Our Amigo, Luis

I always knew I liked 8 year olds. This fact was reaffirmed as Reade and I were sitting down to a nice meal at the only Irish Pub in Antigua. All types of merchants walk right off the streets, into restaurants hoping to peddle their treasures to unsuspecting tourists and this is allowed in all but the fanciest of establishments. A little Guatemalan boy, carrying a heavy basket on his head, approached us hoping to sell us some of his over-priced apples. After I bargained down to a remotely reasonable rate, we exchanged money for apples and began a conversation. In reality, we did not want the apples, as we will be leaving Antigua in a few days, but this was an adorable little boy and the idea of sending him away (while he was trying to actually earn money honestly instead of begging for it) was heartbreaking. He was very dirty and smelly, his clothes were ripped, and he was clearly from a poor family. In all likelihood, his family relies heavily on his apple selling as part of their livelihood.

We found out that his name is Luis, and that he is the oldest of four or five children. His family does not have enough money to send him even to public school, so he spends his days on the streets trying to help contribute to the family income. When Luis plunked down at our table with us and asked for a soda, it became clear that the last thing in reality that Luis really wants to do is sell apples. He wants to play and make friends like any other 8 year old boy. Reade took out his camera to capture our new little friend on film, and Luis was instantly mesmerized. Within minutes, he had learned to operate our digital camera and had set out to take a picture of everything and everyone in the restaurant and on the street. Turns out this kid has a very good eye with the camera. At one point, he ran out to the street and the waiter, Reade, and I all thought he was taking off with our camera. He had only very innocently left momentarily, however, to take a beautiful picture of the arch which he proudly displayed to us when we showed up to retrieve the camera. You can never be too careful, though... they're not all that innocent.

As it happens, this was fabulous Spanish practice for both of us because Luis was very forgiving as we attempted to speak with him using our newly learned verb conjugations. It helped that after we left the restaurant, we bought him an ice cream cone (I'm sure his mom loved that we were allowing him to have so much sugar at 8:30 in the evening). We told him how smart he was and that he should really think about school. We talked to him about anything he was willing to talk about, and then we took some more pictures before our battery died. I would have loved to bring him home with us, but the time inevitably came when we had to part ways. He ran off down the street with the basket of apples on his head, and as he turned into another store, he swiveled around, enthusiastically waved at us, and then disappeared. Below are a few pictures of our date with Luis. Unfortunately, the flash was not working, so they're a little blurred but you'll get the idea.








*As a sidenote, our little buddy found us in Central Park several days later and greeted us both with a big bear hug. When we told him that we were leaving, he refused to smile for a picture. We think he was mad at us, which was kind of heartbreaking. He's pretty darn cute.*