The Luck of the Draw
Sometimes it’s just the luck of the draw. Some people end up on one side of the tracks, poor and destitute, while others fall on the other side, rich and comfortable. Those mired in the deepest hole of poverty and despair can be helped by others but ultimately have to draw their own luck to dig themselves out.
After reading the New York Times column of Nicholas Kristof (Triumph of a Dreamer, November 15, 2009) about Tererai Trent, I eagerly shared her story with West Bay Executive Director Rudy Asercion. In turn, Rudy related the story of Maria Guevarra (not her real name) whose Filipino family he had been helping for the past five years.
Tererai was born to a poor family of cattle herders in Zimbabwe living in a clay hut with no running water. Her father kept her at home to do housework and to babysit her younger brothers whom he sent to school “because they will be breadwinners”. One brother, Tinashe, was indifferent to his studies so Tererai taught herself to read and write from his books and did his homework.
One day, Tinashe’s teacher noticed that he always handed in excellent homework even though he was a poor student in class. After confronting Tinashe, the teacher learned the truth and talked to Tererai’s father about allowing Tererai to go to school. He relented but only for two semesters. He then married her off at age 11.
Tererai’s husband prohibited her from attending school and beat her regularly whenever he caught her reading scraps of old newspapers. Tererai bore three kids before she turned 18. She had two more soon after.
About 12 years later, Jo Luck, the head of an international aid group called Heifer International, visited Tererai’s village and met with Tererai and other village women to encourage them to stand up, nurture their dreams and change their lives. She asked them to write their dreams down on paper and to follow them. Tererai wrote down that she wanted to study in America, get her bachelor’s degree, her master’s degree, and her Ph.D. This was the impossible dream for a woman who only went to elementary school for two semesters.
Tererai began working for Heifer as a community organizer and started taking correspondence courses. In 1998, she was accepted at Oklahoma State University where she enrolled, bringing along her 5 children and her abusive husband.
In Oklahoma, Tererai and her family lived in a humble trailer with little food, some obtained from picking through trash bins. She had to work two jobs, because her husband refused to work, all the while keeping up with her studies.
After falling behind in her tuition payments, the university was poised to expel her when a school official, Ron Beer, came to her aid with donations from the community to pay her back tuition. His church provided food for her family while Habitat for Humanity provided housing.
Tererai excelled in her studies and eventually obtained her bachelor’s degree from Oklahoma State, her master’s degree from Arkansas State, and this semester, her Ph.D. from Western Michigan University for her dissertation on AIDS prevention in Africa.
While Tererai had personal ambitions for herself, Maria Guevara had none other than for her kids. An immigrant with barely a sixth grade education, Maria had four children, ages 12, 11, 9, and 7, when she finally left her abusive, alcoholic husband and sought the assistance of the San Francisco-based West Bay Pilipino Multi Service Center five years ago. Maria and her kids were living in a one-room shelter on the $100 a month she earned from odd jobs. Unlike Tererai, she could barely read, write and speak English.
With West Bay’s assistance, Maria enrolled in CalWORKS, a welfare to work state program that provided her with the funds to improve her vocational and language skills to help her secure gainful employment. West Bay helped her family obtain food stamps and apply for low-income housing which came in the form of a subsidized three-bedroom home in the Mission District. The kids were enrolled in West Bay’s After School program in 2007 and started earning above average grades in school.
One of Maria’s daughters, Laura, was born with a cleft palette on her upper mouth, which West Bay was able to get the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) to correct with a series of surgical operations after West Bay was able to raise funds. As a result, her self-confidence soared, as did her GPA. She started to consistently earn a 4.0 GPA and in 2008, was accepted to Lowell High School, the premier academic school in San Francisco.
Maria’s oldest child, Lolita, was also doing well in high school with a 3.3 GPA and all set to enroll in a nursing program after graduation.
Everything seemed rosy for Maria and her family, probably for the first time in their lives. But then, one event changed everything. Lolita became pregnant and this caused her to transfer to Hilltop High, a school for pregnant teenagers. After she gave birth, Lolita returned to her previous high school. But because caring for the baby had become a priority, Lolita often missed her classes and is now at risk of getting kicked out of school altogether for poor attendance.
Lolita wasn’t the only one affected. Her mother and younger siblings have all had to take turns caring for the newborn baby. This has caused Maria to miss an alarming number of her ESL classes. Even Laura’s grades at Lowell have been drastically affected as they have dropped all the way down to 1.6 GPA.
The only one not affected by this development is the 17-year old father of the child. The boy who had unprotected sex with Lolita has had no contact with either Lolita or his child since the child was born.
The additional mouth to feed and the time consumed in taking care of the baby have caused severe financial problems for Maria’s family. West Bay’s showcase success story of a destitute family who turned their lives around may yet be undone by one unplanned pregnancy.
Let’s hope and pray this Thanksgiving that they dig themselves out of the hole like Dr. Tererai Trent did.
Tererai Trent http://www.oprah.com/media/20090925-tows_tererai-dream-education
Please send comments to Rodel50@aol.com or mail them to the Law Offices of Rodel Rodis at 2429 Ocean Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94127 or call (415) 334-7800. For past columns, log on to Rodel50.blogspot.com
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