the grocery store. But if you make a house with a nice enough inside, I guess it’s easy to forget there’s a landfill in your backyard.
Our physical beings weren’t created for this, and neither were our souls. In our mess, we can sup up a pad for ourselves, hang up pictures on the wall, put on some lively music, light some candles. Yet the stench never really goes away. There’s always a pit in our stomachs saying, this isn’t how it’s supposed to be. Just as our bodies are made for clean air, clean water, living water, and a healthy environment, so are our spirits. They crave opportunity and freedom and joy. Our souls know we’re not supposed to wallow in sin and depression, but we do anyways. We ignore the truth because its comfortable to.
We can so easily throw a coat of paint on the walls of our pain and call it pleasure. We can so easily parade around in our sin, calling it fun, but really we know its a cancer eating us alive.
It is it time to move out? Are we willing to leave our mansions in the landfill?
You can check out what Amigos for Christ is doing at:
http://www.amigosforchrist.org/our-work-nicaragua.html
