sweeping it under the rug. ... ?

In the neighborhood. (watch the video.)

So, these train tracks are one of the saddest sights of my everyday in Rio. I cross them daily to leave or enter my neighborhood. And as the reporter says in the video, these crack users are children, women, pregnant women, men... all kinds. Yesterday, a tall man lying on the sidewalk just outside the favela entrance, with a big stuffed Pooh bear by his feet... comfort? I see dozens of bodies on sidewalks, every day. I look at their faces to see if they are people I know, kids I have hugged. They usually aren't. There are just so many. ...

The reporter also says that the spread of addiction is moving much faster than the government's efforts to deal with it. Only four shelters for addicts in the city. Users are rounded up, brought in to the police station, and let go again. What's the point?

And,

ladies and gentlemen,

the world is coming to Rio.

2014, World Cup. 2016, summer Olympics. What's to be done?

There are rumors among the street people here in Rio (and I must say, their rumors about the government’s dealings with them have a way of proving true, or close to true)

that a giant prison is being constructed on the nearby island of Ilha Grande, a tremendous ‘shelter’ where all the ‘harvested’ street dwellers and crack addicts will be thrown over the years and months approaching the World Cup and Olympics. All of them together. All of them away from the eyes of the world and the media, on an island accessible only by boat and plane.

Imagine all the ‘crackheads’ without their crack, all the street kids tossed in with the adults, with the dealers, kingpins with petty criminals…if this place is real, it will be a hell on earth for those inside. Who would agree to work at such a place? What kind of help will be offered the inmates? … Please, when you see any features on the upcoming World Cup or Olympics, write to local, national and international newspapers, magazines, and websites, urging them to investigate Rio’s preparations. It doesn't have to be a long, complicated letter. Just ask what's going on. Ask them to do their jobs. Don’t let these things go on under the table.

Don’t let them be done violently and at the last minute. The bodies I see on the sidewalks…these people are lost. And, yes, they are criminals. But they are people. The world's arrival here could be an opportunity for well-planned change. For hope, at least for a few caught in the ditch of crack addiction, wandering the streets. Do whatcha can. Please, write, and

pray.