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By Francesco Fantini
It was my last day in Korogocho. From the terrace of a brick building, one of the few in the slum, I had a good view of the street below. Vincent was next to me, as always. Quietly I observed what was going on below. The hustle and bustle of the people, the animals, the children playing. For once I wanted to think while surveying the scene objectively. I snapped a sequence of pictures of children playing; they were my last shots. For days I'd wandered through those streets that really can't be defined as such. A slum is not a neighborhood, it's not a city; it's just a place. A place where life is inconceivable for us. Garbage is the dominating element of the landscape. From the huge garbage dump which surrounds the shanty town, the garbage penetrates the streets and houses wherever it finds room, like an enormous tentacled monster. It invades the people, the animals, and my soul so much that I refuse it. It's no coincidence that it's called "refuse"; it's refuse which is the consequence of our lives; it's the foulness produced by our cleanliness. Even the people, these poor people, are part of the refuse produced by our wealth. So I walked these streets amidst the violence, the yelling, the stench, immersed in the worst scenario imaginable, in a tough life without mediation, with no chance for escape, with no place to hide, and where every thing is pungent, brutal. Every sensation and emotion is overwhelming, you don't have time to comprehend what's going on around you. Things happen first, and then if you're still on your feet, maybe you'll get a chance to make sense of it later. "Down here", it's hard to find kindness, sensitivity, the space you need around you to let you see that the people around you are human beings, the measure you need to feel human yourself. It's as if you're lost, floating like another piece of trash in a sea of excrement. Right, but I'm supposed to be here out of "good will". I can walk around and take pictures and feel like I'm doing good simply because of the fact that at least I'm here. But let it be clear, I'm just visiting hell, I don't have to live in it! That's why I'm surprised, I'm shocked when I become aware of a kindness that doesn't easily meet the eye; I see clean people emerge from the trash: I can feel the love and the warmth of the persons I meet. I slowly start to understand, as I become less judgmental. I stop searching for solutions, my solutions, when I perceive the hospitality, the respect and the dignity around me and become aware that the more I am accepted, the more I can accept myself. I open my eyes, start taking notes and pictures, joyfully learning to respect my "teachers": the drunkard lying in the trash, intoxicated with Jet Five, the burnt oil from jet planes which is a popular drink here. A boy who goes off to work in the dump with a sack on his shoulder, and another who is preparing his dinner in the alley and smiles at me. The children who run around me incessantly and poke and make fun of me, calling me "muzungu-muzungu…", "…white-white…". Everything takes on a new dimension, their humanity opens my heart and overwhelms me as would the beauty of a flower. I can smell the fragrance of the excrement, become a part of it and be ok. I can face the fact that much of that filth is mine, that it comes from my cleanliness and this essential to my new awareness. I go along with Daniele to the shacks to celebrate mass for the sick. The neighbors gather and talk, they wish each other life and salute death, they come together to accompany those who are about to leave on the final journey so they won't feel alone. I follow along this trail to which I do not belong, but which I am in any case a part of. I am not an inert presence, I want to be there. I want to learn what it means to die in a shack in hell, anointed by friendly hands with blessed oil that emanates the perfume of serenity, so very different from the anguishing stench that announces the death of one of those forgotten souls dying in one of our condominiums in "paradise". I must learn, I continue taking notes and pictures. I am compelled to look and comprehend the urgency of this undertaking, but not out of pity. I mustn't do it out of pity; I have to do it out of hope. Thus, it is here in hell that I have found hope. The boy was lying on his rags, resting. A few days before his a friend of his had been caught stealing. They'd hung him by his wrists, stuck him in a tire and set him on fire. These were the kids I'd meet on the streets and who would smile at me: sure, they were ready to take me for everything I had, but they would smile and take my hand and walk with me a while. I can still feel the touch of those dirty hands and I hope this feeling stays with me for a long time more. There is no original sin, no sense of guilt; you either take that hand or you let it go. The rest is just talk. That night it rained for hours. The rain battering on the metal roof made a hellish din. Normally the sound of rainfall helps me sleep after a hard day, not unlike so many other hard days I'd had before, but this time particularly so. That night however, I suddenly woke up overwhelmed with anguish. I couldn't stand that clamour of rain and metal any longer, so I went out under the awning and covered my ears, but the noise was getting worse, and then I realized that it was rising from inside me, but I couldn't control the anguish. I felt like I was going crazy, but my thoughts raced with a deafening clarity. I knew I was only a "muzungu" who was just visiting and was about to leave, too soon…or maybe it was too late. I was up there on that terrace taking a sequence of pictures of the kids playing down in the street, and on my last shot a girl looked up at me and smiled, and I knew I didn't stand a chance. They got me again. From the airplane window I kept looking down towards that girl's impertinently smiling face. The cabin attendant had just served me my lunch, one of those pre-cooked trays covered with plastic. The kids had told me not to eat: "Francesco, put a piece of paper with your name on it into the tray and don't eat. They'll throw it into the garbage dump and we'll look for it and we'll know this good meal is a gift from you…" So I think to myself that I'm going to have to do something; I can't keep asking myself if they found my note. That's why I have to ask you to give me your names, lots of notes to send to the dump because there, in the midst of that mountain of garbage is the place where hope can be restored: that's why I shout to you W Nairobi W!
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