First days in project

Well let me start by telling about my Sunday. I unfortunately didn't go to the Iglesia de San Ignacio. We tried to, but it is still closed for some kind of reconstruction or refacing. I found out that my host mom prays to saints about a problem she has with her kidneys, which was kind of interesting because that was the only religious thing I have ever seen either of my host parents do. We went to the Museum of Colonial Art instead of the church, which was more boring than interesting.



My first day of work was yesterday, and it was very interesting! I expected it to be unorganized..and boy was I right! I ended up working with the other two volunteers in the Casa Hogar, the house for the 20+ girls. We went to the library, the girls got on the computer, and then the supervisor left. We were left with no rules or guidelines, and no directions! We just tried not to let the girls do anything we deemed inappropriate, but that proved kind of difficult. One girl opened her web browser to a homepage that said "come es el pene", one girl was watching the exorcist, one girl was looking a powerpoint about "amigas borrachas" and one girl was looking at pictures of trees shaped like penises...there is a lot to help these girls with! I noticed so quickly how attached they get sooo easily, like they were calling the other girls and me their moms and aunts and dads and stuff because a lot of them don't have steady families. We sat down with the project coordinator AFTER the girls all went to school (we work with them in the morning and they go to school at 12) and talked to him about what we want to do. We weren't ready to decide that at all because we hadn't even gotten a chance to experience the rest of the projects, but I already knew that I wouldn't want to work at Casa Hogar every day.



We ended up talking more today about what we wanted to do, but in the morning this time. They told us to be in the library at 8 (I recommended yesterday that the library coordinator should tell us the rules of the library and computers) and the library director didn't even get there until 8:20! The program director was supposed to come get us at 8:30 to go around all the projects again and talk to the directors of each project in more detail, but he didn't come until 9:10. I keep forgetting we are in Colombia.... We learned the rules though and what to do if the girls were breaking them. When the program director finally came to get us we walked over to the bakery and coordinated with her when we wanted to come work there :). We are going to start on Thursday and work there on Friday as well. When we returned to the library from the bakery we met a woman who seemed like she was the leader of the elderly group that meets weekly and makes chocolates three times per week. She invited us to the group meeting at 12:30 in the afternoon, so we went! It was my favorite thing I had done at the project and I am really looking forward to going every week and making chocolate with them. We went to sit down with the Casa Hogar director after our meeting with the elderly people and she told us what she wanted us to do with the girls. We are going to be teaching hour long English classes twice a week and having a discussion group (about topics like self-confidence, time management, being a good leader, resolving problems, etc.) once a week. The kindergarten director also wants us to teach the young kids English and I think I will be handling that. I am also going to help with an already existing English class in which the teacher doesn't actually speak English!



A few little stories:

Yesterday the girls at the school noticed my tongue piercing when I was talking and asked me to show them. I refused and said that I don't have it because I knew that it wasn't a good influence. Today we showed up and I realized that one of the 10 year olds had her tongue pierced! I was so surprised to see that but one of the other girls realized that ALL of the girls had their tongues pierced..and then realized they were only stickers! They had all put stickers on their tongues to make it look like they had tongue piercings! I immediately took mine out and when I 'noticed' theirs asked what they were. They all said they were like mine but when I stuck out my tongue it wasn't there. They all took them out soon afterwards.



We (the three volunteers) were walking between the two project buildings, about three blocks. This one guy passed us and then turned about every two seconds for about twenty feet. One of the girls finally said "Hola" and he said "dos monas!?" (two blondes?!) and we all laughed and said "Si..." and he was so surprised! He couldn't stop staring at us for almost a whole block.



Also when we were walking between the buildings we passed a group of about eight construction workers. They said "Ellas son de los Estados Unidos" (they are from the United States) and one of the German girls immediately turned around and said "NO." It was funny how she was so against being from the U.S.! As I think I said before, this is the first time I have actually been aware of being an American abroad and actually felt like I am judged on it.



We have been eating in the cafeteria with the rest of the kids in the project. There was a teenage boy today who, when he learned that I was from America asked if I had any American money! He wanted to buy my American money off of me! I thought that was weird because he can't really spend it here.

Until next time.

Love,

Anna