Hitting the beach for Christmas in Perú
Well the week leading up to Christmas and closing the schools for 2008 was manic to say the least, but great fun! We headed off for our annual day at the beach as an end of year treat, for some of the children it was the first time they’d ever seen the sea! 
It was such a brilliant day! You couldn’t get the children (or us!) out of the sea, even the teachers were in there playing in the waves. There was a lot of burying children in the sand (obviously not our doing?!?), chasing each other with crabs, and generally having a fantastic time! 
Thanks to the swimming lessons we gave grades 5 and 6, they were a lot more confident in the sea. This did lead to a few worrying moments as Jorge, Ruben & Ireny started to edge further and further out! But you’ll be pleased to hear that everyone came back tired, happy and in one piece!
Maldonado & Triunfo both entered a drawing competition for local schools to celebrate the 188th anniversary of Sachaca. It was held in the Sachaca plaza and the children had to draw items that reflected the area. 
They all did brilliantly, with Lisbeth from Triunfo Inicial winning first prize for her age group! 
There was then also a singing competition – Ruth, Maricruz, Anabel, Alfredo, Alejandra, Pablo, Elizabeth and Anibel got on stage in their uniforms and performed an original song about Sachaca, written by….. wait for it…. Ruth & Edyluz!! Thankfully the lyrics were clean! And they won first place!!
We also partied with all our Ancianos at the Comedor in Maldonado, as an end of year get together. We support 45 ancianos & 5 children (from 2 to 15 years old) with daily hot nutritious meals. 
Santa made an appearance (thank you Profe. Alan!) and handed out presents to all (t-shirts, socks, hats, biscuits, toilet rolls), there were snacks galore & then we all boogied! Everyone had a great time.
The children in all grades have been working extremely hard completing their end of year exams, so we felt it was then it was time for Papa Noel to visit them! Marcos (ex-volunteer from the Summer) very kindly came back to help us celebrate and donned the red suit for Maldonado!
Each child came up gave Santa a hug and received a present (dolls, cars, diaries & pens, and footballs). The parents also received a gift from Santa of some basic food/home items (rice, sugar, milk, toilet roll, biscuits). It was so lovely watching the children’s faces, especially the Inicial who were in awe of Santa!
We also celebrated all the birthdays of December in the usual way, yep shoving their heads in a cake!! It’s tradition! Even better though was the fact that December is the month of Ruth & Carmen’s (Directors of Maldonado & Chiriguana) birthdays, so fairs fair!!
Unfortunately we also had to say sad goodbyes to Profe. Alan, who has worked with us as Intern since August but has been involved on & off with the schools for over a year now. It was fantastic working with you and thank you for everything you did, we and the children will miss Alan loads.
I (Carla!) just want to say a massive thank you to every single volunteer & Intern that came and played a part in developing our projects, and giving the time, love & education our children so deserve. 
Without all of you none of what we’ve achieved would have been possible. So thank you from myself, GVI Phoenix & of course all the children of Triunfo & Maldonado. Here’s to a brilliant 2009!
0 comments:
Post a Comment