Denis was fourteen when his father was arrested (Alex, profiled earlier) and eventually put away for some sixty-eight years. Being fourteen is tough enough without having to deal with your father disappearing for a lot of bad reasons. Denis’s father was not a great father as he had other families and told a lot of lies about everything. He contributed nothing financially to the family and not much emotionally but he was still the boy’s father.
Educating Denis was a challenge as he had had no pre-school education and his primary school was pretty basic. He finally flourished in a home schooling program along with tutoring and managed to gain his bachillerato, or high school diploma. Though he talked about university, maybe a physical therapist, maybe an architect, he was woo’ed by the offer of jobs that were badly paid and involved manual labor. As often happens here he was, now and then, cheated out of his pay. He liked working for an architect but that job moved some distance away and, being the only man in his household, Denis felt that he could not leave his family.
Not too long ago Denis finally got a job with a respected grocery store chain. The downside was that his place of employment is some twenty miles from the village where he lives. Six days a week he travels on a motorcycle on a highway that is dangerous for a number of reasons. On occasion he has been called on to aid accident victims on his way to or from work. He makes very little money for his six long workdays each week. Yes, that is what it is like when there are no unions. But gladly he likes the job and the people he works for and I am sure they like him as he is responsible, honest, hardworking and shows up on time. The hope is that soon he will be able to transfer to another location closer to his home. At one point with a friend there was talk of going to the United States because the travel to and from the job was just not worth the money. I am certain the the current political climate in the US has put that idea to rest.
Last weekend on his way home from work Denis and two friends were robbed at gunpoint on that dangerous highway. Though he was left with his motorcycle (and only his motorcycle) he lost his backpack, two weeks of pay, his cell phone, his vehicle registration, his national identity card, his lunch, his driver’s license and other important documents. He pleaded with the thieves to leave him with his documents and just take his money but it was to no avail.
It is that kind of ugliness that makes one understand why many want to flee. It is that kind of ugliness that makes me wonder why so many human beings are so cruel to each other.
His employer has yet to give Denis a day off during the week so that he might recover his license, vehicle registration, identity card and more. I replaced his backpack and his cell phone but without a weekday off of work he cannot recover his sim chip. Hopefully, going forward Denis will not carry all of his documents in his backpack as no one can assure him that it won’t all happen again.
So sad what happened to Denis. Thank heaven he has Joan in his life.