The name is absent

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underprivileged viewer to be repaired with flashy paint, television monitors, stereo
equipment, and, moreover, to be customized with unusual features like interior waterfalls,
hot tubs, chandeliers etc. This program attracted men and boys from all over the camp to
Vasilo ’ s home adding to the usual cacophony made by the young children that would
gather there regularly.

Most of the compound residents I had interviewed regarded Vasilo as a
trustworthy local authority on childrearing. Since the day I met her, she worried
constantly about her seven children, and especially her two youngest boys who suffered
from various ailments, while watching over the majority of the children of the compound.
To an outsider, Vasilo would appear to provide an unofficial daycare service to absent or
working parents, at times watching as many as twenty kids. To the local community,
however, Vasilo was just another mother who happened to be well-informed about
children and to whom young ones gravitated naturally. Most adults simply left in the
morning knowing that Vasilo would care for their kids. So today, as per most days,
Vasilo’s house was bursting with young men and boys engrossed in the television,
discussing the latest automotive creation and making lofty plans for their own vehicles,
while small kids played noisily with each other. My host presided over the ruckus with
the calmness and sense of authority characteristic of a riot officer in the midst of a rowdy
demonstration.

After failing to guess what the object was that she had found and which was
making her so happy, Vasilo motioned for me to follow her to the old home where Evi
was living. As we walked the children came too, ducking into their own houses to check
for their parents. Once at the old house I was presented with the grand discovery: my

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