In the hillside shantytowns
that
spring up around cities or, in this case, interior mar-
ket towns, marriages are brittle, single parenting
is
the norm, and women are frequently
forced into
the shadow economy
of domestic
work in the
homes of the rich or into unprotected
and often-
times "scab" wage labor on the
surrounding
sug.
tr
plantations, where they clear land for planting
an,l
weed for a pittance, sometimes less than a dollar
J
day. The women of the Alto may not bring
theIr
babies with them into the homes of the wealth,)-
where the often sick infants are considered sourc
of contamination,
and they cannot carry the littlt
ones to the riverbanks where they wash clothes
t-t"-
cause the river is heavily infested with schistosom :
and other deadly parasites. Nor can they carry
th<'Jr
young children to the plantations,
which are oitel;
several miles away. At wages of a dollar a day, tht
women of the Alto cannot hire baby sitters.
01.1<':
children who are not in school will sometimes sen-,
