Albeiro Vargas was fourteen years old when he realized that in his neighborhood there were grandparents who ate alone, slept alone, and fell ill alone. It was not an abstract observation: they were his neighbors. People he had known since childhood and who, little by little, were left with no one to ask how they woke up.
What he did then was not a campaign or a foundation: it was bringing food. After school, he would collect what was left over in his house and walk with a plate in hand to the door of Mr. Heliodoro, Mrs. Tránsito, Mr. Manuel. He would sit with them. He would talk. He would return the next day.
That routine lasted more than a decade. And routine, when sustained, becomes structure. In 1995, what was a gesture became a foundation. They named it Ángeles Custodios because that’s what the grandparents were: those who had cared for everyone before, and now it was their turn to be cared for.
