How working in a Brazilian soup kitchen transformed my life
Devoted: Bridget Freyne, is committed to helping people of the shanty town she lives near in South America
Bridget Freyne needed a holiday. Like all young doctors, she'd been working long hours and they were taking their toll. She'd also been studying hard for upcoming paediatrics exams.
She was looking for somewhere she could let her hair down and forget about medicine -- just for a fortnight.
The town of Itacare, on Brazil's northern coast, seemed the ideal destination. Having discovered it on the internet, photos of its beautiful beaches proved irresistible.
And the icing on the cake? It had a surf school.
"I had wanted to learn to surf for ages. Itacare has miles of white, sandy beaches and it just seemed idyllic," says Bridget.
And it was. Long days on the beach were followed by nights in the town's lively bars, learning the local 'forro' dance moves.
But it wasn't all picture-postcard perfection. "Just behind the tourist area, surrounded by five-star hotels, was this massive shanty town," says Bridget (29). "The contrast was huge."
Bridget returned from her two-week holiday, but found that she couldn't put Itacare out of her mind.
Thanks to her Australian mum, Bridget had always been drawn to the laid-back lifestyle of surfing towns -- and she'd always wanted a beach home of her own.
Five weeks later, in December 2006, she found herself back in Itacare, putting down a deposit for a beach house.
"My friends thought I was mad. They were all paying half a million euro for apartments in Dublin, and here I was buying a house on the beach in Brazil for seventy grand. But I thought it would be a good investment."
Having begun a Masters degree in international health, Bridget was due to begin a stint on a medical project in Uganda the following summer.
The intervening months were spent in Itacare, working on her thesis -- and her surfing.
As she got to know the locals, Bridget was introduced to Marcio Carvalho and Wanderson Panniset, known as Marcilho and Sagaez. The two men opened up their homes every Saturday as a soup kitchen for up to 50 local kids.
Bridget began helping out, and quickly realised what an important role it played in the lives of children from the favela (the local term for shanty town), many of whom lived in abysmal poverty.
The town of Itacare was once, like most of the surrounding Bahia region, economically dependent on its cocoa crops. But since a devastating blight destroyed the crops during the 1980s, Bahia has turned to tourism as its main source of income. Itacare is lucky: its beaches and lush rainforests have spawned a thriving eco-tourist industry that has turned the resort into one of Brazil's most appealing high-end tourist destinations.
But for the employees of the glitzy resorts, the five-star lifestyle is a world away from the reality they face as they return each night to the favela.
While Brazil has a booming economy fuelled by its wealth of natural resources and commodities, recent estimates show that of the country's 170 million people, 46 million live on less than $1 a day.
'People come to Itacare from all over the state for work in the hotels and bars or in the local fishing industry, but there aren't enough jobs for everyone," says Bridget.
Local estimates put the figures living in the shacks at between 15,000 and 20,000. Conditions are grim.
"Not everyone has a safe electricity supply. Some people might have a few light bulbs, but no running water," says Bridget.
"Other shacks simply have two walls, a plastic roof and a dirt floor. You could have six kids in the one room."
The soup kitchen was a lifeline for kids who had little else. Apart from providing a nourishing meal, Marcilho and Sagaez offered an escape from the increasing violence on the streets outside. As the favela grew in size, with it had come the inevitable rise in rapes, shootings and muggings. Drugs, particularly crack cocaine, were an increasing problem. Domestic abuse was rife.
"Being out on the streets is a very precarious environment for these kids. Finding a place for them where they could be safe was important," says Bridget. Gradually, the soup kitchen took on an educational role. Volunteers offered classes in English and Spanish. With an education system creaking under the weight of increased numbers, many of the kids were illiterate. Volunteers offered one-to-one tuition to help them keep up.
Back home in Ireland, Bridget's friends were settling into hospital jobs and further study. But she was beginning to feel at home in South America.
"I thought I was blending right in. But then when my first broadband bill arrived, it was addressed to: Bridget Gringa (white girl), The Centre, Itacare.' I quickly realised I wasn't blending in as much as I thought!
"But everyone was so friendly and fun-loving. The locals treated me as family. If anything went wrong, they immediately helped me out."
And professionally, the opportunity to work one-one-one with the children who needed the most help was something Bridget couldn't turn down.
"Someone told us about 14-year-old Romario, who'd been in a fight and had ended up in a coma and paralysed on one side," she recalls.
"He needed to be looked after when he was released from hospital. But home was a wooden shack with no latrine, no running water, three younger sisters and an unemployed mum with mental health issues. He had terrible bedsores because there was no-one there to look after him. He dropped out of school.
"I started doing physio with him and took him to the local naturopath. Then we got him signed up back into school."
After six months in Itacare, it was time to go to Uganda. There Bridget worked in a HIV clinic for children.
"It was so different to Brazil. Poverty in Africa is determined by international factors, and by HIV, whereas in Brazil the poverty sits beside this enormous wealth, so it is similar to the problems that poor people face in Irish urban society.
"There's a lot of frustration, and crime, drug and alcohol problems which you don't see in Uganda."
After nine months in Africa, Bridget returned to Itacare with a wealth of experience that she put to good use in the favela, becoming involved in sexual health programmes for teenage girls.
There, with Marcilho and Sagaez, she came up with the idea for a new charity, Association Punho Forte. The initial goal was to fund a community centre that the children could use throughout the week for studying and socialising.
In the New Year, Bridget will move to Itacare for at least a year to continue working on the project.
"Having seen in Africa how big projects can get sidetracked by bureaucracy, I've become a strong believer in community projects that offer a real chance to make a difference," she says.
"The tough part is missing everyone at home, but I've met great people. People say to me, you're so good to be doing this. But I enjoy it. I'm not a martyr. It's like any job. If you enjoy it, it's worth doing."
And the surfing? "My surfing is diabolical. It is the hardest thing to learn. I've had 10 stitches in my head and cracked a bone in my wrist. But I'm still trying!"
