Jardin

I am comfortably settling into my new volunteer work in Arequipa.  I am working with a volunteer organization, Intiwawa, which does projects for children in rural communities.  This entails many ambitious projects to help these specific communities.  San Isidro is a brick mining community that we volunteer with the local kindergarden teacher.  I was able to work with these cute little tots this week.  I absolutely loved it and I can honestly report that children are globally and universally wild!  These ninos took their opportunity to get up on the chairs and crawl around on the desk as soon as the teacher left the room.  They have a keen understanding of how much they can get away with since our Spanish is limited.  I felt honored to be able to join in on their daily activities.  The teacher starts the class with the Lord´s prayer and hearing their tiny little voices since this ancient song was beautiful.  They followed that with other children´s songs where the kids got to tap the tables and clap their hands.  We spent part of the morning doing an arts and craft project about Red Riding Hood.  They had to first draw their interpretation of Red Riding Hood and I do not know what it is about giving a child a red crayon but they really let out all their emotions and feelings!  If I did some pschoanalysis on some of their drawings I might say that it is possible some of the children have some repressed anger!  Nevertheless, getting to see their interpretations via the drawings was spectacular.  From there they had to use red paper and make small red balls which they glued to a cape.  Now if anyone has witnessed, youtubed, or imagined what children are like with say glue or glitter you can then imagine the sudden rush of stress on my end!  Those are objects that somehow wind up everywhere and anywhere on a children.  In their hair, mouth, nose, shoes, and in the classroom for eternity!  I helped facilitate giving out small portions of glue and the children worked diligently to put their small red balls on their capes.  However, one of the girls didn´t make enough red balls for the project and she looked up at me with these sad eyes realizing her mistake.  I knew that there wasn´t any more red paper available so I took a quick scan of the classroom and saw one of the children had left their red balls unattended. I took my opportunity to take some of them and gave it to the girl to resolve the problem.  Unfortunately, the other child discovered the situation and I luckily had some leftover stolen red balls and all was well once again. Under normal circumstances I would never condone stealing, but in the case of children my philosphy to solve problems is BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY!  It is a simple philosophy, yes, but  it has been quite effective!  After our art project the teacher hung the children´s work on the board and went through and asked the group if each picture was bonito or feo?  The children responded bonito and the teacher gave a happy praise and stamp for each one of the completed pictures.  The children loved the praises from the teacher and I really liked the positive reinforcement.  After art came snack time then outside play.  These children have very little toys and have painted cans that they stack together to make creations.  Of course having boys in the classroom this turned into throwing the cans, kicking the cans, and knocking over the cans.  Having the most experience with children I had to step up and correct their behavior, however my Spanish vocabulary came out in one simple syllable word.  Put.  Yes, put.  Try to control those monkeys with one syllable words and see if you don´t feel like a champ that day!  While I have worked with children for many years this was new ground for me on many levels.  My heart really goes out to these children knowing the poverty that they come from and lack of opportunities they will have because of their situations.  Their parents spend up to fifteen hours a day laying close to 500 bricks to support their families.  Not many options for these communities to go off to universities and make a better life.  These people really touch my heart because even with all of their adversity they are still happy.  The children smile and play and at the end of the day that is what is most important.