YMCA Urban Warriors Pairs Veterans with Kids

War Vets, Kids Scarred by Gangs Help Each Other
CHICAGO
By SHARON COHEN AP National Writer
Sep 27, 2014

Jorge Maya sat in a circle at his neighborhood YMCA, a sturdy Afghanistan vet listening to a group of teenage boys scarred by gang violence.

There was Sammy, 16, who could describe the times he'd dodged gunfire, once ducking behind a tree.

Anderson, 17, who'd been around gangs most of his life. By his teens, he was carrying knives and bricks for protection.

And 14-year-old Fernando, who was just 12 when a pistol-wielding kid killed his friend.

Maya's own story was much the same. He'd grown up on the same streets, faced the same dangers, known the same temptations. He'd escaped Little Village, the largely Mexican community that had been home. He eventually joined the Army, trading one violent place for another, a war zone far away. And when he returned, he felt lost.

Now he was at the Y, sitting with other Afghanistan and Iraq vets and these teens, the two groups bound by a history of violence and trauma — on distant battlefields, nearby street corners or both.

They were the first class of a new YMCA-sponsored pilot program, Urban Warriors. For a dozen Saturdays, the two generations opened their hearts and minds, the vets finding new purpose after the war, the kids drawing guidance from mentors who understood their lives.

"I told them I've been through tough times," Maya says. "I've been shot. I dropped out of high school. I'd say, 'Look man, you can do something different with yourself. If I can do it, you can, too.'... There is hope."
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