“Prosperity. Equality. Hope. Love. Happiness. Thank you Peru.”

This Venezuelan man cleans and decorates a major highway overpass every morning in Lima. He sweeps and mops it daily. Other Venezuelans do the same. Lima does not have city-wide beautification programs, so many Venezuelans demonstrate their gratefulness to Peru by cleaning the streets themselves. This is one way of saying thank you for their new home. This home, however, can also be one that includes housing discrimination, worker exploitation, and extreme poverty.

For much longer than many countries, Peru opened its borders to Venezuelan refugees without reservation. Yet over time, as the number of refugees grew, so did a system of inequality, hierarchy and discrimination. Venezuelans often work seven days a week, with no sick days and no guarantee of being paid. If they miss a day due to illness or extreme circumstances, many expect to be fired. They survive in harsh and dangerous conditions, and most work far below their levels of career training in Venezuela.

These stories are unfortunately familiar to refugees all over the world, including in the United States. Yet against the odds, these Venezuelans still want to take care of their new home. They still say thank you. And no matter what happens each day, they still live with grateful attitudes and hope for something new.

His sign translates “We wish you a 2020 full of love, peace, blessings, harmony, hope, strength, faith, health, and dreams. God bless your home, to share with your family and friends one more year. Thank you Peru. There are more of us good guys.”

“Love Locks” are a custom in which padlocks are affixed to a fence, gate or bridge to symbolize everlasting love. When Angelo walked past this lock one day in downtown Lima, the bright Venezuelan flag compelled him to stop. Symbols like this represent a lot to a Venezuelan displaced in an unfamiliar country.

Millions like Angelo fled Venezuela out of unwillingness to settle, and hope for a better life. They show gratefulness every day to one of the few remaining countries to open its borders to Venezuelan refugees. And while Peru is no longer welcoming Venezuelans with open arms, people like Angelo still work tirelessly out of hope for a better day. All the while holding onto an everlasting love for their home country in their hearts.

 “When I think of ‘hallacas’ I think of my grandmother. I think of the smell of smoked leaves and roasted olives. I think of Venezuela,” Kimberly smiled as she kneaded the giant bowl of cornmeal.

Today, displaced Venezuelan families who have resettled in Lima, Peru gathered to make a traditional Venezuelan holiday dish – hallacas (ah-YAH-kahs). As we stuffed, chopped, cut and wrapped the savory ingredients, the ladies told me more about the dish and what the tastes, smells, and traditions mean to them.

“To me, ‘hallaca’ means alegría y unión (happiness and togetherness),” Katherin chimed in. Her hands were covered in chopped red peppers as she tossed them into the bowl. “Every year our family would meet at my grandmother’s house to make hallacas together. For my family, we made the hallacas on the 23rd of December. It’s best if you let them sit for a day before cooking them. The flavor of the platano leaf seeps into the rest of the food, and it is so delicious.”

“Hallacas are made of things we eat every day in Venezuela,” Evelin explained as she cut the giant platano leaves into smaller squares  for wrapping. “Corn, carrots, pork, and pimentos are common for us. Green olives used to be common, but now they are very expensive, so we only eat them in December. We wait 12 months to make hallacas, and we usually eat them on December 24th and 31st.” 

Most of the Venezuelan families in the kitchen have not been able to make or enjoy hallacas since they fled to Peru for refuge two and three years ago. The abundance of food in the kitchen is a far cry from one meal a day they were eating just weeks ago before we met some of them.

“This is the first time I have made hallacas since leaving Venezuela two years ago,” Mary explained. “Last year we couldn’t afford all the ingredients, and we couldn’t find the leaves to wrap them in, so we tried to wrap them in foil and cook them. It didn’t work! This year, I can tell, these are going to be delicious.”  

As salsa music played, the people couldn’t stop smiling and dancing. 

“Being able to make hallacas today represents something new and beautiful. We are all together — families from different countries sharing traditions together and making new ones. We are grateful for this time — for the hallacas and the friendships. And we are very thankful for a new beginning.”

Thank you for helping build community through experiences like these. Because of your help, these families spent the holidays safe and happy. Donate here to help them continue rebuilding their lives!

By Gwen Brown

“Every family has a story. Welcome to ours.”

This simple and authenticated sign greets me every time I enter my friends’ home in Lima, Peru. It couldn’t be more beautiful or more true. Every person who is part of this family adds to the history and its richness. And everyone is welcome! 

Jason and Becca moved to Lima over a year ago when our service work expanded from Cusco to Peru’s capital. They have since opened their home to our friends from Cusco, 10 Venezuelan refugees, and my huge-hearted gringo friends who come to serve! 

Coming here feels like coming home. Thanks to the sentiment behind the sign, it feels that way to every. single. one who walks through the door. Every story is a miracle and every story somehow flows into the next as this tapestry of love is knitted together through hard circumstances and healing conversations. One of those miracles is a young single mom who walked 11 days to safety. Soon after arriving in Lima, Katherine delivered a premature, BEAUTIFUL miracle baby after fleeing an abusive relationship as well as the threats surrounding her in her country. 

My plan was to spend a week or 10 days supporting the daily efforts by digging in with life coaching and just to help these ones who have been through so much to get a shot at a new and better life. Love has come to these people and because of it, they are loving one another in incredible ways. They help one another and live together like family. There is no caste system, no judgment, no divide—just looking after one another’s things and children as if they were their own. What happens in this house is truly a miracle! The love here is changing them and impacts me daily. 

My kids at home think about the kids here. They make gifts for them and pray for them as they go to bed. These family’s stories have become interwoven with my family’s story which is why my 10-day trip has now become 3 weeks. Even though I’d like to be home with my kids as the holidays approach, I haven’t been able to leave. Honestly, I have had thoughts come about what I’m missing out on–like setting up our first Christmas tree as a family of 6 and enjoying some of the cozy “comforts” this time of year brings in our world. 

But none of those things are as lasting as what’s happening here. These ones have lost so much, but their eyes are full of hope and promise instead of counting loss or looking back. They are why I’m spending my birthday south of the equator. And I couldn’t be happier about it.  

I’d like to invite you to be a part of the story, too. It’s a good one and your life will be richer and fuller for it.  


Join the story today by becoming a monthly donor. Also, check out Something New’s upcoming trips and plan a visit!

Right now, a five-story, empty building stands on Los Quechuas street in Lima, Peru. It has no kitchens or closets YET, but it begs to be filled with the laughter of families, salsa music, and the smells of arepas and lomo saltado (traditional dishes from Venezuela and Peru). 

As Kelvin toured the building last week he began to see himself and the people he loved filling up the living spaces — safe, fed and protected.

“The kids could play here and be safe!”

This building is a far cry from the 10×10 foot room where he, his wife Mary, and three daughters have been living. Because of the crime in their neighborhood, Mary and the girls stayed in their tiny room 24 hours a day. So the thought of space for his daughters to play comforted Kelvin’s mind. 

Kelvin had been a successful IT engineer before Venezuela’s economy crashed and left him jobless. Mary was studying mechanical engineering. When we met him last month in Lima, they were down to their last $1.60. They had been taking pain medicine to dull their hunger pains so they could give the little bit of food they had to their girls. They did not know what would happen next because his then-boss decided not to pay him at the end of the month. He has been working to set up concerts and other events—the only work he can find.

Thanks to your donations, we were able to get Kelvin and his family into safe, transitional housing, and got them food and diapers for the month. And at the building last week, Kelvin began to see hope for not just him and his family, but for his cousins, his daughters, and his friends. 

Friends like Angelo who we met driving a cab over a year ago. Even after driving 16 hours a day, six days a week, he was barely making enough to feed his wife and infant son two meals per day.

Together in 2020, we will provide a safe place to live for Kelvin, Angelo, and many others. We will expedite their professional credentials in Peru, others will finish University degrees and some will start on them. Mary and her friends will start a business so they can earn a living and also work together to raise their beautiful children. And each and every one of them will no doubt pay it forward.

Right now, the five-story building stands empty. With your help, we will fill it with families like Kelvin’s and Angelo’s–and with the joy, life, and COMMUNITY they bring with them.

If you have anything at all to give, please, please help us build.

We didn’t plan to establish Something New in Lima, and yet, here we are.

We started in Peru with a focus on moms and kids in Cusco who are continuing to learn day by day. They are fighting for better jobs and digging in to raise their kids rather than being overwhelmed by daily survival. Their lives are stabilizing as they find their way on the Nuevo Camino. Meanwhile, in Lima, we continue meeting young Venezuelan refugees. Not long ago, their lives looked a lot like yours and mine.

Until 2013, Venezuela was a thriving first-world nation producing much of the world’s oil. Today, it’s producing refugees.

The Venezuelan exodus now rivals the Syrian refugee crisis of 6.5 million people. Peru is now home to close to 1 million of the 5 million+ displaced Venezuelans. Many of them are young people—some right out of college, some forced to quit school, and others not able to get work in their professions without proper credentials in Peru. They are people like Brayan who left Venezuela with a one-way ticket and a backpack.

They did not want to leave their homes and they never thought something like this would happen in their country. Former geophysicists and accountants are now struggling to find work as taxi drivers and restaurant workers. Those working a job—any job—are the lucky ones. Resources are already stretched thin and refugees face the additional hardships that come from carrying an accent and facing rising resentment over their very presence.

We can’t solve the refugee crisis, but that’s not going to keep us from doing what we can do.

Right along with seeing how much needs to be done, we see how much more we can still do. We have 26 new friends from Venezuela and we meet more daily. I have a mantra from Frozen 2 ringing in my head as I write. At a moment when the task looks big and the way seems unclear, Anna decides to “do the next right thing.”

We will do the next right thing

One of our core values as an organization is to focus more on solutions than on the challenges. So “the next right thing” for us is to invest in a 5-story building in Lima. There, refugees will find safe housing and nourishing food to strengthen their malnourished bodies, along with support finding secure jobs.

Thank you for being a part of their story

We are so grateful for your support. Whether you attended Pinewood Realty’s Open House, helped us with Giving Tuesday, or can contribute to the newest urgent needs detailed below, thank you.

You are providing what these families crave most—the knowledge that they are seen and loved and cared for.