Carlos Julio Bernales Pinedo

The first steps in Lima

I know about life in the slums from my own experience, as I spent twelve years of my childhood in Ventanilla, Lima. Now I have set up the Estación Esperanza project there together with my wife Miriam. I understand the challenges that people face. Thanks to my contacts, we find open doors and people place their trust in us.

Even during the years when I didn’t live in the slums, I volunteered as a youth leader in a Protestant parish. I also looked after the worries and needs of the homeless in Lima. I consider it a great blessing that I was able to found and now lead an aid project.

Thanks to a stable family and the church community, in which we were heavily involved, neither I nor my two siblings got off on the wrong foot. Not only that… Thanks to the support of my sister, who was 10 years older than me, my brother and I were able to prepare for the state university entrance exam at a preparatory institute. After two years of catching up on school material (everything you don’t learn in a state school, unfortunately), I passed the exam and was able to attend the state university free of charge for five years.

Even if you are from the slums, you can get out of the poverty spiral. But some factors are important and we, as Estación Esperanza, want to promote these as much as possible:

• – A group to which you feel you belong
• – Confidants
• – A helping hand (in rare cases, e.g. financial support for education)
• – A healthy family environment