An outstretched hand to Peru's street children

Young ones find a unique place for food, healthcare

(Corey Byrnes Photography)
Early this month, the writer's husband photographed countless street children roaming the urban heart of Cusco, Peru, a popular tourist destination.

Cambridge resident Mary Kovaleski Byrnes teaches writing at Emerson College, where she is working on a master’s of fine arts in creative writing. She recently returned from a three-week trip to Peru.

By Mary Kovaleski Byrnes

Jan. 5, 2009

CUSCO, Peru -- It is difficult to be alone for long in Plaza de Armas, the main square in Cusco, Peru. As my husband wanders to photograph one of the cathedrals, a young girl climbs onto my park bench. She sits close to me, practically in my lap, her small damp hand resting on my knee.

“Hola!” She greets me. “Como te llamas?” This is a conversation my limited high school Spanish can handle. The girl grins up at me. Her name is Maya and she is 5 years old. Her mother is over there, she tells me, gesturing to a woman begging in front of the fountain. A slight breeze kicks up, chilly and promising more rain; Maya is wearing a red moth-eaten sweater, but no shoes.

Maya is one of countless street children roaming this urban heart of Cusco as dusk settles in. Most of these children are hard at work, selling anything from finger puppets to pan flutes and candy. Like brightly-colored butterflies, they flit from one pack of tourists to the next, relentless, undeterred by the persistent “no, gracias” they receive.

This is my second trip to Peru. During my first visit in 2004, I was working with a nonprofit group, the Council on International Educational Exchange, meeting with Peruvian college students who were about to embark on temporary work visas to the United States. The program was designed to build English-speaking and business skills; many of the hundreds of students were tourism majors, and their time in the United States would provide them with additional skills and perspectives, with the overarching goal of further equipping students to improve their country upon their return. There was much hope for Peru in the ambitions of the young people with whom I worked during that time. Now, upon my first return to the plaza, I find Cusco relatively unaltered.

In 1996, Jolanda van den Berg sat in the same plaza, surrounded by a similar scene: mountains supporting the sprawl of the city’s thousands of ramshackle hill houses, the colonial opulence of the square with its dueling Conquistador-constructed cathedrals, bold Andean patterns of the locals’ garments, the milling of disoriented, sunburned tourists. And the children. Ranging from ages as young as 3 into their teens, the children were everywhere then, as they are now: children whom van den Berg could not turn away.

That day in 1996, van den Berg invited two of the young street boys to stay in her recently-rented apartment. She had been to Peru months before as a tourist, but even after returning to her comfortable life in the Netherlands, could not forget the children she had met. She and her husband would eventually adopt 12 boys here and create the Niños Hotels and Foundation.

We are staying at Niños I, the first hotel of van den Berg’s now multi-property nonprofit organization. With all profits going to support Cusco’s street children, Niños and another two hotels do a bustling business in an area teeming with tourists. Cusco is the gateway to the Inca Trail and Machu Picchu, Peru’s top tourist destination, and consequently, a crossroads of extremes. Some wealthy tourists will drop thousands to visit the ancient Inca ruins in comfort and luxury while extreme poverty affects 48 percent of Peru’s people, according to UNICEF. Most of the impoverished children live in Cusco and the surrounding Andean Highland areas.

In this shuffle of commerce and survival, so many of Cusco’s children are lost. Many of Cusco Department’s residents between ages 6 and 14 don’t attend school regularly, or at all. Even for those who do, there are complications. In search of better educational opportunities, some parents from surrounding rural villages rent basic rooms for their children to share while they go to school in Cusco. Evoking images of Peter Pan’s “lost boys,” these elementary-age children, mostly boys, are left to their own devices to care for themselves and one another and survive.

But with the help of Niños’ Hotels and Foundations, these children have found a support system. In addition to the children van den Berg and her husband adopted, 34 other children live with three adopted families supported by Niños.

Each room in the hotel is named in honor of one of the adopted niños (our room was named “Jose”); the staff knows all of them well and can tell their stories, pointing out different children in the smiling black-and-white photos decorating the bright halls. The Foundation also operates two “children’s restaurants” in the city, serving 500 street children a hot meal six days a week. The restaurants are hopeful, empowering places, with flowers on the table and full place settings. They have expanded to provide even more support, offering medical and dental care (children can see a doctor when they are sick, get cavities filled, etc.), a warm shower, assistance with school work, and a place to play soccer and other sports.

On our last morning in the city, we rise early to the church bells in the nearby plaza. We wander the hotel’s courtyard a final time, making our way to reception to check out. The thick, wooden front door of the hotel is open; sunlight and the noise of an awaking city stream in. Sitting inside the doorway is a basket of fresh bread. I mistake it for a delivery for the hotel guests’ breakfast. Then I see a small hand reach through the doorway. A young boy grabs a loaf – his breakfast – gives us a quick smile, and is gone, off into the streets toward whatever awaits him.

For more information on Niños Hotels and Foundations, go to www.ninoshotel.com. To learn how you can contribute to the Passport blog, contact the Globe's assistant foreign editor, Kenneth Kaplan, at k_kaplan@globe.com.