Last 3 weeks in Huancayo

Tinkuy Peru has turned out to be the most rewarding of the four volunteering projects. First we´ll start with some more information about Tinkuy Peru and their plans.

Tinkuy Peru:
Since Tino was eight years old he has wanted to help the poor, but then without money since he was poor himself. Tinkuy Peru started in 2002 after a radio interview in New York where he was questioned about what he was doing to help the poor children and whether he had an exchange program setup. This gave him the idea to setup a volunteer program and four months later he got his first volunteer (from Canada) who helped a lot with organizing the volunteer program.
The Andean School (where they teach English to help fund the Mountain School) is closed because there aren´t enough volunteers. They hope to re-open in January 2008.
We´ve talked a lot with Tino and Marie and the have many good ideas for Tinkuy Peru to help fund the schools. They may open up a guest house with an artesan shop and organize tours in Cuzco. Gloria can hopefully start a bakery, since she is almost finished cooking school and is an excellent cook. Additionally, they are hoping to be able to offer workshops to the older children and some parents in, for instance, gourd carving, ceramics, weaving and silver. These workshops will hopefully provide a better future. Also, they would like to open up another school in the town Concepcion (another poor town 1 hour bus from Huancayo).
With the rest of our donations we funded two things. Firstly, the registration of the school, which will make it an official school with all the benefits of a "real" school. Secondly, we have paid for the first floor of the new school; currently Tinkuy Peru is renting one floor of a house. The "Casa de Niños" or "Children´s House" (which may be the name of the new school) will have computers, proper bathrooms (with showers) to improve hygiene and a playground/garden for the children. Future plans may include having a floor dedicated as an orphanage and another floor for the workshops.

Tino´s Family
Tino´s entire family and everybody else living in the house is very nice and have made us feel at home at all times. Most of them help in one way or another with Tinkuy Peru. Many of them are also studying and/or working hard as well. Tino is one of the 10 best weavers in Peru (his weavings look like photos) and has met many important people because of that. Instead of making a lot of money with his weaving he has decided to help poor children and only do a little bit of weaving. Tino and Marie are so appreciative of any help they get or anything you do and are also very helpful. It´s always nice to chat with the family and they have many stories to tell.

Teaching
Teaching at the schools is 4-5 hours per day, but our days were full because we also spent time on walking around 20 minutes each way twice, preparing lessons, some teaching or helping out (math, chess, computer) at the house.
Brian was mostly teaching math and some english: in the mornings with students between 6 and 15 years old and in the afternoons between 9 and 11. Paulien taught math, english, some geography and health to her afternoon class (7-14 years old). Paulien mainly taught numbers, letters and colours to her morning class (3-6 years old). In the beginning Gemma worked with Paulien in her morning class and afterwards another volunteer named Brian (from Ireland). Gemma and Scott left after our first week and the volunteer Ian only came back shortly to return later this year. So, most of the time we were 3 volunteers in total. The class sizes ranged from 3-15 children depending on how many students showed up and how many volunteers were working. All of the children only attend for a half day and for the other half they attend a government run school. Students in Peru only attend their government run schools for half a day. There is a big difference in the level per class (for instance, 4 different math levels) because of the age difference, but also between students of the same age. This might be because they go to different schools, but also because some students are more eager to earn. Some students are clearly behind; for instance, a 5 year old who cannot recognize the numbers 1-10 and a 13 year old who cannot tell time well in Spanish. Often the children, also the older ones, just wanted to draw in class instead of learning new things, but we only allowed some drawing or games at the end of class if they were good. A bingo/memory game in English that Paulien got from her co-op student was very popular. The children also asked for help (miss/teacher, ayudame!) a lot as well as for erasers, pencil sharpeners or kleenex, which kept us busy. The class with 4-6 year olds in the morning could get pretty tough, because after the break in the morning they could get quite restless. The teacher there works basically as a volunteer (Tino pays her a small wage) and whenever she had other commitments class would be cancelled if there were no volunteers. The government has decided to close the class for 3-6 year olds at the government school starting next week. Kids 5 and up will be attending a different government school 4 blocks away, while the other children will go to the Tinkuy Peru school. Next year all the children can go to the Tinkuy Peru school when it´s built and officially registered. That will also be a lot better for their hygiene, since there was no bathroom at the current location and often no running water. The children would just pee behind the classroom and sometimes even on the school yard.
We did 2 excursions with the students aged 3-6. A walk up the hill, while the teacher told them stuff about the area and nature. The other time we went to the zoo and the playground. All of us (12 kids and 3 adults) went into one station wagon taxi. Again, the children walked in pairs, were well behaved and enjoyed the outing a lot.

Children General
The children love having their picture taken. So, we were basically forced to take lots of photos if we brought out our camera. Then they would, of course, want to see their photo right away on the camera screen. We got presents from Sara: a knitted and perfumed table cloth, cereal and many drawings. Sara is mentally and physically disabled, but is always cheerful and always first to class in the morning and afternoon. Little kids told Paulien that she had a big nose (it is compared to theirs), while the older ones would admire or braid her hair. The children that we taught seem noticeably poorer than other kids from the same area. They often wore the same clothes, or clothes with holes in them, but they were happy in general.

Huancayo General
Most of the time it was sunny. One of the weeks was fairly cloudy and rained a bit more than normal. The temperature would often drop by 5pm when class ended. On the way home in the afternoon we got amazing views of clouds, sun, rain and mountains. There were often fiestas with a small symphony for live music and people dancing. Tino and Marie told us that they have fiestas for any reason: such as for finishing a floor of a house and for finishing the roof there is a big party.
Many women use a very colourful blanket to carry a child, produce from the fields, plastic bottles, groceries, etc. We bought one too and one day Paulien wore it and got a lot of attention from the locals.
There were a lot of dogs, but most of them were healthy and the situation was a lot better than in Ecuador in Cabo San Francisco.
There were many bike kiosks, either parked or biking around with a megaphone.
Brian found out that there are a lot of fun places to go at night (even till really late). The people everywhere are very nice and we never felt unsafe. Kids are often saying "hello" on the street. People in general called us gringo or gringa (name for white person) and mama/mami or papa (words used to show affection). Many people made small talk for no reason and we got warned a lot to be careful as well. All this made us feel really welcome.

Excursions
Our second weekend we went on a bike ride north of Huancayo in Mantaro Valley from 10:00 a.m. till 7:30 p.m. with Tino, Marie, Scott and Gemma. We biked about 60-70km total with multiple stops. First stop was Coches where there are detailed gourd carvings "mates burilados" - we got a small gourd filled with stories of the area. Then San Agustin de Cajas for fresh fruit juice. Followed by Hualhuas where there are different craft places with weavings (we got a scarf). After lunch we went to San Jeronimo, which is a town with many silver shops. Paulien got a bracelet and earrings. Then just Tino and us biked up to Virgen Inmaculada Concepcion, which was a hard bike because it was steep and the weather changed and got windy and cloudy after being totally sunny. Concepcion is the second tallest statue at 25 meters in South America, followed only by "Christ the Redeemer" in Rio de Janeiro. You can climb in the statue to the top - it was so windy and cold at the top that we only took a few quick photos of the amazing views. We took a one hour bus back. This was a very good trip: it was nice to be biking again, nice scenery, good smelling eucalyptus trees; at the end we were sore from the bumpy dirt roads. That Sunday we walked around town and at night we went to Torre Torre under a full moon. Mabel bought coca leaves, which Brian chewed on until his mouth was numb. It was really amazing and a great experience.
Our third weekend we went to the glacier Huaytapallana. In Quechua huayta means flower and pallana means "pick up". In April and May there are many flowers, but we only saw a few flowers. September, however, is apparently the best time for hiking the glacier. We took a taxi for over an hour to get up to 4000 meters for the start of the hike. The way there was a rocky dirt road with cows, sheep, llamas, donkeys, horses and pigs - on or alongside the road. The mountain is holy and people perform ceremonies there. We also did a ceremony of our own - we each put the best coca leaf from a handful under a Tinkuy Peru rock pile called "apacheta" and made a wish. We hiked from 9:30 a.m. till 2:30 p.m., which is apparently fast. 6 hours is normal for this hike. At the highest point we reached an altitude of 5300 meters. The hike started out sunny and when we reached the glacier it was cloudier and started snowing. We saw rabbits, squirrels and birds. There was snow, yet it was barren and rocky - there were multiple lakes and one was a bright turqoise (like Lake Louise in Canada). Since Tino has climbed the glacier many times before and has done a glacier guiding course we were able to hike higher up the glacier than most tourists go. Paulien found it a little bit scary jumping over small crevaces and walking on icy ridges. The top part was really steep and it was really fun to slide down the glacier. At the high altitude the clouds were amazing and moving fast and changing shape quickly. The visibility would change really fast and at one point we could just see each other. After hiking we had a really well deserved lunch of yummy trout at the restaurant at the start of the hike (the only place around for many kilometers). We could see our breath in the restaurant, it was starting to get cold already. This hike was a great experience: the hiking/exercise itself (which is a lot harder at this altitude), but especially the immense mountains, snow, walking on a glacier, having the entire glacier almost to yourself and being at such a high altitude. We both took some altitude medicine for the hike. Here you can buy single pills of medicine - they open the package and cut the amount of pills out you want. Sunday we checked out the artesan market again and "Mercado Libre", which is a gigantic market of food, clothing and other daily necessities. We were, most of the time, the only gringos around. We had lunch in a vegetarian restaurant and had a 4 course meal (including lamb soya) for one euro. In the afternoon we went to "Parque de la Identidad". It´s a beautiful park made mainly with nicely arranged rocks in different patterns. There are different statues showing artists and things specific for Huancayo and a castle for children to play in. For dessert (before dinner) we ate picarones (onion-ring shaped and deep fried dessert with sweet honey sauce) and arroz con leche (like rice pudding).
For our fourth and last weekend we went to La Cabaña (touristy restaurant) on Friday night with 3 other people. We had some local drinks with pisco (alcoholic). Then to two different discos - one was apparently the best in Huancayo, while the other was a bit dodgy and we were the only gringos. We got back at 5:30am and didn´t do much the next day because of that. That Saturday was Tino´s birthday, so Brian got up before 9 to make soy milk together with Marie for his Dutch pancakes. We made different kinds of Dutch pancakes and hutspot (Dutch meal) for around 13 people for Tino´s birthday dinner. The cooking, cleaning up and eating took from 6-11, so luckily everybody enjoyed the meal. Sunday we went to Torre Torre for the third time. This time we brought a camera to take daytime photos. On the way up and down we saw some of our students that live around there. One of our students was walking with her 2 younger sisters and a herd of sheep. After that we went to Mercado Libre with Gloria. We saw some parts that we hadn´t seen before and started to realize how big the market was. Some interesting items for sale were snakes (in a jar) and dried frogs (for soup).

Stay General
Shortly after our last blog post they changed the water connections and there was a normal temperature shower. Also, not long after the last blog post Paulien got better. In addition to latin music, 80´s and early 90´s music is very popular in Peru and Ecuador.
The food we got at the house was generally tasty and healthy and cooked by different people. For breakfast there was bread and often fruit with either egg, french toast, pancakes, chocolate milk or porridge. Lunch in Peru is also the biggest meal of the day and always had soup and a plate of rice with veggies, salad, beans, or eggs and usually potatoes as well. Dinner was always different, but often with potatoes or rice. Every meal had tea, so Paulien drank more tea this month than in her entire life. Two special meals in our last week were grilled alpaca and lasagna with alpaca. The alpaca was the first "steak" that either of us has eaten in 5 years (since we are vegetarian!). We decided to try it because it was supposed to be good and it turned out to be maybe the best meat we have ever eaten. In addition to the lasagna on our last day we also had Cahiuw Relleno (stuffed vegetable) followed by delicious maracuya pie, both made by Gloria. On Sunday´s we would go out for pizza (Brian´s favourite food) - Huancayo has a couple of really good pizza places.
Doing laundry in Huancayo wasn´t the biggest success for us. The first time our laundry was clean, but the second time it smelled like smoke or gasoline. So, the third time we tried another place where we got our clothes back after two full days still wet and not really folded. The fourth time we tried another place where we got clean clothes back the same day, except Brian´s jeans were missing - even though that was the only place that marked all the clothes by either sewing a mark or writing with permanent marker on the other clothes. To make a long story short, after some hassle and not believing we would see the pants again, we got them back.

Last Day
The kids were already a bit sad on the second last day and asking when we were coming back, but on the last day even more so. Both in the morning and afternoon we had a small fiesta with some drinks and food/candy at the end of the lesson. Since the children knew about the fiesta ahead of time, we had good attendance and even a student we had never seen before. Unfortunately we didn´t have a lot of time on our last day to hang out with everybody because we were busy packing and arranging the last few things. It felt weird to leave - we were both sad to go and would have liked to stay longer. We liked Huancayo and working with the children, but also we really liked our stay with Tino´s family. Everybody was so nice and it felt a little bit like leaving our own family behind. We took a night bus to Lima. We want to return one day, hopefully before our hair is gray.