Observations on the Young

In his book “Amazing Grace”, Jonathon Kozel is consistently inspired by the community’s children and how they are able to endure despite the poverty they are subject to on a daily basis. At one point he says:

“Despite its racial isolation and the destitution of its children, nonetheless, [public school] 65 is still sometimes a cheerful place in certain ways. The atrophy of childhood by physical and spiritual night…has not yet destroyed the playfulness and trusting innocence of many of the younger children, who may not yet be aware of what is happening to them. Even in the older grades, some of the children do not seem to lose their willingness to trust. It is at the secondary level – in junior high and more dramatically in high school – that the sense of human ruin on a vast scale becomes unmistakable.”

Watching the children in Brazil, whether in the public high school we visited, walking the streets of Rio de Janeiro or on the beaches in Bahia, I can’t help but be inspired with the shining smiles, exuberance and vitality of this nations youth. Yesterday a small boy approached us at lunch and asked for money. We gave him a couple reis and prepared to leave. Smiling up at us he motioned for us to give him more. His irresistable smile won us over and we ended up giving him the rest of what we had (equivalent to about $6 US). When we walked out of the restaurant we saw him counting his money before heading off down the street skipping and dancing. Sitting with a room full of high school students you could feel their excitement about having us there with them as well as the trusting way they opened up to us to share their experiences. And at this school, Kozel’s analysis of the “sense of human ruin” did not seem readily discernable. To be fair, we were told that this was considered a good public school in Rio and its students seemed to be part of a lower middle class as opposed to extremely poor, for example, many of the students had parents who worked as doormen, janitors and other members of the service industry. Though they lived in favelas, we have been told that they did not represent the poorest members of the community. Though the differences between their private school counterparts were unmistakable, I’ve found myself curious to visit other public schools – to explore the differences between the students we visited and those who are part of an even lower socioeconomic class to compare the differences. We were told that we would visit another high school in Sao Paolo at which point I’m curious to make further comparisons not only between the US and Brazil, but also within the public school system of Brazil itself.