Drug Addicts in Brazil

07/10/11-07/11/11

After attending Videira on Sunday night I had to walk home because I had given all my money away in the missions offering. As I walked home on what would be considered a cold night in Goiania, I saw a young black man with no shirt on walking on the sidewalk in front of me. All he was wearing was board shorts and he was so skinny that he looked almost like a starving person in Africa. He was barefoot, his pubic hairs were coming out of his sagging board shorts, and he was filthy from head to toe.
As soon as he saw me coming he tried to hide himself by pretending like he was calling someone at a telephone booth, which are called orelhaos here in Brazil because they are shaped in the form of a huge ear. At first, I felt slightly suspicious that he was going to rob me, but then I thought twice about his condition and I was deeply moved with compassion for him. I walked right up to him and introduced myself and he told me that his name was Welton. I asked him if I could talk to him about Jesus and he quickly agreed by sitting down on the cement sidewalk. I sat down with him and we began talking.
Within one minute another street kid approached us and asked me with some attitude, “Hey, are you of Jesus (literal translation)?”
“Yes. I follow Jesus. Do you follow Jesus?”
He went on to tell me that he used to follow Jesus, but he stopped following Jesus a few years ago. His name is Caio. He was not nearly as sickly looking as his friend Welton and he was fully clothed with pants, a t-shirt, and some sandals. His clothes were extremely dirty and his hair was messy, but he looked like a normal young person otherwise.
“Where do you guys live?” I asked them.
“Right here,” Welton responded, “I sleep over there.” He pointed to a dark corner next to a shop. Later on I saw the mattresses and blankets they slept on in that dark corner.
Here are their stories:
Welton began doing drugs at a young age and eventually he started smoking cocaine. He became so invalid and crazy that he is no longer accepted in his home. He is only 19 and he can’t even remember how many years he has lived on the street. He still occasionally visits his family when he is sober to play some video games and spend time with them. They only live a couple miles away from where we were sitting. I was shocked. He said that his family can’t handle him and he can’t get off of drugs. He described cocaine as the living incarnation of Satan destroying humanity and destroying his life. He knew that it was killing him and he didn’t want to do the drug anymore, but he was helpless to be free from the drug. He was so so hopeless. He was starving for food. All I had was $1 real, so I gave it to him. He thanked me and bought some blow-pops with it. He came back, gave Caio one lollipop, and offered me one, but, of course, I didn’t want to take his only food.
He spent a short amount of time in a drug rehab program, but he eventually left because he couldn’t overcome his addiction.
Caio is 21 and he has been living on the street for about 6 months. He first smoked weed when he was 11-years-old. In high school, he began smoking heavier drugs and all of his friends warned him to not smoke hard drugs. He said that most of those friends all sell drugs and smoke them too. He has now been out of prison for a total of 4 years of his life and the jails here in Brazil are a much harsher, poorer reality than in the U.S. He attended Jovens Livres, my cousins ministry, for a year and two months and he was given the opportunity to study at their seminary to become a pastor. He chose not to go since it was 3 years long and in the middle of the country in another state. After getting out of Jovens Livres he stayed sober for five more months. His girlfriend liked to party and liked to drink, so she would always offer him beer. Eventually, he decided to drink a little bit. He soon began to drink regularly. This led to him to smoke cigarettes on occasion and eventually he began using drugs. Now he said that he is worse off than he was before. Part of him doesn’t believe that he’ll ever get off of drugs, but another part of him wants to go through a drug rehab program again and be set free completely.
We talked for about two hours. I shared the Gospel with them and told them about the power of God to set them free from drugs. I challenged them to get their lives straight and gives their lives completely over to Jesus. I shared Jay Koopman’s testimony with them to show them what God is able to do with an ex-drug addict who dedicates his life to God. They were extremely hungry for everything I shared with them and received everything wholeheartedly. They were amazed by Jay’s story and expressed their deep desires to truly follow Jesus. They hated the life they were living and they desperately wanted God to change their lives, but they felt so hopeless that nothing could deliver them from cocaine. Also, they said now they smoke Oxy too.
They described to me the drug scene here. It’s very different than in the U.S. They said crack just arrived in Goiania about four or five years ago. Since then, they claim that it has destroyed all of Goiania. There are certain alleys where the drug dealers sell drugs and they sell a rock of cocaine for $10 reals and a rock of Oxy for $2 reals. What was very interesting to me is that, according to these young men, the drug scene here in Goiania is not associated with violence. Gangs do not exist in Goiania. The only gangs here are the “torcidas organizadas” or organized soccer fans. The drug dealers here don’t have a reputation of killing people, harassing their clients, or of leading networks of organized crime. They simply receive the drugs and sell them to make money.
Also, the cops here are very violent and corrupt. They told me stories of several times that they were beaten by cops with batons for doing drugs. Caio told me that once him and a friend stole something and the cops caught them. In order to confess where they had robbed the items from they took them to the woods and put four tires around each one of them. They threatened to light them on fire to burn them alive if they didn’t confess. Finally, Caio’s friend confessed and they were immediately taken to prison.
Moreover, Caio described to me the situation of the jails in Brazil. He told me that jail is where drugs abound the most and where crime abounds the most. I asked him how it was possible for drugs to be so common in the jails if the cops are constantly watching the criminals. He said it’s because some of them get bought out by drug dealers, so that they allow him to bring drugs to the jail.
Lastly, I asked them how they survived on the street because they had mentioned that they never beg for money. They told me that they get paid to “protect cars” and that gets them lots of money. This is a very common, yet corrupt, practice in Brazil. When lots of cars park in a certain place for any event or even randomly on a street there is almost always a random guy there who tells them that he will protect their car from being robbed. The guy really does stand there for however long needed and watch your car for you. Then when you return to your vehicle you usually pay the person 2 or 3 reals. If he watches ten cars an hour he could get 20 or 30 reals an hour. That’s about 12 to 18 dollars an hour. That is really good pay for a homeless, drug addict. Most people here in Brazil hate this “service” but they usually have to pay because their car will get keyed if they don’t or the person with harass them with words and threats until they finally give them something. The authorities do nothing about this practice because they think that it’s good that at least the poor are trying to work and are providing a level of security to the city. Some of these people really are legit workers with uniforms, but some of them are homeless drug addicts.
Furthermore, they said there is a local restaurant that gives them free lunch every day. At night, they don’t need to eat because that is when they do their drugs and the drugs kills their hunger. Then around 3 or 4 in the morning they go to a local bakery and ask the bakery for bread. Every day the bakery throws them a bag full of freshly baked bread. Also, the cops don’t bother them at all for sleeping on the streets, but if they are caught smoking the drug then they get beat up and put in jail.
At the end of it all they both made of promise to God that they would go through a drug rehab program. Then I prayed over them both and cast the demons out of them.
It was already 10:30 p.m., so I called my grandma on the payphone to ask if someone could pick me up. Andre eventually picked me up.

The next morning I went to Videira at 7 a.m. for a prayer meeting and to meet with a Videira pastor to talk with him about GGM. The prayer meeting was excellent, but, unfortunately, the pastor never showed up. So I decided to walk home. On the way, I preached the Gospel to two more drug addicts. One wanted to go to a drug rehab desperately, but the other one didn’t believe in rehabs.
Videira has a drug rehab and since Jovens Livres is currently booked, I told everyone I talked to today and yesterday to go to Videira’s rehab program. Both of these addicts were young men too. One was a former computer programmer. None of the addicts that I saw were old.