Interview transcript
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What is your name?
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Eduardo.
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Where are we?
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In Lima, on Leticia street.
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What's your job?
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I'm an itinerant vendor. An informal worker.
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What do you do?
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Everything you see is recycled.
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We are looking at motors and magnets, which are used to make projects in universities, high schools and institutes.
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And do you dismantle also?
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Yes, I dismantle also, but most of the time people bring the merchandise ready.
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Do you work with colleagues or alone?
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Individually.
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How long have you been here?
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Approximately 10 years.
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Has Leticia changed much in that period?
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Yes, it has changed. Things aren't like they used to be.
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The style is different, before it was nothing but a dirt road.
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The panorama was very different.
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The fact it was a dirt road, did they change your way of working?
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I didn't start off doing this, I used to sell other electronic devices.
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Then as the years pass, you look to find what works out best, because it's not always going to be the same thing.
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What do you prefer of your work?
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Electronics in general. And now that computers are in.
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Which aspect do you prefer?
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Be it in computers or electronics, things are always going forward, there are more innovations.
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In science class they ask the students to carry out a project.
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What is the difference between recycling, dismantling and repairing?
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To repair you have to study, you have to have a general notion of the device.
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Anyone can dismantle things.
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Why dismantle things to sell them, as opposed to only throwing out the devices?
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Because when a device is working you can't just discard it.
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Here in the street, the problem is that the government doesn't look after workers.
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Because there are only about 45% of formal workers to be sincere, and the rest of us are here in the street.
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And now that there's more pressure from the Serenazgo (police), how does that affect you?
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They are a torment we have to deal with.
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As I said, neither the central government, nor the municipal government, looks after the interests of itinerant vendors.
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Does it make your work difficult?
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They make our work difficult.
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They sometimes chase us, as if we were criminals, but we're hanging in there.
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What do you think?
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It's bad that among Peruvians we chase each other, we treat each other poorly.
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Anything else you'd like to add?
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I'd like to say that the central or municipal government should create a space for us to work at ease, where we don't have to run away from the police.
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Because to speak clearly, there is no work out there, we're desperate.
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It's the truth.
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But you have work now?
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Thanks to our ability, because we are creative. If it weren't for that...
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So the idea of public space?
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Of course, we respect the idea of public space.
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But it's our situation of need which pushes us to this.
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If we had a space to work, we wouldn't be in the street, don't you think?
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But public space, if it's for the public, which is us, but they say they are recuperating public space... who's the public?
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That's why I say, we need to work, and are obliged.
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And it's not as if we were blocking the whole road, it's just a small space.
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According to me, if we are the public, then we have the right to be here.
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Of course, we are not the owners of the sidewalk or the street. Everyone has the right to pass.
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But as I said, there is no alternative offered by the central or municipal government.
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And there are many of us, about half of the workers.
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About 45% has employment, and the rest of us?
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Who looks after the needs of people my age? No one.
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That's the truth.
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But you are working, despite these conditions
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Yes, because of my ability. Otherwise, what are we going to take home?
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Thank you.
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My pleasure.
