Casa Semear

"Whenever the ABBA team receives new children directly from the street they are faced with the difficulty of persuading a “hardened” child that the street is not the best place for them to live.  For many years we dreamed of a team to work closely with some of the more “at risk” families in order to prevent the younger children from going to the street, since prevention is far easier than the long hard road of reintegration after the breaking of family ties"

History



Jardim Sao Jorge

This dream came true for the ABBA team with the opening of Casa Semear. When the team were working with children who lived on the streets they discovered that a large number of them came from an area known as Jardim São Jorge - a slum on the south side of Sao Paulo. Since prevention is better than cure, ABBA saw the advantages of starting a project which would help keep children within their families and actually stop them ending up on the streets. The project is non-profit and relies entirely on donations and regular charitable giving to keep it running.

The Jardim Sao Jorge Favela

Why is it important to work within the favela community? Many of the people living in the favelas are trapped in a poverty cycle that is  difficult to break. Of they have little or no chance of employment or any regular incomes. The cycle of poverty that the families live in can often  cause a whole variety of family breakdown including parents (and kids) with substance or alcohol addictions, abuse within the home etc. which can often lead to the children running away to live on the streets because they feel that they will have a better life there.



Street life often leads to petty crime, failure to thrive and a whole number of other dangers. Children live on streets from as young as about five years old and some are even born there as girls can turn to prostitution as a means of survival and end up getting pregnant with nowhere to go. The longer that the children live on the street the harder it is to convince them that the streets are not a good place for them to live. Family or community life is difficult for them to adjust to and many children, even after being reunited with their families or living for long periods in the rescue houses, choose to return to the streets because "normal life" is just too difficult to cope with. Casa Semear's mission is to work with the favela children and families in the hope that they can intervene before crisis stage and keep the children from getting involved in street life.

Building

Robert and Silvana Meikle built up relationships with children and families in Sao Jorge and in 2009 they managed to aquire a property on the edge of  the favela to base their ministry in.



Casa Semear - Building View

The property was in need of major renovation before the project could make full of use of the space. In July 2010 a team from Glasgow went out to help with the building work, taking along with them over £10,500 which had been raised to finance the work. I was part of this team and this is where my commitment to support Casa Semear began. The renovations are still on-going but the house is almost able to accomodate all the activities required. In the outside area (blue section at the back) two flats are being built to accomodate visiting missionaries and Semear staff. The lower level is currently the home of Dora, one of the Semear staff. It is anticipated that she will move in to one of the new flats the the red area will be used for teenagers as a "den". Man of the children live with over five people in one or two small rooms in the favela. For the teenagers it can be particularly frustrating sharing a room with several younger siblings and so it is hoped that this will provide the space they need to relax and have a break with friends their own age. The ground level area is where the children have classes in english, literacy, numeracy and bible studies. There is a small library, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom on this floor. The upper level is the main area for games and group activities for the younger children. At the back is the arts and crafts room.



Activities and Programmes

Casa Semear opens for the children twice a day during the week. The children are free to come and go as they wish. On average there are around 50 children in attendance throughout the day. There are the options of arts and crafts, games, English lessons, literacy & numercy  classes, bible studies and now there is also some age specific programmes in place. The reason for the learning and studying is that many of the children from the favela will not attend school. Some children, particularly the girls, will stay home to help look after young siblings. Others simply don' bother and the law doesn't inforce them because they know that they are favela children. The school systems overlook them and as a result many children grow up with no education and therefor no job prospects - continuing the cycle of poverty. So, if the staff can't encourage them to go to school they can at least help to make up for some of the education that they will be missing. There children from as young as three and as old as 18 so there is quite a diverse age range to cater for. At the moment Dot is running a programme called "Superwoman" for the teenage girls. This is a group where they can talk about relevant life issues that are affecting them, particularly relationships, family, society, self-esteem, their future hopes and so on. Many of the girls in the favelas become teen mums and this can often be encouraged by the parents. However, through the Superwoman programme Dot is hoping to encourage them to consider all their options and think about what they'd really like to achieve with their future - and of course it's time for some good girly fun

Silvana makes weekly visits to the families and in the favelas and tries to get an understanding of some the issues that the parents and children are facing at home to see how Casa Semear can help them more. This year at the Christmas the team held a BBQ which the children could bring there families to and this provided a really great opportunity to show some care for the families and let them have sometime they could enjoy with their kids. The families received food parcels to help them over the holiday period. Building relationships with the familes is such a vital part of the work otherwise the team would be working with the children in isolation and may not be able to help address some of the problems that would cause them to leave for the streets. It also makes a great difference to the parents (many of whom are single) to have somebody listen to and support them when the rest of society simply ignores them.