GVI Phoenix Project

Facts and figures

On an annual basis we aim to provide:
First time education or educational reinforcement to almost 2000 children in primary school
Secondary education to over 200 children and adults
Employment to over 75 local people; more-so indirectly
100 energy saving wood-burning stoves and 15,000 trees planted
Around 100,000 teaching hours
Over 500,000 pieces of fruit
1,000’s of pens, pencils, pencil sharpeners, colouring pencils, work-books and erasers
Over 300,000 whole or subsidized meals
Daily education in 16 communities across Latin America
Direct benefits to over 500 families

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

The family connections in Ecuador

In our communities in Ecuador, volunteers quickly become connected with the family units in their school. Being an almost totally catholic society the families are big, and in some cases one family makes up to a third of the school.

For example in Huayrapungo, the Guitarra family contributes 6 children to the small school of 28, Cecilia, Oscar, Alex, Edwin, Kevin and Nina. The Lanchimba family are not far behind with Patricio, Rosa and Caesar being supported by us in high school and William, Jose, Darwin and Diego in regular school. The Lanchimbas actually have 10 boys in their immediate family!

In Urcusiqui, we have the Panama Pinsag extended family quietly running things, with Cristian, Aida, Geovanny, Jon Jairo, Franklin, Doris, Katharine, Jonito, Mateo, Myra and a new, as yet unnamed baby (that’s right, they don’t tend to name babies here until they are about 6 months old and have developed a personality that helps shape their name) all around the school and all living in one house. The little ones sleep in with their parents, and the older kids share a room. The 4 boys share a bed, and the 3 girls share a mattress and blanket on the floor. It is quite a sight to see.

Larcacunga is no different. The Aguilar Torres extended family contributes 11 regular faces to the Larcacunga school. Jose Edgar, Anahí, Brayan, Nayeli, Nathaly, Liza, Jhordy, Lisbeth, Andrew and baby Nayeli all in the school, with older sister Tania teaching in the kindergarten.

Volunteers love getting to know how the families connect, and who is brother, sister and first cousin of whom. The kids all know the connections and are very quick to tell you that they cannot marry so-and-so because they are their cousin. When you sit down and try to work out the family tree of the community it quickly becomes apparent that only a maximum of 3 or 4 families in each of community are not somehow related. The poor children do not have much choice in 10 years or so, when it comes time to pair off and make a family.

Maybe we should start a GVI matchmaking service in the future, introducing families from one school to the families of another!