A Labor of Love for Wilmington Gang Members : Christmas: Former rivals become allies in the kitchen and dish up 600 tamales at a community lunch to raise toys for neighborhood children.

For a group of Wilmington gang members, their friends and family, the meaning of Christmas came wrapped in an unlikely package--a batch of tamales.

United Wilmington Youth, a group formed by the once-warring East and West Side Wilmas gangs, served up 600 tamales at a community lunch Saturday in exchange for toys. After the lunch, they distributed the toys to needy kids, with help from the Wilmington Free Clinic and dozens of donations from residents and businesses.

Because as a group they are people with nothing--few have jobs and most have families--the members, friends and family of United Wilmington Youth found in their luncheon a rare opportunity to be generous. Many of them can recall Christmases without presents.

“See, when you’re little you look forward to that toy and if you don’t get it you think something’s wrong with you. It can make you mad at everything. It can make you mad at everyone,” said David Gonzales, one of the organizers of the event.

And for some of the event organizers who are parents, Christmas can bring a deeper anguish.

“There is nothing under my Christmas tree for my children,” said Sabrina Robles, 23, one of the women who cooked the tamales. “There’s nothing under there. And what maybe will be there will come from people who I hope are sponsoring my children. But there’s nothing going to be under there for them that will be from me. This has been a bad year, a hard year.”

The tamale luncheon marked the first United Wilmington Youth event to involve a significant number of women--partly because the men were lost when it came to making the tamales.

“But also we want to bring more girls together, from both sides of town, because they have their rift too,” Gonzales said.

Robles brought her mother’s tamale recipe and some friends to Gonzales’ house last week. And there, with a group of teen-agers, they labored over the food.

Over preparing the meat for 600 tamales, the older women and men urged the teen-agers helping out to stay in school or go back to school. To wait to have babies. To live right.

“It was beautiful,” Gloria Rios said of the time spent making tamales. “There was so much unity. That to me was the Christmas spirit.”

Then late Saturday, after the workers finished their meals and folded up the tables and chairs. Rios, Robles, Gonzales, Ivonne Soria, some children and about five others went out into the neighborhood with a bag of presents.

“Is there a child here?” Rios asked in Spanish at a home near Opp and Fries streets. With much coaxing from her mother, 8-year-old Cynthia Rosales faced the crowd at her door as they pulled out a present for her.

Not having perused the unwrapped presents beforehand, the group was thrilled to see a brown-skinned doll appear.

“Hey, it’s Chicana!” said Robert (Gato) Trani, admiring the Sun Sensation Barbie. “I didn’t know they had those.”

Thanking them shyly, Cynthia backed into the house, clutching her doll.

Eight-year-old Courtney Rogers, who happened to be standing across the street in front of Don’s Market, was given the next toy, a doll.

Thanking them, she hurried, long black braids swinging, into the store.

The tamale makers had thought to continue from door to door, looking for children to give the toys to, but neighborhood children--seemingly guided by radar--quickly surrounded them.

“I’ve waited a long time for this,” Trani said, giving out presents. After handing a Batman-shaped bank to a little boy, he admonished the youngster: “Save your money. Go to college, man.”

The group is almost finished when they noticed that Courtney, holding a little boy by the hand, is following them. She is seeking a toy for her 2-year-old brother, Philip.

As they hunted up a toy, Philip is almost in tears, alternately trying to leave or be picked up by Courtney--anything to hide from the crowd of strangers staring at him. A Batman bank is found for Philip.

Once at a safe distance, Philip turned to flash a deeply dimpled smile at the free-lance Santa Clauses who broke into laughter at the sudden change.

As they walked away, Philip turned back again and again to beam at the group--which burst out laughing each time he turned around.

“Did you see those smiles?” Gonzales asked later. “It’s like when I was a kid--the way I remember getting that toy from those cops. Did you see those smiles? Maybe he’ll remember us like I remember them.”