My apologies for not writing this for a week....it has been pretty busy over here in Huaycan! So many important things to say:
For starters, it was the 2nd anniversary of Light and Leadership Initiative on Sunday(the non-profit i volunteer for). We started set up at 6am (the party was on the canchita in Zona D (basketball court). The real festivities began at 1:30pm after going to the individual zones on a combi (small bus)that we rented. We had different activities that we did...art, face painting, "bowling", bozo buckets, jump rope, hula hoops, bracelet making, and more. It was really fun for the kids! They loved it! We then held the vocabulary bee. The kids were split up in age groups and the winners received a free trip to an interactive museum, kind of like Wannado city. They were all really excited! The day ended with dancing...so much fun! Check out the pictures of this day on facebook!
A few details about my kids: My student Lexi used to have really long gorgeous hair. The other day she came to class with all of her hair cut off. She was wearing a hat...has been wearing a hat since that day. I had spoken with her parents before, I met her Dad, he was drunk and slurring his words. I later found out that her Dad cut all of her hair off and sold it for money. Things like this happen all the time...last week my student Melanie came to class with her ear completely plastered in dried blood...she told me her mother tried to pierce her ear and that's what happened...but I think she was cut badly. Other than this, they are all really happy kids. Yes, they are poverty stricken, but I think they are happiest when they're learning or playing sports. We play jump rope and soccer a lot, those are their favorites.
I private tutor a few people:
Moises: I tutor Moises four times a week...at 8:45 a.m. But it's okay because he's awesome. He's 16...him and his family is moving to Argentina in August though...such a great kid-we sing Justin Beiber and Taylor Swift-it helps to print out lyrics for enlgish songs!
Merleini: She is 29, and is a single mother of twins. She is an english teacher. Yes, I tutor an english teacher. She is still very basic, but I am happy to help the best I can.
Juan:: Juan is 17, he speaks pretty well...he is really funny. I tutor him for 3 hours on Saturday afternoons. We usually go through a cool textbook he has and then take a walk and have normal conversation. We have to break it up or else it gets really long, but he's a funny kid.
I teach a class in Zone Z-The Alamos. It is in the highest point of the city, which means the poorest. The moto-taxis don't have enough power to go up that high so I take something called a combi, a small van, kind of like a VW van. It's public transportation. .90 centimos to go up and .50 centimos to go down. The thing about combi's is that theres 15 seats...but they literally squeeze 35-40 people on at all times. Just the other day I was sitting accross from a woman that had her kid on her lap while she was breast-feeding her baby. On the other side of me was an older woman with a huge assortment of vegetables on her lap. You see all sorts of people on this bus and it is anything but comfortable. If you're claustrophobic...you could never ride on this. Today I met a 15 year old girl who lived in Zona Z, I told her she should come to my english class, but she had to run her family's store so couldn't. :(
Today I taught a spanish literacy class. About 4 older women come to the class. They don't know how to read, let alone the spanish alphabet. But today I was working with one woman and I actually got her to read and pronounce full spanish words-very exciting! I really like the group of women, they are really nice and its great practice for me as well.
I went to Lima on my days off, which was really fun. Friday night we all went out to a place called Kenko's. It's a Regeatton discoteka. There were free drinks for an hour and we all took advantage of that. Needless to say, it was a fun night...and I got a pitcher of beer for 12 sols...like 4 dollars and made friends with lots of Peruvians. So I was happy. I'm not really here to party though, i'm here to volunteer so we cant really go out like we used to in Brazil. It's definitely a different experience, but so much more rewarding than anything I have done in my entire life.
Hope I gave you guys some insight into what my days are like! Love you all!
No comments:
Post a Comment