INABIF - Villa Hermosa in Villa El Salvador - Lima, Peru




It was heartbreaking to say good-bye.....

So, Why DID We Go??

So, here's the follow up. Most people that know me, know that I have quite a few issues with the "modern world". (Please read this knowing that I am exaggerating for effect and making some OVER-generalizations, but I always like to get my point across!) I don't like electronics. Okay, so that's not totally true. I LOVE blogging, and digital photography and being able to e-mail instead of having my ear stuck to the phone. I love "looking things up" on the internet, going on-line to put holds on library books, ordering from Amazon and having books shipped in 2 days! So, you're saying, what don't you like?

I don't like the kids choosing to play XBox over reading or playing outside on a rare sunny day. Especially if it entails playing LIVE with fake friends, rather then actually talking to the kid next to them. I don't like Webkins - they start out as cute furry animals and turn into an obsession as the kids "freak-out" because if you don't log in daily they will DIE! And I don't like that how you feed them or clothe them or whatever is by playing gambling games, to make money to go and buy them whatever stupid thing they need! (Thankfully Rachel sees my position on this and agrees). I don't like hearing there's nothing to do during non-electronic times (yes, I institute such rules in my house) when we have a whole closet of games, shelves full of books, Legos, a piano, schoolwork, sports equipment, a treehouse! I don't like fights with a 13 year old on why he needs a cel phone when he only usually calls one friend and that lasts 2 minutes. I don't like watching the same 13 year old at the computer doing schoolwork and simultaneously checking his e-mail every 5 minutes! I don't like having to "upgrade" electronics constantly because they are so OLD (what 6 months to a year?) I even don't like myself when I become e-mail obsessed and feel like I have to check every hour that I am home.

Electronics aside, I just really don't like watching my kids involved in our overly-consumeristic society, constantly thinking they need something else to be happy, or drooling over their friends' latest gadgets. Or plotting what they need next with their allowance money. (Hmm, needs are certainly relative, aren't they?)

So, really, one of my number one goals of our CCS trip was to get the kids to see what else might be important. Get them to see that what they need is not really necessary for a happy, productive life. Give them a real reference point for times when Alex is about to have a breakdown because Mom won't let him get XBox live or play games everyday of the week, or have UTube videos of himself on the internet - "but my friends can do it!!!!" My response - Oh well.

Well, did they learn anything from spending a week with kids with real needs - food, clothing, running water, a bath, books, healthcare .... They certainly saw and were involved with these kids, but did they get it???

At the end of our CCS week, I asked the kids to journal something - thoughts, feelings, whatever. Here's what Alex wrote:

This trip to Peru has been a very eye-opening experience for me. The first day that I went to the Lima slums, known as Villa El Salvador, I thought it had the worst living conditions that I had ever seen. Dogs fought and bred rampantly on roadsides that were covered in trash and human feces. The houses were made of plywood or old bricks with tin roofs. If your family didn’t have enough room, you didn’t move. You simply built another floor on top of your existing house. These shoddy shanties probably had little effect when it came to blocking out the elements. Driving through the town, I found it hard to believe that anybody could ever be happy there.
Before heading to work at INABIF for the first time, I expected hungry little children to glower up at me as if my existence was some sin against them. I expected their clothes to be torn and ragged, and their eyes to be bloodshot. I thought that they would all be thin, dirty and unkempt, like the orphans on television or in movies that spent their days on the streets. But this expectation turned out to be false. The kids were wearing normal clothing, and I didn’t see a single one of them looking sad. They were positively hopping with glee at the prospect of playing a game of soccer on a concrete pitch with a ball that looked older than some of the teachers. You’d think that they were little kids in America, with not a care in the world. They didn’t look at the fact that the ball was in its final state of decay. It didn’t matter to them that falling during a game of soccer meant being cut painfully by bits of gravel. Instead of grumbling over what they didn’t have, they rejoiced over what they did have. Unlike kids in America would have been, they were happy to use what they had at hand. Most people that I know would have said, “Geez, we can’t play with this ball! It doesn’t even bounce! And what if we fall on this concrete? We can’t play here!” Instead of complaining and refusing to play soccer on anything but grass, Peruvian children don’t play as rough as American children. And instead of complaining about the bounce of the ball (or lack thereof) Peruvian kids compensate for it. They don’t even complain, saying things like, “Our lives are bad,” or, “I hate my life.” They just go with it, and are generally happier than most American kids ever will be. To me, this proves that the message gained from traveling to Peru was, “Materialistic items don’t make you happier.” In fact, I think that having a lot of stuff just makes you greedier. The kids in Peru had nothing, and yet when they got something, they didn’t horde it for themselves. They shared. They weren’t greedy or miserly with things that they got. They were happy to share it with others. If everybody in the world were like that, then the Earth would be a better place.

And this is what Rachel wrote and shared with me....

This week has been really amazing. I feel like I helped alot. It was kind of sad to see how the kids live. I also discovered the real meaning of life. It is this. If you give happiness to others, you shall receive. You won't get stuff, you will get happiness, a good life, and hopefully if you're kind and loving, passage to heaven. The meaning is not to be rude, arrogant and think you're better then others. That will give you the opposite. I have realized that by being rich, it is harder to get to heaven and by living a humble life, you are closer to God. I know this experience has changed me forever and I will never be the same.


Did they GET it? You decide.

Did We Go to Change the World???? No. Not Even Close.

I was talking to somebody who asked me to explain more fully the "volunteer" part of our Peru trip. This person (who is very nice and I like alot incidentally) seemed a little interested, but really wanted to go down another path. I think the comment was "No offense, it's nice what you did, but you can't change the world in a week."

And my answer was Precisely!!!!!

Without knowing it, this person hit the nail on the head. To further illustrate why I wanted to go, as well as the CCS philosophy, I am going to include some excerpts from the CCS Insight Abroad handbook. It's long so bear with me, or at least skip it and read the end of this post. I think you will like it!

"... With international volunteering... service is equally divided between hands-on service AND cultural exchange. Cultural exchange can mean alot of different things to different people. It can be listening to local people about their lives, talking about your life and what you do, sharing your cultures through dialogue and stories, or just making friends and getting to know each other. When the local people of a country and an international volunteer are able to connect as peers, it becomes service because you have both helped each other learn a little lore about the similarities and differences we all share across the globe.

You will find in your international volunteer experience that sometimes you are not actually working, or that sometimes you get frustrated because things are not organized or on time. This is all part of the cultural experience. By understanding the priorities in the culture and working around them, you are learning about the local culture and what it truly means to live there. Just being at the local organizations communicates to the people that their work and cause are important on a global level. Such a presence has the potential to catalyze social change, shows support and solidarity and allows the local people to become aware of the world around them through exposure to other cultures.

People are sometimes disappointed when their work does not "change the world" in a few weeks, or even months. Your volunteer work may consist of helping in what you perceive as a small way. This could be taking care of children or teaching them a song: try not to lose sight of the fact that you are helping an outstanding local organization do their job better and more efficiently. You should be proud of these small accomplishments, which often reap significant benefits that may not be immediately apparent. Your presence at the project shows people in host countries that people from other parts of the world care about their situation. You will also be learning about other cultures, ideas and values, which may help broaden your own perspective. Don't forget, you too are part of the world we are all trying to change."

There's more--- keep reading if you can!

"Your CCS program will offer you the unique opportunity to establish meaningful relationships with project staff and local people. Ultimately the human connections you make will far exceed the contribution made through you service portion of the program.

CCS enables you to gain a wealth of understanding and knowledge to become a more responsible global citizen that is informed about issues confronting other parts of the world. You will be learning about the lives of people of another culture and the issues they face such as poverty, hunger, illiteracy, and innumerable others. You will learn that the images you have seen in the media are often far from reality in host countries.

You will be able to return home with a greater understanding of the world, having made meaningful connections with others while serving overseas. You will become a small, yet important. piece in the process of helping people from vastly different cultures understand each other. Hopefully, you will share this knowledge and understanding with friends, neighbors, relatives... In doing so, you will bring us closer to international understanding, making our global community a better place. In this way, a short-term volunteer does change the world."

And finally-

"Remember, you will take home what you have learned and experienced In-country. This can have many positive unforeseen effects."


Remember the conversation that inspired this post? Well, it ended with a discussion about how to REALLY change anything, the local people had to be empowered to take over and not rely on volunteers and such. And I fully agree with that as well. Thankfully there are tons of programs like that going on around the world - even in Peru with things like the rafting coop that took us down the Urubamba and the weaving coop / llama farm.

However, in my book, the world of at least one person was fully changed, and even if the rest of our trip had been horrible (which it wasn't, of course!!!), the whole thing - expense, time, illness, etc. would still have been worth going. Stay tuned.....

Back with a Bang!

Wow! I was so happy to get through 2 1/2 weeks of Peru feeling fabulous. Even after eating all kinds of new foods and spices and Pisco Sours and even "forgetting" and brushing my teeth with the Peruvian water, I had absolutely no stomach problems. Until about 8 hours after arriving back in the United States, that is. Maybe it was those delicious GMO corn-chex they served me for breakfast on the airplane. Or maybe the high-quality CAFO (read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life for more explanation here) chicken from the Chinese carry-out. I'm not sure, but what I am sure of is I was almost ready for the Immodium yesterday and still have a painful stomach today.

And, the eruptive fun does not end there. Alex came downstairs a few hours ago and asked me to look at his stomach. He has almost 50 little red spots all over his stomach, back, neck, wrists, and legs. At first I thought maybe they were Machu Picchu no-see-em bites, but since we were there 5 days ago, I doubt that is the answer. I really think he has chicken pox! Despite having been vaccinated at age 1 1/2, I think he has the chicken pox. He says the spots are very itchy, and he had a headache last night. I hope he has the chicken pox - it would be nice to have the whole revaccinate / not vaccinate issue behind us, but it will definitely mess with our coming week of piano, choir, soccer, meetings, classes, lessons - you get the picture. Maybe someone is telling us - stay on vacation!!!!

Cross Cultural Solutions - Our Week

CCS Logistics-
It has been so hard for me to write about our time volunteering with Cross Cultural Solutions and I think the reason it’s hard is I know I will never be able to do it justice. So, I decided to start with logistics and see where it goes from there.

Sunday 8-3-2008
We and another family were picked up from the hotel at about 8:30 by the house director, Enrique – “Kique”. We were really lucky at the house – we were assigned one room for the four of us and had our own bathroom. Some rooms were assigned up to 6 people and had to share a bath with up to 10! (There were a total of around 40 in the house). Kique gave a quick orientation at the house, and then we all loaded up in vans and cars and were driven to our neighborhood of work – Villa El Salvador. Click here for photos. It was really shocking driving through VES for the first time. It looks more run down then the worst Chicago South Side neighborhoods I used to drive through as a short cut to work. We were taken to Martinsitos, a daily center for adults. There we were given a history of VES – it lasted around 1 ½ hours and was fascinating. Afterwards we went back to the house and started meeting up with our new family for the week. It was so fun! I’m sure I won’t remember everyone but, my favorites were the family groups and more “mature” single people – Shannon & Parker; Romi; Peggy & Katie; Pam & Casey; Elizabeth, Jim & Jane; Noah, Roberta, Shanna & Isaiah; Gwyn; Mary; Liota; Rudy, Mateo & Sydney; Mike; Alex; Katia; Simone; Janice; Sanna; Conor; and a few more singles. Alex and Rachel immediately started having fun playing cards with the kids and the young college or just post-college kids. In fact that is what they did almost every minute that we weren’t working, eating, touring or walking to the Circle of Death! They have tons of new games to play.
We wrapped up Sunday, by heading to bed, excited and a little scared for our first day of work to begin.

Monday, 8-4-2008
Today was our first day of work. We were assigned to INABIF – Villa Hermosa. It is a daycare center. Our partners were Peggy, Shannon, Parker and Conor – 8 of us total. When we first got there, we discovered that our CCS helper, Juan Carlos was the only English speaker and very limited at that. Only Peggy could speak Spanish, so she became our main interpreter. Since this was the first time that our INABIF section had any volunteers, they were very unsure what to do with us! Peggy was able to figure out that they wanted new lines painted for futbol and volleyball courts. They wanted the basketball and futbol nets painted, and they wanted a mural on the wall. After we got that figured out, we thought we would start working when about 40 kids came running out to play! They crowded around us and started asking “Como se llama?” y “Cuantos anos?” – to Rachel. It was overwhelming at first and then FUN!!!! The boys all headed over to the futbol area, and entrenched Alex, Pat and Conor in a game. The younger girls took Rachel off to play Salta Suca – jumprope, hopscotch, hand clapping games. Parker had his own contingent of girls. Peggy played volleyball and Shannon and I followed Rachel and Parker and their girls, joining in the fun as well. We ended the first day too soon.

Tuesday and Wednesday, 8/5 & 8/6/2008
The girls at INABIF had told us that they wanted a Volleyball mural, so that’s what Peggy, Shannon and I began painting on Tuesday, when we arrived at 9AM. Rachel helped a bit too. It was a true collaboration, esp for 3 adult women who do not call themselves artists! I had asked Juan Carlos if we could have the INABIF kids paint but he said no, too messy. I really would have liked to see their joy at having been able to create something on their own. But, they seemed to like it nonetheless. We had to paint quickly, as everyday we had to be done by 11AM, when the kids ran out to play with us until we had to leave at 12:30 PM. Everyday, Pat and the CCS “boys” would just barely get the paint put away when the INABIF boys would run out to play futbol, nevermind wet paint! On Tuesday, we asked the girls if we could take pictures of them. Click here to see them. They loved it! We had 2 girls in particular who wanted to be in all of them – Luz and Demy! I told them I would bring them copies for themselves at the end of the week. On Wednesday, both Luz and Demy brought me pictures of themselves – they were happy to share with me and I was very touched.
Everyday when we arrived the kids greeted us – running up and hugging us and grabbing Rachel by the hand. I thought I would be worried about Rachel disappearing with 30 little girls who speak no English, inside a daycare located in a housing project, but I really did not think twice about it. When we left the girls would escort us to the front door waving and saying “Hasta manana”, until tomorrow!

Thursday, 8/7/2008
While we were helping serve breakfast this morning (a hard roll and cup of warm chocolate milk), the daycare director told us that we would be throwing a Kinkana on Friday. Wow! Peggy was able to interpret that a Kinkana was a party, with competitive games. We asked if we should bring snacks and they said sure! The director said it was totally up to us to plan. That was a little scary. So, most of our time before the kids came out to play was a planning session – well Peggy, Shannon and I. The CCS boys finished up the court painting with help from Rachel. We came up with a list of games and needed supplies. We also decided that we wanted to be able to bring them more jumpropes (they only had 3 for all the girls), a volleyball net (they played without) and some basketball nets, a basketball (they had none) and another soccer ball (they had one flat). Seeing how little these kids have, we were totally willing to spend our own money for this. Peggy also offered to get little treats for the kids at Chinatown on Thursday afternoon. When we got back to CCS and told Kique that we needed all kinds of supplies he was a little surprised. He said the director had talked to him and that our ”party” was just supposed to be games. So, maybe we misinterpreted, or maybe Kique did not get the same story as us. Nevertheless, he went with it – getting cookies, candy, juice, balloons and many more supplies for us. He gave Pat the okay to buy the jumpropes and nets, so we headed to Sporting goods store on the Circle of Death. Pat also bought some CD’s to burn some music to play at our party. (When we told the director’s helper he could keep them on Friday he was SO happy!) By the end of Thursday night we were ready and excited!

Friday 8/8/2008 The Kinkana!
When we arrived with bags and bags of stuff, the kids all greeted us at the door, especially Rachel and Parker’s girl possees. We knew we had only a little time to set up so we got to work right away. The INABIF center also has Abuelos come each day, and many of the women offered their help. It was so nice! We decorated with balloons and streamers and set up for the games. The favorite was the Cuchara – a lemon and spoon race. We were able to play jump rope games and participate in a traditional circle dance. The boys had basketball contests and of course played futbol. The day was amazing, but in the back of my mind very sad too. This was our last day with our little girls. At the end, the director lined up all the kids to say good-bye and thank you. I looked at them lined up, and most of them (Girls, not the tough boys) were crying. I cried too. I’m even crying now remembering it. I miss those little, precious girls. They are so nice and so loving and so happy the whole week! And they literally have nothing! They live in homes with dirt floors. They do not get enough to eat, especially nutritious food, as evidenced by their red-tipped hair and white-spotted cheeks. Their daycare has no books, no toys, no paper, no crayons, no markers – nada! And they are happy. They play handclapping games and jump rope. Soccer and volleyball. They help each other and love each other. I hope that our being with them for 1 week was a positive experience for them, because for all of us, it was the experience of a lifetime.

For pictures of our time in the CCS house and with friends, click here: CCS

Full Circle - Back to Lima

Tuesday - August 19, 2008

Today was a long day. It started with our flight back to Lima at around 9AM. Once in Lima we were taken to a private residence near the president's palace for a very special lunch. The residence belongs to a family who has passed it down for 16 generations. The original owner entertained Pizarro! While Alex really doesn't hold Pizarro in high regard, it was still amazing to eat in the same place that he also once ate. The house is reputed to have ghosts. Ale said to find an area that felt cold - that was where the ghosts are. We felt a breeze in the main hall. Ghosts? I hope so.

After lunch we checked into our hotel - Casa Andina Lima. We only had time for the kids to swim before we had to leave for the airport. We said good-bye to our new friends after gathering addresses and e-mails. I hope we stay in touch.

What an amazing trip! Click here for pictures of our last day - August 19, 2008.

Sacsayhuaman - More Incan Ruins

Monday - August 18, 2008

Today we went to visit Sacsayhuaman (pronouced "Sexy Woman" by English speakers). When our tour guide Ale asked the kids what they thought the theme of today's pin would be (yes, each day we all received a cute little Disney pin), one of them said a naked lady. (That's not MY kid!) It is believed that this was an Incan fortress or an important religious center. It was very impressive. Amazing that the Incas could get these massive rocks to fit together perfectly.

We had the afternoon free in Cusco. Cusco is a beautiful city - I called it the "Florence" of Peru. Alex agreed.

We ate with our new friends at the Inca Grill and then took a tour of the Cathedral in the main square of Cusco. It was an amazing Spanish Catholic wonder. I did like the Cathedrals in Italy better, however.

We had our final dinner on Monday night and afterward the White Elephant game! It was alot of fun. Alex's friend John knew what Alex's gift was and chose it promptly. Alex was thrilled to end up with a rattling musical instrument made of llama toenails. Pat stole an alpaca hat. Rachel stole some very cute llama and alpaca toys, and I unwrapped some earrings that remind me of the circular terraces at Moray.

Click here to see pictures of our day! August 18, 2008