22 Septiembre 2011

After learning about Indian culture, the high school students spent the entire session decorating their faces and hands with bindis and henna.

Need-less-to-say… they loved it.

We didn’t even have time for yoga.

20 Septiembre 2011

The VALE committee showed up today to observe the program and I think were more entertained than they anticipated. It is “What is India?” week, and the rural Peruvian kids were properly decorated in bindis and vermilion powder before they started their yoga session. Hirma took pictures for us…

The rest of the session was spent decorating their hands and arms with washable markers in traditional henna style.

The best part of today’s session was discussing who Ghandi was. His one sentence definition was, “He fought for the Indian peoples freedom with peace instead of war.” When they were inquisitive I told stories of how he acted non-violently to wide eyes and open mouths.

 There is something special to being the person who shares world knowledge with individuals who potentially will never hear the names Mahatma Ghandi, Adolf Hitler, Martin Luther King Jr., Bob Dylan, Winston Churchill, Bill Gates, Fidel Castro, Nelson and Winnie Mandella, Carl Marx, etc. Not only do they miss out on individuals that affected change, but they are missing out on the theory and the ideas behind these   people. Every teacher knows that moment when you teach someone( especially a child) something new, and it clicks, they get it. It is the most refreshing and motivating second of a teacher’s career in my opinion. Somehow, this moment I experienced today feels different. When you take something you assume the entire world knows, understands, and perhaps even remembers and introduce it to someone cut off from that knowledge. It has its own distinct beauty.

18 Septiembre 2011 take two

18 Septiembre 2011 take two

Grandma, please stop reading this entry now.

Just shortly after boarding the bus from Arequipa to Madrigal the driver demonstrated to me his ability to make my nerves active. This, is nothing unusual in South America, as I come to find 9 in 10 do so. If this had been my first trip to Madrigal, I would have been frightened, but this trip having become such a habitual necessity, has normalized my emotions and no longer creates stress in my system every time I journey into the city.

“At least we will get there in shorter time than usual.” I rationalized to myself to bury any doubt that might still have been living.

Five hours in, as we are passing through a town about an hour away from my own, comfort of home begins to find refuge in my heart and mind. I can feel the closeness to home, my family and friends here and the warmth of my pale yellow room mocks me being so close an yet so far still when the bus breaks slam and we begin to slide.

Somehow, a thousand things happened in that second.

I am genuinely scared at first, and then quickly reprimand myself for always being so paranoid. I often find things in these peoples’ lives that scare me that they know to be everyday life.

Then, the air vanishes as everyone on the bus gasps in unison. The back of the bus feels heavier than the front and looks like it is gaining on us as the nose of the bus tips downward at the edge of the canyon.

My thoughts immediately go to Doña Juana and the images of her tumbling in the bus accident last year that killed 12.These images that have haunted my mind for months place her, in the front of this bus today, and preminisce tumbling.

The sound of womens´ vocal chords behind the unified gasps sends me a message of sincere communal anxiety and my heart stiffens almost into a protective state.

Are my arms long enough to pin us all down if we flip?

Do I have time to find some sort of seat belt?

Don’t let your head hit the window.

Then the bus stops

 and an energy shifts in a millisecond to shared solace. There is almost the buzz of laughter in the air. The risible energy quickly revises to anger as everyone glares through the wall, at the driver we can’t see.

Obviously shaken he reverses, gets us straight, and continues cautiously… for about 10 minutes.

18 Octubre 2011

Parasite #2... check

start the meds today and head back to the canyon.

Plans for the month:
Volar A Las Estrellas after school program
translate for another medical campaign with Quechua Benefit
master bread making in my new wood burning oven :-)

17 Septiembre 2011

Today I woke up to a loving text message,

“Do you want to get some coffee today? Or I can cook you lunch. My morning is free for you.”

I had met a young woman about 3 or 4 months ago in the combi from Madrigal to Chivay. We made casual conversation and ended up realizing we had a ton in common. Her family is from Madrigal, she lives in Arequipa right now because she is studying English and Art. She has a degree in Education, and is always all smiles. She is just the sweetest, post positive thing in the world (ok, so maybe we don’t have that in common).

When I come into the city I ring her, and when she is in Madrigal she finds me (she even came to see me speak at the “Strong Women’s Convention” last month.

Being the dedicated Peace Corps Volunteer that I am, I immediately imagined her running the VALE program after I leave.

Today, we got coffee to discuss. All I can say is, she gets it. She not only understands the importance of the program, but loves the idea of it. She even has some ideas to make the art projects easier. She got me way too excited about the potential of the program. She brought up expanding it to other towns not even knowing that was my pipe dream and that some villages have already expressed interest. To top it off, her family lives in Madrigal, so she would want to be there (for most professionals, moving to the villages is like a punishment because they are so cut off).

Seeing this program as something seriously sustainable makes my stomach turn with excitement. My brain just starts running with ideas and doesn’t stop. But now, the question is… funding.

The plan:

Finish the next 3 months of the program in Madrigal.

Run the data to determine its success.

(if successful in reaching its goals) Advertise its success like a crazy person to Peace Corps volunteers and staff all over the country, to other villages in the canyon, and to potential funders (Municipalities, The Ministry of Education, NGOs, philanthropists).

Train Lucia on how to manage the program.

Run second round of program in Madrigal.

Then… depending on funding and being able to find other professionals interested in teaching in the canyon… begin to teach other community leaders on how to develop the program.

Monitor success of the programs (from afar? Or extend my service a third year?)

Serious chimera.

“Some of the world’s greatest feats were accomplished by people not smart enough to know they were impossible. -Doug Larson

13 Septiembre 2011 take two

I don’t always publish these kinds of conversations because they are just so much of a downer, but, every once in a while these experiences should probably be shared…

Last night I pulled aside one of the young women I am closest to in Madrigal.

“You seem distant, what’s up?”

silence, no eye contact

“you can talk to me about whatever it is. Is it school? Your family? Your friends?”

silence

more coaxing… a lot more coaxing I won’t bore you with, then…

silent tears

“sometimes when I cry and talk about my feelings it doesn’t fix the problem, but it helps me figure our how to deal with the problem and then I feel better.”

Sobbing for a few minutes, still no words had come out of her… then… she has a subtl explosion of sharing…

“It’s my parents. Sometimes, when they get drunk, they fight. And when they fight, they say they are going to separate.”

“Do they talk like that when they are sober?”

“No.”

“Remember when you tied the donkey up poorly and he escaped, and when your dad got home drunk he yelled at you really strongly? That day you and I talked about how the man that yelled at you wasn’t really your dad, and the things he said your dad would never say. That drunk man was someone different from your father that loves you. Remember that day?”

nod

“This is the same, your dad drunk is a different person than your dad sober. Your mom drunk is a different person than your mother sober. So when they argue drunk, they say things they don’t mean and might not even remember.”

More tears

We discussed why her parents separating would make her sad, and how no matter what happens between her parents they both love her very much.

As we are discussing how much her parents love her it is all I can do to contain my fury at her mother and father for getting drunk so much and fighting in front of her. But, what are they to do? What is she to do? They all live in one room.  It isn’t like they can step into their bedroom and shut the door. The whole family’s beds are right next to each other.

We talked about her putting in her headphones and listening to the pre-recorded music on the family’s cell phone when they fight, or going to the table she has set up next to the corn storage to do her homework to read a book. As I am inviting her to come to me in my little hut anytime she needs to get away from them, I twinge of doubt crawls up my spine.

I can’t tell every child here that is neglected or abused to come to me whenever they need to escape. I would have more than I would ever be able to handle.

Even with a program that is unfolding successfully within its goals, I still feel this twinge of guilt that I could be capable of more. This delicate balance to maintaining my own happiness and sanity while conquering as many needs here as possible is constantly teetering. Great, so you have instilled curiosity, accessibility to information, and leadership skills in the kids here, but what about the malnutrition, domestic violence, alcoholism, and lack of family planning (aka prego teenagers and single mothers)? When I am crazy obsessed with my work I start to get lonely and depressed. When I take time for myself to go camping or read a book I start to feel guilty that I am not getting as much done as I did when I was consumed by work.

I am here as a youth development volunteer, so I have a specific set of goals to work under. But, if I could just focus on women and mothers in the community, or just focus on greenhouses and teaching balanced diets, or even water filters and solar ovens for a year there could be effect in so many different ways.

This community needs more. They need more role models. They need more mentors. Children to adults here really do want to learn… but, they have been left behind by the rest of the world.

This blog goes out to Michelle Davis and all the volunteers of Liderazgo en Red, and Paul Lopez and all the volunteers of Project Mentor. The work you do as mentors is so important. Even if we cannot work out bringing mentors to Madrigal, with all my heart, I wish you the best of luck and appreciation for what you do in City outskirts. 

13 Septiembre 2011

We had to do some curriculum shuffling this week (=lu stressed). We couldn’t do the next two weeks of classes because I haven’t been able to get their supplies out of customs yet. Fortunately, the African culture class only required I get my hands on some potatoes. No problem.

So, we jumped ahead 3 weeks.

Tuesdays are for 3^rd, 4^th, and 5^th graders. As they were finishing decorating our pretend kete cloth papers in the traditional adinkra clothing fashion from Ghana, one little guy came up to me with a hollowed out egg shell. He holds it up for me to see.

Assuming he must have gotten his hands on an egg one of the older kids did for Russia week in the traditional pyansky style I ask,

“Wow, where did you find that?”

“I did it.”

“You did?! Wow.”

One of his classmates announces, “He wants to paint it.”

Surprised at all of their knowledge I ask, “Who taught you how to do that?”

His compañera speaks for him again, “His big sister.”

Not only does this mean that his older sister completed all the stages of learning by teaching, but she taught him well.

Stunned and proud, I set him up in his own little space with some tempera paints and showed him how to use a brush properly with 12 other ears huddled around watching intently. As I explained what a pyansky egg is to his classmates, he delicately painted away.

Here are some photos of the adinkra project...

The VALE program turn-out has astounded me. We had 107 kids sign up (remember Madrigal has a population of about 700), and I assumed we would lose about 20% optimistically. I budgeted for 80 students. The VALE committee (made of all female teachers and mothers) told me to realistically expect 40 a week, or 10 a day.

I told myself that only 10 a day would be fabulous. If only half of those 10 completed all the stages of learning for each topic we discuss, they could become great leaders and influential in their community as they grow older.

But, with 25-30 kids attending a day, and assuming half of them complete all the stages of learning, that leaves about 60 strong, curious, knowledgeable, leaders in Madrigal.

I can’t really comprehend what kind of effect that will have on Madrigal as a community.

But, it does give me faith in their new found curiosity just might be strong enough to support a community library. I just hope the attendance keeps up.