Most children living in Bogotá’s sewers do not want to leave. They grow accustomed to the waist-deep feces, the stench, the darkness, the water and the rats. As frightening and dangerous as the sewers are, the children feel safe there. “We take bread and hot chocolate into the sewers so the children will sit down and listen to us while we talk them into leaving with us,” said Alexander Quinche, the lead psychologist for Fundación Niños de los Andes. The charity began 30 years