Site Visit

Billy, our program co-ordinator visited us in Andahuaylillas the first week of September. Part of his job is making a visit to each JVC site he works with at least once a year. He has to meet with the site supervisors, have individual meetings with each JV, and 2 meetings with the JV community. A month before his arrival, he sent out a packet of documents to fill out. The documents, and the site visit in general, got me thinking big picture about this experience. I've been reflecting a lot on this year in relation to next year. What do I want to continue? What do I want to stop doing? What do I want to start doing? How do I shift roles from being a 1^st year to a 2^nd year. All big important questions that I won't talk about right now because this post is supposed to be about Billy's visit.

Billy's visit was great. He, Theresa, and I had a fantastic meeting with Pd. Eddy (director of FyA 44). Pd. Eddy seems like he really understands the volunteer experience and he is mindful of helping us to have the most enriching experience that we can. It's nice to work for someone who takes the time to think of what's best for you.

We also had a lot of fun. Billy's job is to accompany us and the other communities he works with, and having fun is part of accompanying people. We played cards, we hiked, and we had a great outing to eat duck and cheesecake. I really appreciate the work Billy does to support us and the time he takes to really listen to us. And I'm glad he's such a fun guy as well. After Andahuaylillas Billy flew south to Tacna to spend a week doing a site visit there. Then he spent a week in Mejia running a retreat for the JVs in Peru and Chile. Now he's in Santiago doing his site-visit with them. Being a Program Coordinator for JVC may not be a very glamorous job, but you do get to see a lot of the world through site visits.

ReO/DisO

Sorry I've been so long in posting. September has been an exceptionally busy month. 

Photo credit to selfie master Billy Hood.**

ReO/DisO is the easy to say - but tricky to type - abbreviation for Re-Orientation/Dis-Orientation, the week long year-end retreat run by JVC staff. It's a multilayered retreat because it has to balance the needs of 1^st year JVs preparing for their second year (Re-Orientation), and outgoing JVs preparing to move back to the States (Dis-Orientation). It's also one of the few times that JVs are in face-to-face contact with JVC staff.*

As I always don't with retreats, I won't get deep into the specifics of ReO/DisO. I don't think retreats are experiences to be broadcast to the entire world. But I'll share a bit.

Sorry I've been away

I've been busy the last two weeks with a visit from our JVC Program Co-Ordinator, preparing for our big retreat next week, and grading hundreds of notebooks and exams. I'll put some new stuff up as soon as I can.

Wildfire

So this is what I saw when I stepped out of the classroom at recess yesterday:

Qoriorko, the golden mountain, was on fire. It sounds like someone was brining their field (normal thing this time of year) and the wind snatched the fire away from them. 

The fire burned all day sending up a huge cloud of smoke that covered the valley. In the evening when I went to Secsencaya with Alfredo to do catechism class there were bits of ash falling onto our soccer game. Secsencaya is at the foot of Qoriorko. 

The people of Secsencaya had an emergency meeting and were climbing the mountain with water as we were leaving at 7:30. There were able to put out the fires nearest their community. But the mountains burned all night and is still smoldering today. 

Today at recess the view showed us not a golden mountain, but llanaorko - the black mountain. 

So much destruction from one moment of foolishness. Another teacher told me that a woman and her child died in the fire yesterday, and the kids were laming about a man who also died. The burnt mountain stand over the valley today as a grim testament to the dangers of not paying attention. 

Setting the scene

Remember last week when I was going on about cultural relevancy and mountains? Well check this out-

Today we worked on The Good Samaritan in 1st grade. Jesus gives no information about the setting, so many students - like this one - did the logical thing and assumed it happened in the mountains. That's just common sense if that's what you grew up around. 

Sunday Song - El Profeta

I have to shout, I have to take risk...I have to walk, I have to fight...how can I not speak if Your voice burns inside me?

That's my kind of Christianity. The question isn't how could we get involved in righting the wrongs of the world, it's how couldn't we. The apostles knew this undeniable call. When Jesus calls Simon Peter and Andrew, "... they left their nets at once and followed him." (Mark 4:20) There's no waiting period, no packing the bags, no finishing up the mending of the nets. Jesus is calling, it's time to go. 

When He calls, how can we not answer? The Gospel isn't a nice set of stories, it's a box of matches, and we're the kindling. God's voice is burning inside, who are we to stay silent?

It's time to fight, because my people are suffering.

 Jesus is calling, it's time to go. 

Fun extra: The group Siembra that's performing in this video performed the song at one of our Thursday night volunteer masses. They were here to lead the choir for FyA 44's anniversary mass. 

Translation after the jump.

Quinceañera

There have been moments in my life where I'm utterly baffled by the reality of the moment in front of me. It happened when I was in Bangkok for a friend's sister's wedding. It happened when I was dancing on the plaza of Andahuaylillas during one of the biggest religious festivals of theyear. And it happened last Saturday when I was at a stranger's quinceañera.* For those who don't know, a quinceañera is Latin American version of a Sweet Sixteen (except that it's on the 15th birthday). If you want to know what quinceañeras are like, you've come to the wrong source. I've only been to one. I can't tell you what all quinceañeras are like, but I can tell you about this one.

JV Life: Drinking Water

You don't drink tap water in Peru. It's got giardia in it. But you have to drink something, so what to do? There's two ways to do it: boiling and purifying. Most Peruvians boil water and drink tea, or use boiled water when they make juice. Being Americans, most of us are in the habit of carrying around a water bottle on the daily. We are fortunate in that the parish provides us with Micropur tablets, which use silver to kill off anything harmful in the water. How does that work? I have no idea. Anyways, here's what the water purifying process looks like in the Mountain House.

1. Fill up the 20 liter San Luis jug (pictured right). This takes like ten minutes because we do it with a pictcher. How I wish we had a bit of hose to hook up to the faucet.
2. Put the Micropur purifying tablet in it. Don't forget this or everyone will be sick!
3. Leave a note on top of the water jug saying at what time the water will be ready (in 2 hours).
4. Pour water from the jug into the dispenser on top of the fridge (pictured below).
5. Repeat pretty much every day.

Gran Kermés

Continuing the theme of FyA 44's anniversary celebrations, Saturday was the FyA 44 Kermés. What's a Kermés? No one could really define it for me. As far as I understood it was a fundraiser fair with food, games, Bingo, and a tombola.

What's a tombola? I do know the answer to that because I worked the tombola. It's like a raffle in that you buy a cheap ticket to win a prize. But at a tombola, everyone wins something. Hermana Rosario coordinated over 2600 donated prizes. About 250 of them were cool things like remote controlled cars or giant stuffed animals. The rest of the prizes were various things like notebooks, colored pencils, picture books, t-shirts, chess sets, etc. Along with Victor, Martha, Jacqueline, Fran (a local friend of ours), and Ingacio (a Spanish college student who had just arrived that day to start an investigation on mountain farming culture) I spent the day receiving numbered tickets and finding the correct prize.

FyA 44's Traditional Dance Festival

Last week we continued the celebrations of FyA 44's 20^th anniversary. Wednesday was the festival of traditional dances. Basically everyone danced. The students were divided by ciclos (grouped by 2 grades at a time) and about 20 students from each ciclo danced. The staffs of inicial, primaria and secundaria each danced separately. Finally the parents also performed dances by ciclos. The entire performance took 4 hours. It was scheduled for 2 and went till 7.*

The beauty of the event was how enthusiastic the participation was. At least among the primaria teachers, no one was dragging their feet about having to dance in front of their students. People of all ages participated. What especially struck me was the enthusiasm of the students. They were just as happy to dance to 500 year old music as their parents were. So many cultures exist only as relics and plaques in museums. But last Wednesday I got to see a culture that has outlived its creators and is very much alive today. No need to go to a museum to see these traditional costumes, just go watch the people put them on and dance.

NOTE: I've been assigned the the duty of taking pictures and video at all school events. For the festival of dances, I was given the school video camera and asked to film all the dances. So that means I didn't have my camera. Plenty of other people took pictures. When I get a few I'll post them up.

*If you're assuming there was a one hour intermission you're wrong. The event was scheduled for two, so it didn't get started until around 3.

Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: The Inward Mountain

I touched on the idea of culturally relevant pedagogy (let's call it CRP for simplicity's sake) at the beginning of the school year when I wrote about the quotes from non-Peruvians that the Belgian volunteer chose for the welcome back to school board. In that post, I focused on “active anti-racist teaching.” CRP was about building cultural pride and working against all too common idea that only white produce worthwhile things.

Today I want to talk about a different aspect of CRP. Sometimes, CRP isn't a political decision, it's just a practical decision. That was the case for me about a month ago when I decided to build a lesson focused on the following meditation from Howard Thurman:

There is in every person an inward sea,
And in that sea there is an island
And on that island there is an altar
And standing guard before that altar is the 'angel with the flaming sword.
Nothing can get by that angel to be placed upon that altar unless it has the mark of your inner authority.
Nothing passes 'the angel with the flaming sword' to be placed upon your altar
unless it be a part of 'the fluid area of your consent.
This is your crucial link with the Eternal.