No matter occurred to ... the household who misplaced all of it? Spoiler alert: It is a comfortable ending

In August 2023, we shared the story of a household of three from São Paulo who had misplaced every little thing because of the pandemic. With no work, house, automobile or meals, and their younger son positioned along with his grandmother, they struggled to outlive. They spent nights on the ground at a transit hub and sometimes discovered beds in a shelter.

A program known as Vila Reencontro allowed them to maneuver right into a transitional tiny house and get entry to meals and social companies. Now, reunited, employed and settled right into a rental in a quiet neighborhood close to household, they’re regularly getting again on their ft.

We adopted as much as see how they’re doing now.

With fists held tight, Henrique rubs his eyes as he closes his bed room door and makes his technique to the kitchen to repair himself breakfast. The ten-year-old mumbles a “good morning” to his mother and pop as he passes by the lounge and offers his gray and white cat, affectionately named Psycho, a scratch on the pinnacle and below the chin.

Within the kitchen, he fills a glass with milk and scoops a heaping spoonful of chocolate powder into it earlier than giving it a stir and placing it within the microwave.

Henrique, son of Érica Lacerda de Souza and Bruce Lee de Souza, has breakfast on the sofa in his new house in Guaianazes, São Paulo. Once they misplaced their rental unit throughout the early days of the pandemic, Henrique went to stay along with his grandmother.

Gabriela Portilho for NPR

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Gabriela Portilho for NPR

“He at all times makes his personal breakfast,” says his mother, Erica Lacerda de Souza, as she watches him from the kitchen doorway, her husband, Bruce Lee Sousa, nodding in settlement from the sofa within the adjoining lounge. “It’s his job to deal with Psycho too. He places out his meals and water and makes certain the litter field is clear. I need him to be impartial and accountable.”

Only a yr in the past the trio was one in all 37 households every of whom had been residing in a tiny home within the downtown São Paulo neighborhood of Anhangabaú. It was a part of a municipal program known as Vila Reencontro, impressed by New York’s Housing First program from the Nineteen Nineties and one of many methods the Brazilian metropolis of 12 million was making an attempt to assist its rising variety of unhoused individuals, notably throughout the pandemic, get again on their ft. This system offers households with tiny houses for as much as 36 months together with entry to meals and social companies.

All is misplaced

Once they needed to shut their bodega due to pandemic laws and their different work dwindled — Lacerda de Souza’s as a cleaner and Lee Sousa’s at a automobile wash — they misplaced the home they rented and nearly every little thing in it. Whereas Henrique, who was then 6, was despatched to stay along with his maternal grandmother, the couple spent two weeks sleeping on the ground at São Paulo’s downtown Barra Funda Terminal — a central hub for metropolis transit — and months making their approach by town’s shelter and different momentary housing techniques earlier than studying about Vila Reencontro and being provided a tiny house.

Érica Lacerda de Souza helps her son, Henrique, repair his hair. She says that this is likely one of the boy’s vanities — he desires to ensure his curls look good earlier than heading off to highschool.

Gabriela Portilho for NPR

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Gabriela Portilho for NPR

There, Henrique was capable of stay with them once more, they usually had been supplied a slew of different alternatives, together with assist discovering everlasting housing and jobs.

Simply six months after transferring to the 194-square-foot house — barely smaller than a one-car storage — Lee Sousa was provided a spot in a piece program and began his job with town’s sanitation division — which he nonetheless has in the present day — final September. The trio additionally benefited from a metropolis housing program that allowed them to flip by a listing of potential houses out there to lease so they might select what can be the perfect match for his or her household.

A brand new starting

After seeing a number of choices, they determined to go along with their spacious house within the east-end neighborhood of Guaianases, which they’ve now been in for about two months. It’s removed from downtown, however Lacerda de Souza says it’s what she prefers.

Érica Lacerda de Souza hangs on the wall of her home the one image she has of her household — taken throughout a stroll in Villa Lobos Park in an upscale space of town. All the opposite photos she had of her household had been misplaced after they misplaced their house.

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Gabriela Portilho for NPR

“I like residing in a quiet, household neighborhood,” she says. “Right here I can stroll to the grocery store, there’s a bakery across the nook and Henrique doesn’t have far to go to highschool. We’re so much nearer to my mother’s home now too, so it’s simple for her to return go to or for Henrique to go spend time along with her.”

The housing program can pay their lease for the following two years and has already helped them furnish their new house, offering them with a desk, a mattress, armoires and a fridge. Different gadgets — like their sofa and range — they bought themselves, as they slowly rebuild what they misplaced. After two years, the household ought to have the ability to pay their very own lease.

The household receives visits each different week from a program social employee, who has additionally helped them get entry to medical care – Lacerda de Souza has again ache from two herniated discs — and modify to their new circumstances.

“There are such a lot of small stuff you take as a right,” Lee Sousa says. “Like figuring out how you can plan your month-to-month grocery run. It’s been years since we had been ready to do this ourselves. If you’re in shelters and even within the tiny house, meals are simply served to you. Now now we have to relearn how you can finances for what we’d like.”

Erica Lacerda de Souza, her son, Henrique, and her husband, Bruce Lee de Souza, chill out of their new house in Guaianazes, São Paulo.

Gabriela Portilho for NPR

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Gabriela Portilho for NPR

The three like spending time collectively in the lounge, the place they usually lay the mattress from the couple’s bed room on the ground to allow them to watch films and TV reveals collectively. Lee Sousa has a penchant for Indian movies, whereas Lacerda de Souza prefers reveals like Supernatural and Henrique likes watching Cobra Kai.

Their new house is on the high of a prolonged flight of stairs, and the household has already befriended their neighbors who stay within the different three residences off the lengthy stretch of hall. When Lee Sousa is at work and Henrique is at college, Lacerda de Souza likes to speak over espresso with the 2 younger ladies who stay subsequent door. When Lee Sousa arrives, their youthful male neighbors are sometimes ready for him to speak one thing over or ask for recommendation.

And Henrique has been doing exceptionally effectively at college, making new pals shortly and by no means eager to miss a day. Each morning he takes his time doing his hair, ensuring the curls are good, earlier than his mother walks him to the nook, the place she watches him head up the road as a result of he doesn’t need his pals to see that she’s with him.

“I assume he’s already getting too previous for that,” she says with amusing.

A non secular revival

Their home, says Lacerda de Souza, isn’t empty now, and has turn into a hub not just for household — weekend pasta nights are a favourite occasion — but in addition for his or her spiritual group.

The household’s religion lies within the Afro-Brazilian faith known as Quimbanda, one of the stigmatized religions within the nation. On account of cultural misunderstanding and detrimental stereotypes, they struggled to observe it whereas residing in shelters and the tiny house for concern that others wouldn’t perceive.

Érica Lacerda de Souza gives brandy to one of many non secular entities in her house. Érica is a “mãe de santo.” a non secular priestess of Umbanda, an Afro-Brazilian faith. Right this moment, in her house, she and her husband observe Umbanda rituals and welcome different believers.

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Gabriela Portilho for NPR

However a small space off the lounge of their new house has allowed them to return to working towards their religion, the place statues of saints and different sacred objects are on show to allow them to pray and meditate — at all times with the curtains drawn. Others from the group are sometimes there to do the identical, and a few keep over on the household’s new house after they have nowhere else to go.

“Having your individual area is every little thing,” says Lacerda de Souza. “It’s liberating. And I’m at all times comfortable to assist others. The place would we be if no person had helped us?”

Jill Langlois is an impartial journalist primarily based in São Paulo, Brazil. She has been freelancing from the most important metropolis within the western hemisphere since 2010, writing and reporting for publications like Nationwide Geographic, The New York Instances, The Guardian and Time. Her work focuses on human rights, the atmosphere and the influence of socioeconomic points on individuals’s lives.