Folo Media’s Patton Dodd sat down with Chris to discuss life in and out of the West Side.
Chris Carrillo’s story is rare and he knows it.
The San Antonio native grew up in poverty, spending a lot of his time on the West Side — and he made it out. He’s one of the few. When he was a kid, Carrillo and his family bounced around the city, and eventually landed in a neighborhood near Alamo Heights.
When his mom sent him to the store, his world opened.
“You see people just smiling, just walking about with big smiles on their face like there’s no worries in the world,” Carrillo said. “I go there and I see Mercedes. I see some of the nicest vehicles I’ve ever seen, and people just smiling, and it opened up my eyes to — there’s a different way of living.”
This article was originally published by the H. E. Butt Foundation’s Folo Media initiative in 2017.
