By Desilon Daniels?“We hearing about how the country doing well and thing but like we ain’t getting the benefits too.”Most of the houses in Angoy’s Avenue are wooden and erected by the residentsAngoy’s Avenue is a seemingly forgotten community.Commonly known as Cow Dam, the Berbice neighbourhood – Guyana’s largest squatter settlement – lies on the outskirts of central New Amsterdam but in the heart of poverty.The area is relatively large and takes several minutes to cover by foot. At first, the community may seem like any other. The roads are not great but are not terrible either; music is playing, and a few shops – even an ice cream parlour – are open.However, as a walk through the community continues, there is a shift; the asphalt eventually turns to mud, concrete houses shift to wooden ones and utility posts all but disappear.In other parts of the world, and even other parts of Guyana, Angoy’s Avenue is the embodiment of neglect and poverty. However, while residents of the community are aware that they are not in the best of circumstances, many of them unbelievably opine that the community is much more developed than it had been before.According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Guyana has met the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the proportion of people who suffer from hunger. Guyana has also made significant improvements in reducing poverty while increasing employment. “The proportion of the population living in extreme poverty has declined from 28.7 percent in 1993 to 18.6 percent in 2006.? In order to meet the MDG target for poverty reduction, the extreme poverty rate must be reduced by a further four percentage points by 2015,” UNDP has said.While on paper four percent may not seem like much, for persons like Patricia (name changed) of Angoy’s Avenue, any reduction in Guyana’s extreme poverty rate would drastically change her life.Patricia has been living in the poverty stricken community for 11 years. She recalled how the area had been overgrown with bushes when she first arrived. She said that her family went about clearing the bushes and building up a land with old materials before they finally built a tiny shack.“We dig drain at the back and full up the place and so. Long I deh here; when I come here fuh live me ain’t had neighbour or nothing so,” Patricia said.Just over a decade later, Patricia is living on the same land with her five children and husband. “It’s only me that grow up that still living at the back here suh. Now, the people here smoking and drinking and killing.”In fact, she said, there had been a murder just two yards away from her own.The shack has not grown since then and is still one living space with no separations for a bedroom, a kitchen, or even a bathroom.“My house ain’t so proper where I living now, so I’m trying to save, save lil money to see what I can do. Even if it’s a $200 for the day or what, it’s anything to help and do something proper. Sometimes them children want bring them friends home by we but they can’t ’cause we ain’t get a room here.”Vanessa and her son, JoshuaThough she is married and living with her husband, Patricia is somewhat of a single mother; her husband works on a sugar estate and, though he is employed, Patricia admitted that his earnings rarely trickle down to the rest of the family.“He like drink so when he leff and gone out and he draw pay, I ain’t even hold a cent. It’s me looking after the children them; you got to say like it’s a one sided affair because when he draw pay you not gon’ see it,” Patricia said. She continued, “He just gonna deh in the rum shop til night time. When he do bring some money I don’t tek it cause when you see you get a man and he does drink, that money don’t bless.”Her husband’s behaviour has left Patricia in a tricky situation; unable to find work, she had to find a way to take care of her children and last year she opened a little shop in the area.“I decided that I wanted to make a living; when dem children fadda wukking he hardly give them money and so. So, I wanted to help myself get things for the children, especially when they got to get this and that for school.”The shop is not much, but Patricia is proud of it. However, despite the added income, things are still difficult. Patricia noted that the community is one where many are living below the poverty line and cannot afford to support her business.“All of my children take lunch to school every day; the big ones might want a lil money and sometimes when they come home, you got to pay $1,100 to put on a lil internet on your phone so that they can do homework. If you can’t mek it to put on the net, you got to give $200 to send them til out on the main road to a cafe.”She said too that she would often depend on the very goods in her little shop to provide meals for her children.“It’s hard to live in here; nuff time I go out on the road and the people just crying that money ain’t deh, money ain’t deh. For me, sometimes I might see a