A Week of Celebrating Sheila

First up was Sheila's first birthday party which we threw on Monday, August 30th. Sheila was so excited that she barely slept the night before. This celebration was so that her sister-in-law and her kids could attend since it was a national holiday of Santa Rosa. Unfortunately, five minutes before 1:00, when everyone was supposed to arrive, we received the phone call that they couldn't make it because they were sick. It was especially sad because early that day, Sheila kept telling Magda and I, "They aren't going to come. I know no one's going to come to my party." Rejections and let downs.

Luckily, Magda made frantic calls to some of the women from Pastoral and, being the caring and generous women they are, they came for the birthday lunch. Instead, we turned it into a celebration of Santa Rosa so Sheila wouldn’t feel so bad. It worked. The day turned out lovely. We ate lots, danced a little and laughed a lot.

On Thursday, we had Sheila’s real birthday party, starting with a lunch with the Sisters from the house in Las Delicias. For lunch, there was Aji de gallina, one of Sheila’s favorite dishes. At the end of the lunch, we brought out Sheila’s presents and birthday cake, and Sheila had us do the tradition of passing the candle from one person to the next until it came back to her. We chatted and then danced. Sheila absolutely loves music and loves to dance (especially Huayno, a traditional dance of people from the mountains). She can out-dance everyone with her Huayno, moving her feet to the music so fast it’s exhausting both to do and to watch. Haha.

Before long, her “aunts” and friends from the parish started arriving to join in the celebration. No one left without dancing a bit. “No cake for you if you don’t dance,” Sheila said, laughing. Most of her “aunts” and “grandmas” are actually just paisanos that lived in the same village as Sheila’s family and knew her parents; people who have long since moved to Lima, fleeing from the Sendero Luminoso, or rebel terrorist group that began in the 1980s and were largely concentrated in Ayacucho.

Many of these “tias” took Sheila in off and on over the years. But Sheila never stayed with them; she was always restless and wandering…

To our delight, more than 20 people came to join in the celebration of Sheila’s life. It was nice for her to see just how special she is. This was her very first time actually celebrating her birthday; she’s never had any parties, cakes or presents on her birthday. One of the favorite things for us was seeing Sheila acting like an adult, joining in conversations and insisting her guests eat more by serving trays of food. It was a full day of celebration; from a 1 o’clock lunch to 9 at night when the last guests left after more dancing and cleaning up.

But the celebration didn’t stop there. A couple days later, Saturday, was Sheila’s baptism. Many of her aunts came, as well as a few friends from the parish. The Baptism was really beautiful and Sheila was glowing with happiness. For the past couple of months, she has kept nagging Magda about her baptism. Since she can’t read and has a hard time learning by teacher-style lectures, Magda talked to her about Jesus and bought her a nice DVD on the life of Jesus so she could prepare for baptism. Father Jose, from the church here in Tupac, welcomed Sheila to get baptized along with the others. Finally, her wish had come true.

The baptism had a nice human touch thanks to Father Jose who preaches at the church here in Tupac. He is originally from Ireland connects well with the people here with his down-to-earth nature. Everyone attending the service kept commenting on how funny Father Jose was, using his hands to pour water onto the young people during the baptism. After Sheila got baptized with water, lit her candle, got affirmations declared by her godmother, and got anointed with oil, she was officially baptized.

Afterwards, everyone came back to our house to eat, drink and chat. The best part was that all of Sheila’s aunts could come together and see the difference in Sheila; and remember how they have a bit of responsibility in caring for her. Though she’s had a really tough life, Sheila is so lucky in the fact that she found such a generous, lovely, affectionate person like Sister Magda for a “ma”; Magda gives unconditional love, something Sheila’s never had in her life.

Finally, on Sunday, since her kids never made it to her birthday, we went to visit them in Callao, a nearly 2-hour trek with 2 kombis (small van type bus), 1 carro (small bus) and a moto (motorcycle type vehicle with a small carriage in the back) to get there. That part of Lima is a shanty town, none of the houses having running water and other amenities. It is a town surrounded by fields of vegetables.

I really enjoyed meeting her sister-in-law and her kids and especially Sheila’s kids, a boy who’s nine and a girl who’s six! They ran up right away to greet us with kisses and big smiles. At first, Jose played with his presents of stuffed animals and snuggled up close to Magda. After seeing his sister playing with it, Jose attached himself to my camera and took dozens of photos of anything and everything, while Micheli played with the musical ballerina Sheila gave her (a present from her own birthday) and sat on everyone’s laps, giving us hugs and whispering secrets to us. It was a really precious couple of hours. Marta, the sister-in-law, was really nice and hospital and sent us off with bellies full of lomo saltado with rice and a gift of leeks (which I made into a yummy leek-potato soup!)

The thing that impresses me the most is the love that Sheila has for her kids, always thinking about them; how she needs to save her money to give to them, about how their well-being is. She has a mother’s generous heart when it comes to her kids, wanting to give them even more than she can, offering her bracelet to her daughter that was a gift, thrusting a few soles into Marta’s hand for her kids. Right before we set off to their house, Sheila insisted and was set on buying a canister of milk powder full of vitamins to take to her kids. Her kids are one thing that keep her going. She’s even generous enough to give another woman, even if it is her sister-in-law, the title of “mother” to her kids. She accepts that they have two mothers now. The time that she’s had to reflect since she has been separated from her kids has given her time to think about the type of mother she wants to be. Right now, it seems that Sheila is also changing the person she is becoming. We can only hope that she keeps blossoming even more into the affectionate, humorous, compassionate person that she is.