News from Costa Rica:
By: Stephanie Andrade Vinueza
Purral is a district located in the province of San José, Costa Rica. Purral is known as the cancer of the canton of Goicoechea. Los Cuadros is known as the cancer metastasis of Purral. Diagnoses confirm that people who live in Purral live with fear of crime, violence, despair and injustice. In the middle of this context, the dream of witnessing signs of life that could counteract the many signs of death took the form of a summer school. We dreamed of giving almost 100 children in the area the opportunity to choose to invest a week of vacation in artistic, recreational and educational choices as a way to avoid opting for other options that do not benefit or improve their quality of life. The results exceeded our expectations. Adults, youth, children of Los Cuadros of Purral, with the help of some external actors, got involved and joined the initiative. The art workshops of dance, rap, crafts and popular music captivated all the participants, no matter the age, helping them to discover their skills and artistic abilities. The significant relationships that were built during that week beg for continuity and execution of more initiatives that unify the community in positive purposes. People who live in Los Cuadros of Purral have so much to give, the problem is that they cannot easily identified that because of the few opportunities that our society offers them. Our dream is that Los Cuadros of Purral’s not only cures its cancer but more than that, that it becomes the lung that provides life to Goicoechea. Purral is just one!
This is the performance from the rap workshop. Daniel is singing: “I walk the street and a bad guy comes to me with a gun. I said to him ‘go home ‘ cause God is my protector number one”. Happy Summer School, January 16 to 21, 2012.
