What is poverty? | Daniel Cerezo | TEDxRiodelaPlata

This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences.

Daniel Cerezo had a very low origin with many economic difficulties and asks himself what poverty ισ. His answer may surprise us.

The first question I asked myself
and I ask you too is:

What is poverty?

Maybe some of you imagine
that poverty has to do with this,

and with living
in a neighborhood like this.

And in fact, since I was a kid
I believed that poverty,

or they made me understand
that poverty had to do with this.

I am the fifth of six children:

Yomi, Mariela, Marcela,
Mauricio, me, and Oscar.

We were born in San Juan. We came to
Buenos Aires for the moon and the stars.

My father had been promised
a job, a home, a car, success.

This is the only picture
I have of my parents together.

Because Buenos Aires kills my father.

He ends up dying
within a few years of being here.

And there it began an eternal struggle

to live with dignity

and to improve our quality of life.

We seized a plot with my brothers
in the middle of a settlement.

We were poor,

people who were living
in a usurped land.

We sometimes even didn't have
anything to eat for dinner.

However, despite all this,

despite having lived
through discrimination,

and my whole family
being pointed out for many years,

there was something
I always loved and I always liked.

I love music, I'm a musician.

And I really discovered music through
a woman who when I listened to her

it was amazing for me.

I looked at her and
she was like an angel.

I knew all her songs, all her lyrics,
all her choreographies.

I learned all her songs,
I had all her cassettes.

There were cassettes at that time.

And for me she was a star, an angel.

This woman was Gladys, la Bomba Tucumana.

(Laughter)

(Applause)

I dreamed with Gladys.

Once I told my mom:
"Mom, I want to be Gladys."

(Laughter)

And she said: "Oh son, don't you like
Antonio Ríos or Alcides?"

No, I wanted to be Gladys.

And my mom told me:
"Well, but how about La Nueva Luna?"

No, I dreamed of being
an artist like her one day.

I always dreamed with her.

I always dreamed of learning
to play her songs.

A great friend from childhood, Edgardo,

his mother, Olga, worked
in the neighborhood developing projects

so that people like me, who lived
in these neighborhoods,

could study.

They had a project
in Crear Vale La Pena Foundation,

in which they worked with art
in the context of poverty.

My friend told me one day:

"Daniel, why don't you stop
pestering around with music

and sign up in the
community cultural center?,"

where they gave free keyboard
and piano lessons.

I said: "No, me taking piano lessons?

Ridiculous. I have to go out
and give a meaning to my life."

And he said to me: "But go,
sign up for the piano class."

And I signed up for piano lessons.

Saturdays at 9 am.

I said, "Oh, how nice!"

In this Foundation there was
a teacher, a concert pianist,

Liliana Alpern, who gave once a week

a couple of hours of free lessons

to people who could not
pay for the class.

I went to her piano class
when I was nine.

And I saw Lili, my piano teacher,
in high heels, with a silk shawl,

glasses, green eyes, blond hair.

And I looked at her and she looked at me.

She said: "What is your name?"

"Daniel." "What are you doing here?"

There was an upright piano beside her.

I said, "I want to play that."

And she says: "What do you want to play?"

(Laughter)

And I said: "Gladys, la Bomba Tucumana."

(Laughter)

And she said: "Who is that woman?"

"What? Aren't you a music teacher?"

"Yes, I certainly am,
but I don't know all the musicians.

But if you bring a tape with her music,
I'll listen to it and I teach you."

"Really?" I said. "Yes."

I go to my house, grab the cassette,
I bring it back and Lili began:

"B B B B B, C D, C D E,
E F G, B C".

(Laughter)

And I said, wow!

She began to teach me and I felt
I was John Lennon playing "Imagine."

(Applause)

So awesome.

Lili said: "Look Daniel,
you can learn this and much more,

if you want to."

"Really, Miss?"

"Yes. You can learn
everything you want to learn."

And the next Saturday I brought
La Nueva Luna, Los Charros, Gilda.

I learned to play a band called
Los Palmeras, I dreamed with Los Palmeras.

And she taught me all the music
I wanted to learn.

Pretty soon, I had learned
everything I wanted.

And Lili said, "And now,
what do you want to learn?"

I said, "That's it, I've learned
to play what I wanted to learn."

And she says: "Look, Daniel,
with these same chords

there is a guy named Beethoven.

Do you know who Beethoven is?"

I told her: "Yes, a dog from a movie."

(Laughter)

"No, dear, Beethoven is not a dog.

Beethoven is a musician
who plays 'Für Elise'".

And she showed me "Für Elise".

When I heard "Für Elise" I fell in love.

And I said, "Lili, can I play that?"

And Lili said, "You can play that
and much more, Daniel.

Everything you want to play."

And there I learned at age nine
to break with the first poverty.

That is the poverty of culture.

I just thought that music was...

(Applause)

I thought that music was
what I heard in my neighborhood,

but I didn't know
other kind of music existed.

So I learned to be not only
a musician, but at age 14,

Lili puts me another challenge,

with a partner who we played
the piano together, Marcela Tula,

the two attended her class.

"Now you, after five years of taking
free classes at the cultural center,

must begin to teach others."

And I said, "No, me, Lili?
I can't teach others".

"Yes, you can teach others."

"But Lili, I have nothing to give."

She said: "To give, you don't need
to have something in your pocket.

All you have to do
is to be willing to help others."

Then I started teaching
in my neighborhood.

With Marcela, we both
learned how to teach.

We gave classes to young people,
the very beginners in the neighborhood.

I went from being the kid who hung
in the street corner to mess up,

to be "the neighborhood's Professor".

I would pass by and people would say:
"Professor, Professor".

Then I'd pass by like four times!

I'd go to the grocers and they would say:

"How are you, Professor? Take a candy".
And I'd grab about five.

The grocer's daughter was my student.

And there I learned to knock down
another poverty,

which is the poverty of dignity.

The poverty that is lost because,
by living in the contexts we live,

we think that poverty only
has to do with hunger,

and feeling cold at night, but no.

Poverty has little to do with economics.

It has to do with what you do
to design your life project.

What you do to say who you are,
regardless of the degree,

or the position you have in a company.

Who you are as a person.

And that is what I learned at age 14,
to start teaching in my neighborhood.

When I was 17...

(Applause)

At age 17 I began to coordinate
the community cultural center

with activities for young people.

It was not anymore
just learning and teaching.

What we did with a group of young people
was to form them and start thinking

about our community,
how our neighborhood

could do activities
to improve the quality of life,

not only of those who studied,
but of our community.

We did events in neighborhoods,
we celebrated Children's Day,

looking for the needs
in our neighborhoods

and we began to improve,
not only our lives,

but the lives of our neighbors.

At age 25 I leave this Foundation,

because I felt that in it

I had gone from student to teacher,
coordinator, executive director,

I even prepared young people
in political issues.

And I began to understand
that I had to knock down another poverty.

Then I started working
with a civil organization

called Inicia.

And what we did in Inicia
was to work in a prison,

because the son of a friend of mine
was there in the unit

and we went to visit him.

When I went to the prison
the first thing I saw

were those drawings that you see
behind the young men,

it was like an art gallery.

They were drawings where they had drawn
everything they wanted.

I looked at Cristian with Olga
and we said, "Hey, Cristian,

what do you do here in the unit?"

"Nothing".

"How's that, Cristian?"

"Nothing. On Monday nothing,
nothing on Tuesday, nothing on Thursday."

"What if I proposed you a workshop where

you can think about the mistake
you made, why you are here

and you can think of a project
for when you leave prison?"

And Cristian replied:
"Would you do that for me?"

"Of course."

Then we started a workshop
where we talked about leadership,

so they could lead their life project.

We had a book: "The New Leaders,"

which belonged to this organization.

And it had chapters like:
"Personal transformation,"

"The common good", "Ethics" or "Values."

Each chapter we read it with the inmates,
the 48 who attended the workshop.

And not only that,
we would create a comic

and each of them could put in the comic
what they learned from that chapter.

But not only that,

we invited the authors of the book

and we reflected upon the workshop
we were giving.

So that the prisoners could also think
some way of a life project

once they were out of there.

And then I knocked down another poverty,
the poverty of prejudice.

We think that people
who are deprived of their liberty

not only deserve to be there,

but they don't have the ability,
nor the dignity

to be able to change their future.

Yes, they can change their future.

All they need are opportunities.

And what I was providing there
was an opportunity.

But not only with this I knocked down
the poverty of prejudice.

Then I got to work on another project

with a colleague, an acquaintance
from the gastronomic industry,

who had a restaurant chain
in down San Isidro.

He said: "Dani,
in front of my restaurants

is the settlement Martin and Omar
and I don't know what to do,

because every time
I pass by they tell me:

'Hey, mustache, got work for me?',

and I don't know what to do".

Then we created a program
called Cocina para Integrar.

What did we do?

This man would teach the women
from the settlement to be chefs,

so that they have preparation not only
as people engaged in odd jobs,

but also in a trade
in the gastronomic industry.

And then I broke another prejudice,
I broke another poverty.

The poverty of thinking
that people who are living

in contexts of vulnerability
can only work doing odd jobs.

No, they are professionals
who also can be formed in trades,

as that of being a chef.

On this path I met with another person
who also helped me

knock down another of my poverties.

We met during a talk we gave together.

He had a company which developed
products with design,

shoes with a different design.

He gives his talk, a young company
which exported worldwide.

I give my talk and he says:
"Dani, you have to work with me."

And I said, "Tomás, what do you want me
to work on in your business?"

"You have to do in my company
what you do in the neighborhoods.

You have to work in my neighborhood
which is my business, my community,

with my employees."

"What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to be
the Human Resources manager."

And I said, "But, Tomás,
I don't even know how to clear salaries."

He says, "I don't care,
you will learn that,

what you know is to listen
and to be with the people."

After working three years with him,
he proposes me to be even more than that.

And today I am the Culture
and Happiness manager.

In the private sector I work as --

(Applause)

Not only I work in the neighborhoods,

to improve people's quality of life,

but also companies start
to think that all the people

working in a company can improve
their quality of life.

They have to work happy
and work on their company culture.

But this was not last.

The last big project
that I have with three friends

is to build a social enterprise
called Creer Hacer.

What is Creer Hacer?

It is a social enterprise

where we work with the private,
public and social sectors.

We build a bridge for these three
sectors so they can improve

the quality of life of any person.

We have lots of projects
with this institution.

To strengthen the NGOs
that want to be strengthened.

We have a project called Barrio Abierto,

replicating a model very similar to this,

but in the middle
of a settlement, like La Cava.

In the middle of La Cava we will make
an event called Cava Abierta.

Six speakers will come to share
their story, very similar to mine,

and they can share with their neighbors
that they decided to take a step forward,

they decided to improve
their quality of life.

(Applause)

You may ask me today,
what is your wealth?

My wealth has to do with this,
to have formed a family,

with my wife, with my brothers,
with my friends.

To be the parent of Lautaro and Catalina,
which is two months old.

And I want to tell you this:
any of you here

can be a Liliana Alpern.

Anyone of you can consecrate time
once a week to someone else,

so that they change their lives.

(Applause)

Regardless of your economic poverty
or your economic wealth,

don't make of your life a poor life.

Thank you very much.

(Applause)

(Whistles)

(Applause)