When I was a single missionary teacher in Peru, I was invited to free outdoor salsa classes by some fellow missionary teacher girlfriends. Afterward, we would go to a salsa club where we could practice salsa moves. We did not drink and moved in a group so that we would be protected from any creeposos in the midst. At the dance lesson there were a few guys who invited themselves to tag along with us. One of the guys, a half Peruvian half American, had an older brother (who we shall call Thomas) who he had invited to come along. Thomas had recently gone through a break up and was at home sulking. Why not bring him along to meet a whole group of single girls eager to dance salsa?
It ended up being a bad move. I left the salsa club early and remember seeing Thomas not dancing but rather drowning himself in pity and beer, boring two of my gringa friends with tales of his one lost love. The one good thing about it was that we were able to encourage Thomas, a lapsed Christian, to go back to church.
(Side note: when Wilmer and I were watching True Lies we found that Thomas looked just like the villain in the movie. The upcoming photos of Thomas are quite similar to what he looks like in real life).
Maybe a year later, when I was a newly married in Peru, my husband often would be contracted by missionaries to travel down to a very small town outside of Chincha to work on a church building. I sometimes traveled down there with him on weekends because I got bored going home to an empty apartment every night. Once when I went I found a short-term missions team was there to love on* the local disheveled street urchins**.
When I sat down to meet the group, I realized I knew the newly hired translator. It was Thomas.
He apparently had shaped up since then and got involved in a church.
Our eyes met.Me: Hi, how have you been?
Thomas: Uh, you look kind of familiar, I think we've met somewhere, maybe at church, yeah it had to have been church.
Me: uh, yeah, I do know you from somewhere (not wanting to embarrass him I didn't spell out the shameful truth of his beer drinking pity party days for him).
Throughout the week the street urchins** realized that of all the short term team, Thomas was the most immature of the bunch. While female street urchins usually show their domination of affluent Americans on short term missions by using them as free transport by getting them to carry them as much as possible throughout the day, Male street urchins often prey on the weakest American. Once the weakest American is identified, a group of male street urchins will poke him, take objects from his person, and call him naughty words to try and get him to explode in frustration. The street urchins immediately identified Thomas as the weakest American on the team.
I would often hear Thomas' voice reach a girlish shreak as he would yell in Spanish "That's the last time I am gonna say it! Give me back my hat!" They urchins squealed in delight every time he they got a response out of poor Thomas.
Later that day, as Wilmer was working on the church facade and I was hanging out with the Short Term Team, watching them love on* the children. One of the older children was cruising back and forth down the street of the small town on a motorcycle.
The poor, dirty-faced urchin on the motorcycle: Hey Thomas! Bet you can't ride one of these things!
Thomas: You bet I can!
Poor, dirty-faced urchin gets off the motorcycle: Oh yeah? Show me then!
Thomas then proceeded to get on the motorcycle.
He revved the engine a few times and looked in the general direction of some cute, short-term mission high school girls. All eyes were on him. Wilmer peeked around from his work to see what was happening, I observed in amusement, a female street urchin smiling excitedly in my lap. The townspeople peeked out of their worn shacks*** to see the scene. Thomas looked forward and took off. This was his moment to shine. He took off and enjoyed feeling his curly locks of hair flying in the breeze. He was showing those street urchins who was boss. He went faster and fasted till suddenly, he realized he had reached the end of the street and needed to make a turn. But it was too late.
The motorcycle slipped from under him and he flew into the plywood walls of one of the worn shacks***. The motorcycle, plywood wall, and Thomas were all sprawled out on the ground. The male street urchins were delighted. Their experiment had gone surprisingly well.
*"love on" (verb) : how white affluent Americans often satisfy their emotional needs by giving their time and cheap prizes to lower class children of a different race than their own.
**"street urchins" (noun) : bored children in communities who often enjoy observing white affluent Americans and partaking of their cheap prizes.
***"worn shacks" (noun) : homes of the parents of street urchins.
