saturday, june 20

This weekend I had to deal with something that I had been hoping to avoid for as long as possible. And honestly, I'm still kind of running on autopilot and really haven't processed the events of this weekend, but here's what happened:

I received a phone call on Saturday afternoon around 3:00 from a street dwelling couple that I've known for about 8 months now. They had been living at a home for couples with their little girl up until about 2 months ago when they returned to the street. I ran into them on Wednesday for the first time since they'd left the home. I bought them diapers for their little girl and dinner, and we took this photo:

Three days later, Saturday afternoon, I was in the middle of the crowded street market with my parents when I got a call from the guy. He was crying, and I could barely make out what he was saying until I heard, "Senorita, please come the morgue, my little girl is dead."

We left immediately, and I dropped my parents off at home and went straight to the morgue. I ran into the young mom first on the sidewalk. She had obviously been crying, and when she saw me, she burst into tears and completely collapsed in my arms. The three of us walked back to the morgue, which was in the back corner of an old, empty, decaying hospital building. It looked like something out of a horror movie... I needed to find the doctor who was waiting to talk to me, so I had to walk right into the morgue, into the middle of a room full of dead bodies, young and old, all mostly uncovered and almost carelessly placed on random tables. The doctor explained to me and to the baby's dad that we needed to go buy all the supplies for a forensic autopsy as well as supplies for the two police officers that were involved with the case.

They showed us to a little, old indigenous woman who had a small, portable metal kiosk on the corner full of sodas, juice, and snacks. We told her that we needed materials for a forensic autopsy and for two police officers, and she pulled out some black, plastic shopping bags and started filling them up with gloves and masks and bottles of this and that for the autopsy.

I paid the woman and brought the supplies to the doctor, who then gave me a police report about the baby's death and sent me off to get it photocopied. Because it was a Saturday afternoon, all the photocopy shops around the morgue were closed, so I had to walk about 6 blocks away to get the document copied.

When I got back, the police officers were there, and explained to me that I needed to take the photocopy to an office on the other side of downtown to pay for/pick up two documents that needed to be filled out during the autopsy. They said that once the autopsy was finished they would release the body to me, at which point I felt a wave of panic because I had no idea what to do with a body or even where to get a casket. I was able to speak with Jenn, a friend who has homes for babies and children who have been abandoned, orphaned, or taken away from their street-dwelling parents and has dealt with the death of babies in the past. She wasn't far away and offered to meet me and help me take care of everything.

We went together to the office to pick up the forms I needed, and Jenn drove us back to the morgue, where a tiny, white casket was waiting for the little baby's body. The mortician had called a friend who owns a store, and the friend sent his 10 year old daughter over to the morgue with the casket. She walked us over the to store to pay, and thankfully, the store owner offered to help us get the baby's official death certificate on Sunday morning through a connection he has with a civil registry.

During all that, the baby's mom had gone off to buy some clothes to bury the baby in. She returned with a onesie and some socks, and we walked into the morgue to dress the baby.

I will never in my entire life be able to forget the sight of the little girl laying on the table with her eyes open and a carelessly stitched-up incision going down and across her chest from the autopsy. I felt faint but had to support and comfort the mom who just crumbled at the sight of her little girl. The mortician took the clothes and started dressing the baby, so I walked outside with the mom so that she wouldn't have to watch.

A few minutes later, the mortician came out with the casket with the little girl inside looking peaceful. He wanted 100Bs. for bathing and dressing the body, and then he handed over the casket. We put it in the back of Jenn's car and drove over to the park where the parents live because we couldn't find any place to take the body for the night.

As soon as we got back, the other kids that live on the street around there, who all seem to be related to the baby's dad, started beating on the baby's mom, accusing her of beating her baby to death. It's no secret that she was abusive as most street moms are, and there is absolutely no excuse for it...it's despicable...but the little girl didn't die from a beating. She had a cough for 3 days and died from some sort of asphyxiation that the mortician didn't seem to think was from murder.

Jenn stayed at the park while I ran into the market with another one of the street girls to buy some flower arrangements and candles. When I got back to the park, the casket had been moved into the entry way of a public bathroom and set up on a table with a few candles. We set a cross of white flowers on the casket and watched as the room filled up with glue-sniffing street kids wanting to pay their respects and pray for the baby. One of the older guys who lives under a nearby bridge led the kids in a series of Hail Marys and prayed for the baby before all the kids settled down to sniff glue and drink chicha.

The baby's mom had gone to find some holy water with which to baptize the baby because the general belief is that the soul won't make it to heaven unless the body has been baptized. When she came back the fighting started up all over again... Kids were attacking the mom, kicking and punching her. She and the dad were fighting with each other and with the other kids. I had to get in between some of the kids a few times and take wrestle away big rocks that they were intending to throw at each other. After about an hour of on-and-off, drug-induced fighting, the mom settled down in the bathroom to sleep, and I went home for the night.