t/w: politics, food, economy
hello, everyone! in case you don’t know me, my name’s monserrat, i’m 19 years old, i live in chile, south america and this is my blog. it’s a pleasure to meet you all ♡
i’ve been here as @/cheolmates for a year or so, but i’ve been on the tumblr community since 2014. i can’t believe it’s been almost 5 years now!
as i’ve said before and you might have heard it on the old days from the lips of a wise old man:
“I come from Chile, a small country, where history, land and man are united in a great national feeling”.
my country is a long and narrow piece of land, with the most beautiful sunsets you’ve ever seen and even though our weather is a little bit cold, our people are kind and warm and will always treat you like you’re a part of their family.
our president has even said that:
“In the middle of this convulsed Latin America, let’s take a look at Chile, our country is a real oasis with a steady democracy”
if we talk about economy, my country does sound like an oasis. in fact, according to the World Bank: “Chile has been one of Latin America’s fastest-growing economies in recent decades thanks to a solid macroeconomic framework, which enabled the country to cushion the effects of a volatile international context and reduce the population living in poverty (on US$ 5.5 per day) from 30% in 2000 to 6.4% in 2017″.
so looking back at it… chile really does sound like an oasis, doesn’t it?
good weather, kind people, a growing economy…
well, it’s only like that on the surface, it’s only like that for a few people.
our economy grows, but only on one side, while the other becomes more and more poor as time passes:
the 1% of our population owns the 25% of the country’s wealth.
the 50% of our population lives with the minimum wage: $301.000 CLP ($394 US)
on average, we have to pay $249.700 CLP (even more than that) for rent, $422.515 CLP for food (if we’re talking about a family with 4 people) and $30.900 CLP for transportation. we’re talking about $703.115 CLP per month ($922 US) and we’re not even including education, clothes, entertainment, gas nor basic services. $ 703.115 CLP. half of our people live with only $301.000 CLP
i could tell you even more facts about how unfair our economy is, about how our people are being killed and mutilated for fighting for our rights, about how our government is turning a deaf ear to our claims, but i won’t, not for now.
this time, i want to show you my situation and i want to ask you for help, even though i feel ashamed for asking that.
there are four people living in my house: my mother, my two siblings and me (and my precious dog, of course)
the only income we receive comes from my mother: she earns $900.000 CLP per month ($1182 US) and we have to pay $260.000 CLP for rent and $38.000 CLP on common expenses. that makes $298.000 CLP ($391 US), almost 1/3 of our income. if we talk about food, personal hygiene items and cleaning, we spend $363.480 CLP ($477 US). there it goes another 1/3 of our income. we also have to pay for water, gas and electricity: $113.000 ($148 US). we spend $774.480 ($1017 US) per month plus transportation, which is almost $40.000 ($52 US), so in a month we have to pay $814.000 ($1069 US) and we still have to pay two bills of $300.000 each (we had to get into debts for my siblings to go to uni and for us to be able to rent a home); my mother has to pay them or else we might get in trouble, so sometimes we just run out of money to buy groceries. we don’t have enough money to buy clothes or video games or things like that without getting into more debts, which is one of the main reasons we as a country keep going with our manifestations.
the things is that the month has only begun and we ran out of groceries.
we won’t have breakfast nor lunch for tomorrow.
we don’t even have enough money to leave or house, but that doesn’t stop us from going to protests and fight for our rights!
i took some photos and i’m really ashamed to show them to other people, but i want them to know that i’m not lying
i’ve talked to my friends about it, and i know that even not having groceries, i am a lucky girl: i have a warm bed, i have internet, basic services and a loving family, but i’m tired and i can’t fight this on my own.
even though i am ashamed, i need help.
if you can’t help me monetarily, you can help me by spreading this post.
you can help me here!
https://paypal.me/cheolmates
i’m so sorry if i made someone felt uncomfortable, that wasn’t my intention :(
have a lovely day, everyone!
P.D: i’ll share photos of my kitchen under the cut. as you can see, we ran out of rice, pasta, meat, pulses, fruits and vegetables.
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