I am somebody

By João Guilherme da Silva Simpolis (with Mariana Guerra)

Petrópolis, Brazil — Get back on my feet? What for? What’s the point if the only things I see are pain, suffering, injustice, and people in need? Why, if all around me fully grown men and women are barely surviving? They wake up and go off to exhausting jobs only to receive a minimal salary at the end of the month, with no hope of other prospects. Young people see their own dreams falling apart one after another; the lack of opportunities has completely paralyzed them. Children are getting a terrible education and are denied the possibility of taking control of their own lives.

I feel weak. I feel darkness around me. I feel no desire to get back on my feet. What for? My dreams have ceased to exist, and hope has left me. I had it once, but now everything has changed. When I was a child, I saw the world through a bright lens. I held on to the hope of one day going to university and having a profession. But today, now that the future has arrived, that lens has faded and all I see is darkness. Today, I no longer dream; now it seems a waste of time.

I wonder: if the world has no place for me, why do I exist? Why am I here? What is it that makes me get out of bed and live through this day? What could it be?

It took me a while, but now I have found the answer: it is faith. You can take everything away from me, but you can’t take away my faith: faith in God, in my family and friends, and in people who have the same faith in me. I have faith in life and in a better world — one that is fairer and more humane; faith in my mother’s love and in her unfaltering determination to see her children on the right path; faith that being somebody in this life is having dignity, and not success.

So I’m getting back on my feet because I have faith, because I am a human being just like you, and I can be happy and have an honorable life just like you. My mother had to go through many difficulties, yet she brought me up to be honorable. I am her creation and the result of the faith that kept her standing tall. I am the fruit of all her efforts and hopes. I am somebody.