Eddie

I was walking home from the Albergue the other day when I bumped into my neighbor Eddie. Eddie lives with his sister Yessenia: a recognized leader and my community counterpart. The two are from El Salvador, which is refreshing (it is nice to have someone around who isn’t Tico). Just as Yessenia is active in the community as the president of the Junta de Educacion, Eddie does his part. After a day’s work of hard manual labor, it is not uncommon to see Eddie sitting on the curb with the street kids. Even though these are not his kids, and he is dead tired, he finds time to play soccer and provide them with guidance. This is very rare in my community.

Needless to say, Eddie is a natural ally of mine and I was happy to cross his path as I walked down my street. He was flanked by four neighborhood kids, and dribbled a soccer ball as he walked. “Quire jugar?” he asked. Without hesitation, I told him I would play, and joined the group.

As we wound our way through town to the soccer field, he told me about El Salvador. He has two daughters there who he sends money every month. When asked why he left El Salvador, he responded by telling me how dangerous the country is. Crime and murder is a way of life there, he told me. He went on to explain how the gangs paralyze the people with fear, and were worth escaping. He hopes to bring his daughters out of the fray.

We got to the field and played in pick-up games for a few hours. We played until it became to dark to see.

On our walk home, I asked Eddie why he chose to come to Costa Rica. “Es muy tranquilo” he said. Muy tranquilo: a trait of Costa Rica that I have had qualms with. It is hard to motivate people to improve their community when things are so tranquilo. But Eddie put things in perspective for me. Tranquilo is something to embrace, if violence and fear is your country’s theme. Costa Rica is lucky to be so easy going. There is no revolution, no war. People aren’t dying needlessly, families are intact. The country may have serious problems, but fear isn’t one of them. This is one reason why Costa Rica has such a large immigrant population.

Not long ago, Eddie continued, he tried to cross illegally into the United States. I gave him a concerned look to show that I knew what a grave thing it was. He explained that the trip north through Central America was difficult and dangerous. He got as far as Mexico where he faced the facts. Coyotes (guides who bring people across the border), he learned cost about seven thousand dollars per person. Eddie went on to say how awful the coyotes are, sometimes selling their clients into slavery after the crossing. Some coyotes simply steal their clients’ money or take advantage of them sexually. The worst part, he said, was that their clients pay them money made in America after the crossing; if a client cannot make enough to pay the coyote on time, his or her family back home is usually threatened with death. Eddie wanted nothing to do with these people.

Eddie knew the odds. Most of the people who try to cross the border illegally end up dead or in prison. You have to have incredible luck, he noted, to cross the border safely. For every person who makes it, there are several who have died trying. So Eddie turned back, and headed back down south.

He finished his story as we approached our respective houses. I shook his hand and looked at him before heading in.

“Thank God you didn’t do it, man.” I said to him.

“Si, Gracias a Dios.”