Dying Poor

Towards the beginning of December, a man came to the Nu’Kem store looking for me. Although I had never seen him before, he knew my name and what I was doing here. He needed to speak with me and asked me to step outside. Full of embarrassment with a voice barely above a whisper so the others inside couldn’t hear, he told me his situation—His wife was very sick. She had stomach cancer. They needed to go to the capital to see a doctor. The priest in town had found them a car to use, but they needed money to pay for the gas. He wanted to know if I would buy his TV.

During training we were cautioned about giving out money. As Americans living in Guatemala we are already viewed as being exceedingly rich (which in world wide standards we are), and having spare cash to hand out would only solidify that assumption. I know I was sought out because I am the gringa in Tactic, but what touched me was that this man did not come to me asking for money; he came trying to sell his belongings. I told him I had no need for his television, but I would loan him the money. I gave him 300Q ($40), and he gave me a slip of paper with his name, address, phone number, cédula number (equivalent to our social security number), and employer’s name with a promise to pay back the loan with interest within a month.

But having been nearly a month since I gave him the loan without seeing or hearing from him, I was beginning to wonder if he was actually going to pay me back. It wasn’t the money that bothered me (although as volunteers 300Q is a good chunk of our monthly living allowance) but the thought that I had poorly judged his character. But just as unexpected as his first visit the man showed up at the store today.

The first words that came out of his mouth were an apology for not having paid me back yet, and then he told me his wife had died. The cancer was too advanced, and there was nothing the doctors could do for her. He is left to care for their children. Fighting tears and filled with shame, he asked if I would please give him an extension on the loan. The cheapest casket he could find for his wife was 700Q, and he had to pay for all the funeral arrangements. I wanted to hug him but knew it would be inappropriate in this culture. All I could muster was, “Lo siento. Lo siento. Tome su tiempo con el dinero. Lo siento.”

After he left I went behind the store, sat on a concrete block, and cried. I cried for his wife who I never knew, and I cried for all the poverty that I see here daily that I had yet to cry for. I couldn’t stop crying. Were they not so poor, this man would not have to try to sell me his possessions to have the money to go to the hospital. Were they not so poor, they would not have waited to see a doctor until the situation was critical, and his wife could have been saved. Were they not so poor, this man would not have been choking back tears begging for my graciousness in extending a loan. But they are that poor, and all I can do is cry.