Mental health team tries to get child quake victims to smile, play

Published: 2007-08-29

PISCO, Peru (CNS) -- When Carlos Cortez arrived in Pisco days after the city was struck by a magnitude 8 earthquake, he was particularly struck by the children in one of the tent cities set up for people who had been left homeless. "They didn't speak, didn't smile, didn't play," he said. Cortez, a member of a mental health team from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru in Lima, took that as a challenge. He started by organizing a pickup soccer game with some teens. A handful of youngsters wandered over, curious, and he saw his chance, sweeping them up into a conga line to play "train," winding up and down the rows of tents that will be their home for months. More kids joined the train, which led to a round of Simon Says, other games and art sessions. In the wake of the disaster that struck the towns of Canete, Chincha, Pisco and Ica, along the Panamerican Highway about 150 miles south of the Peruvian capital of Lima, children are struggling to adapt to a new way of life.

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