Help with Food
The armed and violent conflict in Colombia has been going for 50 years. Right now, peace negotiations are ongoing betwwen left guerrilla group FARC and the Colombian State on neutral ground in Cuba's capital Havana. It goes not so well, according to most experts. Hopefully there can be a sustainable agreement reached soon, although most think it can take time.
The conflict has killed a quarter of million people and there are approximately 4-5 million Internally Displaced People (IDPs). I have meet several families that are displaced in their own country. Many sad stories. One of the families was José and Nayibis Lopez and their three children, who were forced to flee three times.
They were forced to flee in 2002 from the small community Fundacias Magdalena when paramilitary groups alleged that the family worked with the FARC. José and Nayibis were threatened to death and had no choice but to pack up and flee. They were forced to flee twice agan in similar circumstances before they ended up in Villa Gloria outside the Colombian coastal city of Cartagena.
The family lives in a small borrowed poorly built wooden shed of about ten square meters. It has two beds, a fan and a TV. Along the walls above the beds hangs clothes and toys. Outside the small room is a small space without a roof where they cook.
Mom Nayibis told me that during the dry season it is fine but when the rainy season comes, the soil in and around the house is partially under water which made it very difficult. After many years without a job José finally get a job as a motorcycle taxi driver. It is good for the poor family, who lived very scant and poorly since they fled the first time.
