slice of life

I'm on the bus, coming up the hill after some grocery shopping. A young girls strikes up conversation, asking me what my name is. I think she is asking me if I'm going to Nueva Suyapa, so I keep saying "si". We giggle when I finally say Anna and she tells me she is also named Ana.

Once the bus clears out near the U, I sit down in an empty seat and she sits next to me. She says she knows me, that she has seen me before. Over a box of raisins that I pull out of the grocery sack, she readily tells me about herself:

she is 12

her mom and baby brother Manuel are in another seat farther back

(pause to go give them some raisins, I keep her seat safe with my backpack)

she live in Flores de Oriente (one of the roughest parts of NS)

they are on their way home after going to "recoger unos cipotes" (to pick up some kiddos)....

...at the INFA office, (a couple of her siblings at the gov. office where kids go when their parents can't or aren't allowed to take care of them)

her favorite food is spaghetti

she is in 3rd grade

do I know Jorge?

who?

you know, el gordito, he lives by me?

no, i don't know Jorge

do you know the "such and such center"?

no, where is it?

i used to be there.

oh, did you live there?

yes.

with other kids?

yes, i liked it.

thanks for the raisins she says, they usually go with milk, right?

sure, i say.