It's all right with me. I mind my own business. I do aerobics in the house with my friend or by myself. I get free time I keep up the yard. The program--it's interesting. Pa'ani program on Friday--take the baby and make pictures and all kind of stuff. I have one baby, four months. He likes to play with people. He's my first. A lady comes on Wednesday from Kam School on parenting. I've been going to all the classes they have here. I'm trying to find a place to share with another family--half-half.
It's a safe community. It's like a little community here. It's different from outside the gate. I feel safe to let my kids out. The drugs? I don't go around that. Everywhere you got the good and the bad.
I was on the beach four months. I like it here. Got us back on our feet. The programs--I like it. Now I'm certified in CPR--I can help somebody someday. I like the budgeting: now I know how to budget myself. I couldn't get into the new HHA housing behind the school--I have five children--too many. We save a little but not so much.
We're real concerned about our kids. This is a drug environment: a lot of people using or dealing. We got security from 6 pm to 6 in the morning. The drug dealers time it--they know when to come. They [the staff] knew he was dealing [the man who committed suicide]. Two incidents guys came to collect money, chasing him around the parking lot with guns. We seen all that going on. I hope that can be prevented so it don't happen again.
If you don't move, who's going to move? The system is corrupted. They have office hours--they're not there, sometimes all day. Gene was pretty cool--he never took sides. A real good guy--he has God in him. Other staff--real unprofessional--our confidentiality not trusted.
We haven't talked housing. This is temporary. Then what? My 20 year old dropped out of college to work. He said we got to get money, to get going. He said we got to paddle that canoe! Now we're off welfare.
Everybody here we all came with problems. I was homeless because of drugs. I don't do it anymore. I thank God I had my religion. I look back and see how ugly I was. Now I'm happy, I use my talents. I hope to have my own business. That's what I see for my own self. With or without the staff, I will make it.
Gene Davis (case manager--just stepped down to work for Hawaii Public Television)
In an environment like this where everybody lives in close proximity--it's like their lives are being examined. You have to live without making judgments about human beings. There has to be maintenance in social relationships. It's easy for someone living in their condo to pas judgment on people's behavior--but unless they've live in an environment like this they have nothing to compare it to. The bottom line is that people here and anywhere are exactly the same.
If everybody who lives here were so very focused on using this two years as an opportunity to have a better life in the future and not be distracted by the imperfections in the machinery--two years is a short time. If it's business as usual--and in some cases that's very heavy drug use--it's wasted time. But if people are focused--and there are some people like that, with the focus. They want to take this for what it is--a ray of hope.
Some people are caught up in a cycle, and they're afraid they're not going to make it. They're already looking for excuses outside themselves.
The suicide was a real shock to everybody. We all feel like family. It profoundly affected all of us.