Reply to Kleo

Dear Kleo,

Thank you so much for sharing your view and sympathy for my personal story.

I will tell you another story from a chapter of my experiences: A homeless child scratched the door of a car parked in front of the boardinghouse where I lived in São Paulo. The owner of the car arrived coinciding with the moment the boy practiced his crime. The boy ran. The owner of the car ran after him and caught the boy by his torn collar and then seized the boy's arm. The man dragged the boy to his car, his face and lips white with hate. The boy cried loud, his mouth opened and distressed. The boy could be ten, but the bad nutrition these children get on Sampa's streets made this boy look like seven years old. The owner madly shook the boy, and almost crying, screaming, asked the boy several times to see what he'd done to his valuable car, and then asked one of the people watchers to call the police. The police came and carried the little creature away. People said they'd kill the boy. Kill the boy? others asked. I know him; he wanders around, one said. I think he stole my mother's Swatch, another was sure. My feeble sister described a criminal like that boy who bumped her to the ground to steal her school bag from her back, another anonymous voice accused. Kill him! Kill him! they all agreed in whispers. I think the watchers talked in that tone afraid to expose their angry assassin instinct. A month later the boy errant showed up back in the area I lived. I have good memory. I'd never forget his dark face. I saw him at least twice before I learned he was executed with three shots, two in the heart and one in the center of his little head. Nobody cared to know the anonymous who killed the boy, and time brutally went on.

My past experiences however didn't make me disbelieve that somewhere there are still people like you, Kleo, who care for a triumphant better future for our children of this world.

Yours,
Regina Edelman

[Editor's note: Regina wrote this in response to a comment about the Edelman-Eggers Letters, Parts 1-10, the first ten posts on this almost year old little blog.]